Why So Blu?

Eddie The Eagle (4K UHD Blu-ray Review)

I can assure you that before I opened my door to the UPS man delivering a package from Fox, I knew absolutely nothing about Eddie the Eagle other than Aaaron Neuwirth reviewed the regular Blu-ray version of it over here.  I asked several friends via text if they ever saw this film or knew anything about it.  While everyone basically said no, one did say yes and said he remembered actually watching Eddie “The Eagle” Edwards in the Olympic Games back in the late 80’s.  He’s nostalgic like that.  So that made me want to do my own research, of course via a Google search box.

Film

It turns out that Eddie Edwards was a real athlete (no duh) and he did go to the Calgary Olympic Games in 1988 for ski jumping, which is notable because the U.K. had never provided an athlete in that particular sport (unless my facts aren’t straight).  However, that’s pretty much it.  I read that about 90 percent of this movie is made up, but it’s supposed to be a heartwarming, motivational tale.  So call me curious as I’m at the the top of this snowy 4K hill ready to go down it fast and hard.  Swoosh!  Did you hear that in your rear channel as I went right by you?  Haha.

So I guess you could bill the 2016 film Eddie the Eagle as a biographical sports dramedy, albeit a highly fictionalized one as we already established up above.  Dexter Fletcher directs Eddie the Eagle and it stars Taron Egerton as Eddie “The Eagle” Edwards.  He is the British skier I made mention up above.  In 1988 became the first competitor to represent Great Britain in Olympic ski jumping.  Hugh Jackman and Christopher Walken also star and round out the noteworthy cast members.  The film had its world premiere at the 2016 Sundance Film Festival on January 26th this year and the rest is history, albeit fictionalized, as we’ll discuss down below.

When I first heard of this title and was invited to the press screening here in Austin, TX earlier this year I sadly was mistaken about this film.  Besides knowing next to nothing about it, I did what no one should ever do.  I judged it by it’s cover.  It looked stupid, definitely not something I wanted to waste my precious time with.  Furthermore, I don’t even think I recognized Hugh Jackman on the cover and without giving it any thought I instantly dismissed this film as a documentary, which I wanted nothing to do with.  How could I have ever been so wrong?  LOL.  I never did say I was the brightest person in the world.

So needless to say after watching Eddie the Eagle I couldn’t be more ecstatic and appreciative that Fox blindly sent me this 4K UHD Blu-ray title to review here.  And you know, it’s very funny too.  I just turned in my Top 5 Films of the year thus far to Aaron Neuwirth a few days ago for his upcoming combo post and if I had only seen this one prior, it would have easily made my Top 5.  I’m talking like easy peasy because I enjoyed the hell out of Eddie the Eagle and had a F-U-N time with the lovable and persistent character that Taron drives here with versatility.  Speaking of Taron, it took me awhile to really adjust to him not looking like his dapper self from Kingsman: The Secret Service movie.  He’s chubby face makes him almost unrecognizable, but I digress.

You know that unmistakable charm and motivation that makes the Rocky movies so compelling and irresistible despite the lunacy of it all at times?  That’s what makes Eddie the Eagle soar too.  Eddie is hungry, he’s driven and by darn he’s not going to let anyone tell him no.  I know this story is highly fictionalized, but you have to admire someone that’s so stubborn like this and so hellbent on making a name for himself.  In all honesty, he kind of reminds me of myself.  We’re both goofy, dorky looking beings and in comparison we both know what makes each of us tick, that drive to be something more than ordinary.  That’s why I left Cleveland.  That’s why I applied for the FBI and continue to write movies.  I want more than just to be a mere mortal, family man.  Some may call that my downfall and flaw in life, and they’re probably right, but that’s what makes people like Eddie and me tick.  We’re wound up, passionately driven and no one’s going to tell us no.  It also makes us annoying people too.  LOL.  However, that’s a whole other matter.

For me, Eddie the Eagle was the feel good movie of the year so far.  Hugh Jackman didn’t really have anything more to given than he already did in Real Steel, but he was a nice Rocky figure to Taron’s Eddie, which I’ll refer to the Baby Creed of this story.  They both helped each other become better people, however, if it wasn’t for Eddie’s persistence and stubbornness to take no as a final answer, none of this would have really been possible for the two.  It helps that Eddie had a very supportive mother too.  She was paramount here.  Eddie may not have taken home the gold medal with his Olympic performances, but it wasn’t about that.  It was about making them, achieving his dream and like any good Rocky story, going the distance.  Let Eddie the Eagle’s story fill your heart with love, laughter and determination and ultimately be an inspiration to us all, even if it’s mostly fiction in this movie.

Video

The below video score and relative comments are based solely upon my viewing of the 4K UHD Blu-ray presentation of Eddie the Eagle.  The video score and comments for the included 1080p Blu-ray presentation of the film can be found here.

• Encoding: HEVC / H.265
• Resolution: 4K (2160p)
• Aspect Ratio: 2.39:1
• Clarity/Detail: With exception of Star Trek Into Darkness, The Martian: Extended Edition and even Sicario on the 4K UHD format, this is one of the finest looking presentations I have seen on the 4-month old format.  The onscreen characters are rich with detail and pop against the still yet sharp, contrasting backgrounds.  In other words, fine detail is all abound throughout here from textures in fabric, wood and brick to simpler things like faded paint on a motor vehicle or stubble on Taron’s baby face.  This one is also lit remarkably odd to show the age of the period piece, but also well at the same time so that helps out with things too.  Two things in particular really made me take notice to how well things are rendered here, the realistic sweat on the male bodies in the sauna and the faded/blemished paint of the van Eddie’s dad drives.  Other things to note are the individual snowflakes that fall and the even the minute grains of snow on the surface of the landing areas that the downhill skiers plummet to.  I really can’t say enough good things for how immaculate this one looks.  It makes me become more and more a 4K snob with each passing day.  LOL.
• Depth: Because of the three-dimensional pop of the onscreen characters, the depth of field is off the charts here too with examples like the streets of Great Britain, the shoots and snow slopes in Germany and even the interview room where Eddie the Eagle gives a rousing press conference.  Most impressive though was relaly high and terrifying it looked being on top of those 70m and  90m towers.  I’m terrified of extreme heights and this presentation reinforced that.
• Black Levels: Black levels are all deep and inky throughout, even in darkly lit or night scenes and I never had any complaints with any washed out looking scenes.  The darker the scenes the more delineation and detail became prominent and visible.
• Color Reproduction: Here’s one of my favorite categories to talk about because of the way the colors nicely contrast with the white snow during many of the scenes.  However, make no mistake.  Never once did the colors ever look over saturated, exaggerated and whatnot.  They were all very earthy, natural and lifelike, like any good HDR presentation should appear.
• Flesh Tones: The skin tones all looked natural and lifelike thanks to the realistic color grading courtesy of the HDR wide dynamic range in place here on 4K UHD Blu-ray.  However, due to the way it was shot there are times when the flesh looks very hot and exaggerated, but the story is what sells it here and you kind of slightly overlook things like this.
• Noise/Artifacts: There’s not a single thing in this 4K video presentation that would make you stop, take notice and say yuck about.  It’s perfect to my eyes in every which way.

Audio

Like I mentioned up above in the video section, the below audio score and comments are based solely upon my viewing of the 4K UHD Blu-ray presentation of Eddie the Eagle.  The audio score and associated comments for the regular Blu-ray version of the film can be found here.  It should be noted that only the 4K UHD Blu-ray disc houses the Dolby Atmos surround track.  The 1080p Blu-ray does not have that.  Chalk up another win for the 4K UHD format, huh?

• Audio Format(s): English Dolby Atmos (defaults to Dolby TrueHD), English Descriptive Audio 5.1, Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1, French DTS 5.1
• Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish French
• Dynamics: Everything sounds in check here.  I cranked this baby up and she roared with ferocity, but never to the point of breaking, sounding muffled or distorted. This one took all the punishment I gave it.  It was relentless like our protagonist in this film.  In other words, like Jimmy Walker, this surround track is dynamite.  And most importantly, let’s not forget that Dolby Atmos track here which adds extra height here and picks you up.  After all, this is a movie about jumping.  You picking up what I’m dropping?
• Low Frequency Extension: The LFE channel kept my subwoofer thumping throughout with helping in the effects department like the thump one’s body takes when it pounds against the frozen ground when plummeting from a 40m run to keeping your booty shaking and the beat grooving of the clever, engaging and fun score employed here.
• Surround Sound Presentation: The surround sound employed in the opening Marv logo had me at hello before this movie even began.  There’s brilliant use of the rears to fill in the engaging score and soundtrack.  One of the coolest things that got my immediate attention also was towards the beginning.  There’s an announcer, doing what he does best, making announcements, and you can hear him in the front, but then you can also hear the echo of his words in the rear speakers.  It’s little things like that make me take notice and applaud.
• Dialogue Reproduction: The dialogue is always loud, clear and intelligible throughout.  Even with the British accents, I never once had any trouble understanding or hearing a single spoken word.

Extras

Fox’s 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray package of Eddie the Eagle features an Ultra HD Blu-ray disc with the film in 4K HDR, a Blu-ray disc with the 1080p version and special features in HD and a redeemable code for Digital HD version of the sports flick that is good for either iTunes or Ultraviolet (your choice).  Sadly, there’s no audio commentary.  That would have been nice, but beggars can’t always be choosers and get their way like Eddie the Eagle does here.  So since there’s really not much here, let’s take a look below at the several extras present on the regular Blu-ray disc.  Race you down to the bottom!  Catch me if you can!

• Let The Games Begin: Soaring with Eddie the Eagle (HD, 46:43) – This one is made up of three segments, All or Nothing: The Hero’s Heart, An Unlikely Friendship: Eddie & Peary and Attitude is Altitude: Filming the Ski Jumps.  There is also a Play All functionality available here too to note.  This is your basic bunch of stuff ranging from cast and crew interviews to the making of the film, recreating the Olympics and even explaining why it was necessary to fictionalize things to make this a film.
• Gallery (HD, 5:43) – Here’s a collection of skills that you can let play automatically or skip through them manually should you chose to partake.
• Theatrical Trailer (HD, 2:25)

Summary

So what do you think?  Does Eddie the Eagle sound bold enough to make you want to soar to the store and swoop down to pick up your very own 4K UHD Blu-ray copy?  I hope I armed you with enough knowledge up above to make your own rationale decision from, but just in case I didn’t let’s take a very brief moment to recap.  Eddie the Eagle on 4K UHD Blu-ray features near reference quality video, an engaging and triumphant audio track and hearty doc on the making of the film.  I honestly can’t recommend picking this one up enough.  It was heartwarming, motivational and captivating.  Never on Earth would I have thought this from a film with a PG-rating.  Call me a snob, call me whatever you like.  I know I would have never watched this had I not been forced to as being the only reviewer on here capable of digesting 4K UHD Blu-rays.  So I owe a big thank you to the kind people at Fox for giving me a title to put on my Top 10 list of films so far this year.  If this sounds like a winner to you, make sure to order your very own 4K UHD Blu-ray today, via the link here, without ever having to step foot out of the house.  I know.  I’m a swell guy.  You’re quite welcome and enjoy!

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DISCLAIMER: This 4K UHD Blu-ray review is judged and graded using the following 4K certified A/V gear found here. 

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