{"id":2528,"date":"2011-08-17T10:01:37","date_gmt":"2011-08-17T17:01:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/?p=2528"},"modified":"2021-04-22T22:35:04","modified_gmt":"2021-04-23T05:35:04","slug":"review-specialist-bd","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/2011\/08\/review-specialist-bd\/","title":{"rendered":"The Specialist Blu-ray Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>The Specialist<\/em><\/strong> is the tale of three movies: Sylvester Stallone and Sharon Stone are in one (average film); James Woods in another (an over-the-top but fun one); and Rod Steiger, with help by Mr. Camp himself Eric Roberts (in a bad film) who seemed to be on a different page from everybody else. As a whole, this is an uneven movie with poor pacing for the first two-thirds and it wasn\u2019t until the action-packed finale that things come together.<\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/a>
\nThe Specialist (1994)<\/strong><\/p>\n


\nREVIEW NAVIGATION<\/strong><\/span>
\nThe Movie<\/a> | Special Features<\/a> | Video Quality<\/a> | Audio Quality<\/a> | Overall<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Genre(s): <\/strong>Action, Suspense\/Thriller
\nWarner Bros. | R \u2013 110 min. \u2013 $19.99 | August 16, 2011<\/p>\n

MOVIE INFO:<\/span>
\nDirected by: <\/strong>Luis Llosa
\nWriter(s): <\/strong>Alexandra Seros (written by)
\nCast: <\/strong>Sylvester Stallone, Sharon Stone, James Woods, Rod Steiger, Eric Roberts<\/p>\n

Theatrical Release Date: <\/strong>October 7, 1994<\/p>\n

DISC INFO:<\/span>
\nFeatures: <\/strong>Theatrical Trailer
\nNumber of Discs: <\/strong>1<\/p>\n

Audio: <\/strong>English (DTS-HD MA 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 5.1), Spanish (Dolby Digital 2.0)
\nVideo: <\/strong>1080p\/Widescreen 1.78
\nSubtitles: <\/strong>English SDH, French, Spanish
\nCodec: <\/strong>MPEG-4 AVC
\nRegion(s): <\/strong>A, B, C<\/p>\n

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THE MOVIE<\/strong> \u2013 2.0\/5<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Plot (Blu-ray back cover): <\/strong>May Munro (SHARON STONE) is a drop-dead beauty with a fatal past. She\u2019s sworn death to the mobsters who murdered her parents and she also knows the right man for the job: ex-CIA explosives expert Ray Quick (SYLVESTER STALLONE). Miami\u2019s playground of the rich becomes an incendiary slayground as May lures the killers and Ray ingeniously detonates them into ashes. But a vicious mob boss (ROD STEIGER), his brash son (ERIC ROBERTS) and a psychotic hired gun (JAMES WOODS) with a lethal grudge against Quick won\u2019t go without a fight. And the feverish passions shared by the two avengers can\u2019t hide an ominous question from Ray. Is May falling for him… or is she setting him up too?<\/p>\n

There\u2019s nothing more fascinating in cinema than Sylvester Stallone in the early\/mid 1990s, reason being it was a transition period from his \u201880s action flicks to a time with a balance between action and drama. With The Specialist<\/em><\/strong>,<\/em> Stallone teamed up with sexpot Sharon Stone who was coming off of her 1992 erotic classic, Basic Instinct<\/em> and veteran journeyman James Woods as the clich\u00e9d, though still great fun, over-the-top villain with a vendetta.<\/p>\n

For his part, Stallone tries to bring some dramatic depth to his character but the plot and, especially, the pacing for the film was so off that it never quite built any sort of momentum until towards the end at which point it was too late. Then you add a truly awful, albeit laughably so, performance by Rod Steiger with a ridiculous accent and you have a film that didn\u2019t know if it wanted to be action-centric, dramatic or comedic.<\/p>\n

I will say that the only saving grace for The Specialist<\/em><\/strong> is James Woods. As I said before, he\u2019s way over the top especially in a key scene where he matches wits with Stallone about half way through but it\u2019s so damn fun that I wish Stallone, Stone and the others took note which would\u2019ve made this a fun movie instead of one with a predictable plot, even with the \u201ctwists\u201d, and monotone acting from its two leads.<\/p>\n

The Specialist<\/em><\/strong> was directed by Luis Llosa who helmed Sniper<\/em> the year before and Anaconda<\/em> in 1997, not exactly a stellar resume. It was written by Alexandra Seros, the writer behind Point of No Return<\/em> but she has no credits to her name since 1994.<\/p>\n

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SPECIAL FEATURES \u2013 0.5\/5<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The only thing we get is the Theatrical Trailer (1:58; SD)<\/span><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

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VIDEO \u2013 3.75\/5<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Presented with a MPEG-4 AVC codec and 1080p high-def transfer, The Specialist<\/em><\/strong> looks decent in HD though it\u2019s a little uneven at times. First, the daylight scenes look the best with some good detail levels but at times it does look a tad… splotchy or muddy. I don\u2019t think this has to do with a poor transfer by Warner but what the source material had to offer. The black levels, as a whole, are pretty good and even shots at night don\u2019t show the flaws darker scenes tend to pick up such as pixilation or dust marks and scratches. Despite the fact it\u2019s not an amazing looking high-def transfer, I have no doubt it\u2019s heads and tails better than the DVD version.
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AUDIO \u2013 3.75\/5<\/strong><\/h2>\n

The DTS-HD MA 5.1 track meanwhile sounds good with fine levels ranging from clear dialogue through the center channel to the various action sequences which provide the depth to this lossless track. The final scene especially has a fair amount of \u201cboom\u201d to the track, it\u2019s not exactly The Incredible Hulk<\/em> levels or anything yet still impressive enough.<\/p>\n

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OVERALL \u2013 2.0\/5<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Overall, The Specialist<\/em><\/strong> is the tale of three movies: Sylvester Stallone and Sharon Stone are in one (average film); James Woods in another (an over-the-top but fun one); and Rod Steiger, with help by Mr. Camp himself Eric Roberts (in a bad film) who seemed to be on a different page from everybody else. As a whole, this is an uneven movie with poor pacing for the first two-thirds and it wasn\u2019t until the action-packed finale that things come together, though it\u2019s all too little, too late.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Movieman<\/em>
\nPublished: <\/strong>08\/17\/2011<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Specialist is the tale of three movies: Sylvester Stallone and Sharon Stone are in one (average film); James Woods in another (an over-the-top but fun one); and Rod Steiger, with help by Mr. Camp himself Eric Roberts (in a bad film) who seemed to be on a different page from everybody else. As a … Continue reading “The Specialist Blu-ray Review”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,970],"tags":[775,1005,808,812,144],"class_list":["post-2528","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blurayreviews","category-quick-hit-reviews","tag-eric-roberts","tag-james-woods","tag-sharon-stone","tag-specialist","tag-sylvester-stallone"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2528"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2528\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25848,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2528\/revisions\/25848"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/moviemansguide.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}