Product Description

In the 1930's an adventurous young pilot discovers a rocketpack that turns him into the Rocketeer, then must fight off bad guys who want the pack for a weapon.
Genre: Feature Film-Action/Adventure
Rating: PG
Release Date: 3-SEP-2002
Media Type: DVD

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #2763 in DVD
• Brand: CAMPBELL,BILL
• Released on: 1999-08-17
• Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 2.35:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD-Video, Letterboxed, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, French
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 108 minutes

Amazon.com
Based on a retro-styled comic book hit of the '80s, this Disney film was meant to launch a whole line of Rocketeer films--but the series began and ended with this one. That's too bad, because this underrated Joe Johnston film has a certain loopy charm. The story centers on a pre-World War II stunt pilot (Bill Campbell) who accidentally comes into possession of a rocket-propelled backpack much coveted by the Nazis. With the aid of his mechanic pal (Alan Arkin), he gets it up and running, then uses it to foil a plot by a gang of vicious Nazi spies (is there any other kind?) led by Timothy Dalton. Jennifer Connelly is on hand as the love interest, but the real fun here is when the Rocketeer takes off. There's also a nifty battle atop an airborne blimp. --Marshall Fine

Customer Reviews

excellent disney movie
It is an excellent Disney movie. I really enjoyed it. It was quite well done.

Great Film, Lousy DVD
I won't go into The Rocketeer's worth as entertainment here - suffice to say that I think it's a wonderful film and well worth 5 stars. But in this review I'm focusing on the technical aspects which I feel detract from the DVD.

This DVD (ASIN: 6305428514) features a 'matted widescreen' transfer which works fine on smaller 4:3 TVs, but which looks awful on larger screen or widescreen TVs. I believe that every DVD today should be made in 'anamorphic widescreen' format so that the image is enhanced for viewing on a larger screen. If it's not then I think that the poor image quality should be clearly marked in some way, as the lack of an anamorphic transfer makes a big difference in quality. In the case of this particular movie the image is very poor due to a terribly grainy transfer that looks as if it came from a VHS tape. The non-anamorphic format makes it even worse and results in what's known as 'gutterboxing' (black bars all around the image) when the movie is played on widescreen TVs. Some TVs allow zooming in to fill the screen in cases like this, but in the case of this film if the image is zoomed to fit the screen the film becomes unwatchable.

So in conclusion, those with the older standard 4:3 TVs under 30 inches probably won't notice any loss of resolution. But for folks with big screen TVs I advise waiting until this movie gets an updated DVD treatment. Alternatively, if you own a good quality up-converting DVD player that can play region 2 discs, the British version (ASIN: B00004CYQH available from Amazon.co.uk) is a good quality anamorphic transfer.

Son of Commander Cody
Dave Stevens graphic novel -- an obvious tip of the hat to Republic serial classics such as RADAR MEN ON THE MOON and KING OF THE ROCKETMEN -- this wonderfully entertaining film in a summer when TERMINATOR 2 sucked up all the box office oxygen. Too bad, nice performances by Bill Campbell as a barn storming pilot in 1938, Alan Arkin as his sidekick mechanic, the lovely (and very young) Jennifer Connolly as the girl friend, Paul Sorvino as a gangster, and ex-James Bond Timothy Dalton as an Errol Flynn type as a Nazi! (The latter probaby influnced by a book in the 1980's that claimed that Flynn was a Nazi agent.) Though it sank at the box office, I highly recommend this delightful romp which even has a Rondo Hatton henchman and a grand finale on a dirgible!