When the Game Stands Tall Blu-ray review

Dec 08, 2014- Permalink

As I said in my review of When the Game Stands Tall’s theatrical release, the film combines two of America’s greatest religions: football and, well, religion. The film follows the story of the De La Salle High School Spartans, who held a 151 game winning streak led by their coach and Bible studies teacher portrayed by Jim Caviezel. When a tragedy strikes both the team and its streak, the players have to see what they’re really made of.

The disc’s 1080p 1.85:1 transfer is clean. Details are sharp down to the blades of grass and the worry lines on Jim Caviezel’s forehead. Colours are accurate and the heat haze in one scorcher of a game will have you reaching for a cold drink.

On the audio side, the disc provides English and Portuguese DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 tracks and French and Spanish Dolby Digital 5.1 tracks. On the subtitle side, there are English, French, Spanish, Portuguese subtitles as well as English captions with descriptions for the deaf or hard-of-hearing. The surround tracks are put to good use and the lower frequencies are perfect for each bone-crunching tackle. The only thing that would make you feel more in the game would be if a family member dumped Gatorade on you after a win.

The disc does come with the usual staple of extras. We get audio commentary from director Thomas Carter, a “making of” featurette with interviews with the cast and crew. There’s a scene by scene interview between Carter and Coach Ladouceur, a series of deleted scenes, a featurette with second unit/football director Allan Graf and a look at the philosophy of Bob Ladouceur and how we would get through to his players and students.

If you’re into the film’s spiritual or sports messages, you may want to add this one to your library.