Spin-Doctor Conrad Brean (Robert DeNiro) is called on to help cover up a scandal in which the president is accused of molesting a firefly girl. The job is even bigger than it looks as the election is only 11 days away. The solution: of course it obvious, declare war against Albania.

This is where Dustin Hoffman steps in to take the limelight. Stanley Motss (Hoffman) is a big time Hollywood producer who is called upon to do a little fabricating. Stanley manages to pull off an incredible diversion for the press and the United States public in the wake of a very close election. Not only does he successfully produce a war, a victim, and a hero but he even has Willie Nelson roll out a sing along anthem for the war. All of this is not easy to achieve however and things are constantly thrown into array and need enhancing to cover them up. While all this is rolling around her Winifred Ames (Anne Heche) an adviser to the president is struggling to keep up with all the drama.

I can’t say much more without spoiling the story. The entire film balances on cynicism and wit which makes this an intriguing piece of satire that you can only sit in wonder at whether it actually happens.

So How Does This Transfer Hold Up?

VIDEO
Village Roadshow have produced a disc with exceptional transfer quality, which rivals that of the Shawshank Redemption & the film is presented at an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 and is Anamorphic Widescreen

There are some very minor instances of ailiasing but nothing overly distracting. Black levels and shadow detail are exceptionally good. There is also a noticeable improvement in contrast levels where darker scenes still show good detail.

There were no mpeg artefacts, and no noticeable film artefacts.

The colour levels are well rendered and show mostly blue tones throughout the film. I can’t find any reason why this has been done but it isn’t intrusive on the film at all. There is still a good range of natural hues throughout the colour palette.

The layer change at 27:49 is not that well placed and is quite annoying as there is a definite pause in the film where this could have been avoided by placing the change at another time further on in the film or even not at all since this is a relatively short film there should have been no need for a dual layer presentation.

AUDIO
There are only two audio tracks on this disc a DD5.1 English track and the Audio Commentary. So any non-English speaking patrons really miss out on this one. The audio was mostly dialogue based so there is very little use of the surround channels except for some musical ambience and effects at times. And virtually no use of the base channel.

The dialogue was mostly clean and clear, but at times there were some mumbling sequences from Dustin Hoffman, who has a tendency to mumble anyway.

Basically the audio was good for the type if film but certainly nothing spectacular about it.

EXTRAS
It is great to see a plethora of extras but at the same time they aren’t terribly exciting to watch.

Animated Menu- very effective use of the menu, which is quite interesting after seeing so many static menus on other discs. This sets the scene for the film very well.

Audio Commentary- this was interesting and informative in relation to the film but does not seem to follow the film. There seems to be little or no correlation between the commentary and the actual on screen footage that goes with it.

Trailers- Nice to see the Dolby Digital canyon trailer, makes a nice change from the city trailer. Theatrical trailers for Wag the Dog and Rush Hour presented in Full Frame ratio are also good quality.

Featurette On the Set- some mildly interesting behind the scenes footage.

Cast and Crew Bio’s- this is an improvement with some nice rolling text instead of a screen by screen static reading pages. The combination of the bio and interview is also well thought out.

Production Notes- Very similar to the bios and very well presented with their nice rolling text.

Featurette From Washington to Hollywood- This is quite a long Featurette, which looks at how hollywood could actually have the effects on the media, which are depicted in the film. This includes interviews with cast and crew.

Macey about Mamet- An interesting feature from William H Macey detailing his influences from David Mamet.

Overall
This was a knockout of a film! I was amazed that this could so easily happen. I was engrossed in the film until about the second half where it dragged a little but still managed to hold my attention. Robert De Niro is fabulous and Dustin Hoffman wasn’t bad either. I was actually more impressed with the supporting cast especially Anne Heche, who shows just how talented she really is.