Audio Video News

DVD: City of God—Buena Vista
Audio: 3
Video: 4
Extras: 4
The outskirts of Brazil's Rio de Janeiro stand in stark contrast to the festive, colorful city known for drawing tourists from around the world. In squalid, dangerous slums, children grow up relying on the protection of drug lords to survive, learning early on that the city's police force is not to be trusted. City of God, directed by Fernando Meirelles, follows one young boy who eventually finds his way out of his miserable living conditions by taking photographs of the violence within.

The sole extra on the disc—the hour-long documentary "News From a Personal War"—complements the film well by offering a further look at the heavily armed drug dealers and the corrupt law-enforcement officers they battle. However, considering that City of God is based on a true story, the DVD's lack of any supplemental material about the person behind the main character seems a glaring omission.

Although the film is subtitled, the Dolby Digital 5.1 audio highlights the film's gritty music and reproduces the staccato of gunshots with clarity. Where the DVD truly excels, though, is with the 1.85:1 anamorphic picture. Crisp edges and detail even in the darkest scenes makes watching every chapter a pleasure.—Christy Grosz

DVD: Northern Exposure: The Complete First Season—Universal
Video: 4
Audio: 4
Extras: 4
It's sad to admit, but a show as quirky as Northern Exposure probably wouldn't stand a chance on network television today. Things in Cicely, Alaska, move a little slowly for today's short attention spans, but that's exactly what makes Northern Exposure such a pleasure. The series' first eight episodes from 1990 are included in The Complete First Season boxed set, and they serve as a great introduction to the show's endearing charm.

Although Rob Morrow's Dr. Joel Fleischman was Northern Exposure's central character, the peripheral characters gave the show its depth. Characters like Ed, Maurice, and the esoteric (to put it mildly) disc jockey Chris made Cicely seem like a real place with real people—people you'd likely meet and would likely want to meet if you even ventured that far north. The budding romance between Fleischman and the gorgeous Janine Turner's Maggie begins to take shape in these initial episodes, and you'll likely be craving the release of season two the moment the eighth episode finishes.

In the meantime, the abundance of deleted and extended scenes will serve nicely to satisfy your cravings. The 1.33:1 picture and Dolby 2.0 sound are solid, although it is a bit of a pain having to flip over the double-sided discs in this day and age. The set is also quite pricey given that only eight hour-long episodes are included, but these are minor quibbles for a quality release like this. Dr. Fleischmann may have wanted out of Cicely, but you'll want to come back for more Northern Exposure as soon as possible.—Gary Maxwell

DVD-Audio: Aaron Neville: Nature Boy—The Standards Album (Verve)
Although new to the all-standards format, Neville has one of the smoothest tenors in popular music. He's no stranger to standards, either. If you don't remember his cover of "Stardust" from bassist Rob Wasserman's 1988 Duets, you'll recognize it from the Rain Man soundtrack. However, nothing from Nature Boy quite reaches that emotional depth.

Pretty as this album is, the stuck-in-ballad mode—broken temporarily by a vibrant "Who Will Buy?" from the musical Oliver—threatens to reduce Nature Boy to mush. Neville needs a partner, and not just Linda Rondstadt, who scored big with the "Don't Know Much" duet in 1989 and returns this time for "The Very Thought of You."

Give an assist here to DVD-Audio technology, which allows engineer Elliot Scheiner to invigorate the album with a high-resolution surround sound mix. On the title track, for example, Scheiner adds some aural excitement by inserting Gil Goldstein's accordion into the surround left channel. Where before, in stereo mode, the accordion spread discreetly across a two-dimensional soundstage, it now puts the listener in the middle of the performance with the instruments well defined and placed. It definitely catches your attention. The same is true of "Who Will Buy?" when the 5.1 mix places Bashiri Johnson's congas prominently in the surround channels. What could seem like a predictable, even gratuitous, use of the technology actually saves the album from its creeping sameness.

Verve surrounded Neville with some real jazz all-stars, including Ron Carter (bass), Roy Hargrove (trumpet), Grady Tate (drums), Ray Anderson (trombone) and Michael Brecker (tenor saxophone). Neville, with Ry Cooder's help, comes closest to a "Stardust" moment with a gorgeous "Danny Boy" that closes the album.

Extras include biographical information, a photo gallery, album credits, and a Neville discography with 30-second song samples. There's also a six-part making-of video. The menu, oddly, does not allow the user to choose between DVD-Audio or Dolby Digital tracks. It lists only stereo and surround mixes, automatically playing the highest resolution possible. Note: "Nature Boy" is a 24-bit/48-kilohertz recording, the native resolution of the original recording. Although the DVD-Audio allows higher sampling rates, you won't feel cheated by Nature Boy. It's a beautiful recording with a surround mix that makes this one a keeper.—Kevin Hunt