Sounding a little harsh and strained at times, this is still one of those low-budget mixes that didn't intend to pack a lot of detail but certainly wanted to you enjoy some bombast. Just a bog-standard DD 2.0 track that definitely won't amaze you. There is no lossless audio track here, folks. Blacks have a degree of noise within them, and they could certainly be stronger, but shadows seemed okay to me, with reasonably fine delineation.įinally, you get a smattering of edge enhancement and even some aliasing, but this is minimal and it didn't bother me one iota.ĭeath Race 2000 was never going to look amazing on Blu-ray, but I have no doubt that this is the best it has ever looked on home video - and the few niggles that crop up do not detract from the fun in the least. Some highlights gleam and the overall cast seems too light. The green of Annie Smith's co-driver's cat-suit, however, seems dull and faded. The black of Frankenstein's cape and suit looks fine, especially with the little golden zippers and the livid scar tissue for contrast. The fireballs of explosions and the gore from the kills are nice and bright, though. Skin-tones are pink and all rather uniformly pallid. Reds can burn out of the screen on occasion and come over a bit too orange, and the greens of the trees, of the foliage and of that little monorail train can fizz and bloom. However, primaries can seem quite lifted and perhaps over-egged at times. But this is only to be expected.Ĭolours have moments of lustre, but for the most part, they are slightly washed-out and pale. Landscape shote, of which there are plenty, fare less well, with some soft and out-of-focus portions. Vehicles exhibit some surface detail, as do the sets, but this is an image of broad brush-strokes - big, wide and unconcerned with intricacy. The costumes, again most notably Carradine's, have some stitching, material texture and finite patterning on show. Some degree of skin-texture is evident, particularly on David Carradine, once that mask has come off. Detail isn't too shabby, once you have lowered your expectations of what this film could actually hope to supply. This is no overt DNR victim and faces are not smeared with wax. Personally, I think that some noise reduction has taken place, the texture, in places, can appear a touch too smooth, areas a little too bland. In fact, for much of the running time, the image looks very clean and strong. There is still some damage in evidence - just minor pops, flecks and scratches - but nothing that will prove distracting once you accept what you're dealing with. Grain is intact, although there are certain brief shots when it increases massively for a moment - Frankenstein and Annie in their first bedroom scene, for example. Well, this transfer doesn't look quite so ropey or rough around the edges at all. Now, unbelievably, I have only got a lousy VHS copy of the film that I can find, so I cannot compare this to how any DVD edition looks, but, if my memory serves me correctly, Corman's road-rage opus has always tended to look a little ropey and rough around the edges. It is never going to win any awards for hi-def glory, you understand, but I think you will be surprised at how detailed and clean and vibrant it can look. And for a low-budget quickie from 1975, a film that was designed on-the-back-burner and made for the Drive-in market, it looks very nice indeed. Shout have transferred Death Race 2000's 1.85:1 image from a new interpositive film element via AVC MPEG-4.
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