Over America [Blu-ray]

Nice pictures, terrible narrative
If you're looking for something to show off your new HDTV and Blu-Ray player, this MIGHT be of interest.

The footage is "old" - at least from before the World Trade Center was attacked in 2001. The photography is generally beautiful, as is the music track. Image quality is quite good, especially considering that this is early HD footage. No matter what I do, the image is slightly dropped down from the top on my Samsung 46" LCD.

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What's wrong with this video?

The narrative is inane and often wrong.
Examples: Over Philadelphia, the narrator says the rowers (in racing sculls) share THE river with tugboats and barges. In fact, in Philadelphia is between 2 rivers. The scullers are only on the smaller Schuylkill River (which the video misspells) and the big industrial river where the tugs, freighters and tankers run is the Delaware River. There is no "river sharing" going on.

Other annoying narration goes way overboard in...

Excellent footage, fair to good display.
If you are considering buying this 1-hour DVD, it is definitely worth it for the footage. It has random aerial views from across the country, including Alaska & Hawaii (similar to Blue Planet). Just the footage of NYC and the WTC is worth the price.

Most to all footage is complied from older PBS shows that I remember seeing in the mid-late 80's. While many shots look to be true HD, others are easily seen as not.

Once again, buy for the footage, but don't expect complete HD satisfaction. Had I known, I would have bought the standard DVD so my family could borrow it.

Disappointing Blu-Ray
The Over America concept is a great one for HD, but this blu-ray fails to deliver as its cons outweigh its pros.

On the plus side:
- the footage is quite remarkable considering it was shot in 1994/1995. Not being a videophile or an HD historian, I didn't even know that HD technology was available back then.

On the negative side:
- It is less than 60 mins long (amazon claims 88 mins)
- In the < 60 minutes available, there is only time to pick and choose a few areas of the country to be covered. Broad swaths of the country are ignored, including New England (except NYC), the South/Southeast, the Great Lakes (except for incidental Chicago shots), the Plains, the Rockies, and the Pacific Northwest
- Scant narration provides little information and when it does happen, it often feels like empty propaganda (is Tom Skerrit the Iraqi Information Minister for Texas?)
- Scant on-screen labels may often leave you wondering what you are looking...

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