Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World 4K 2003 Ultra HD 2160p

Storyline
In April 1805 during the Napoleonic Wars, H.M.S. Surprise, a British frigate, is under the command of Captain Jack Aubrey. Aubrey and the Surprise's current orders are to track and capture or destroy a French privateer named Acheron. The Acheron is currently in the Atlantic off South America headed toward the Pacific in order to extend Napoleon's reach of the wars. This task will be a difficult one as Aubrey quickly learns in an initial battle with the Acheron that it is a bigger and faster ship than the Surprise, which puts the Surprise at a disadvantage. Aubrey's single-mindedness in this seemingly impossible pursuit puts him at odds with the Surprise's doctor and naturalist, Stephen Maturin, who is also Aubrey's most trusted advisor on board and closest friend. Facing other internal obstacles which have resulted in what they consider a string of bad luck, Aubrey ultimately uses Maturin's scientific exploits to figure out a way to achieve his and the ship's seemingly impossible goal.

User Review

A magnificent film. The best in its genre. Mostly because there is almost nothing else in this genre. Films featuring sailing ships are as rare as armored turtles in our northern forests.

If you think about it, what do we have from the valuable bird, the cormorant? A bunch of old “Blads,” “Morgans,” “Black Beards,” and “Treasure Islands.” Yes, you could add films like Admiral Ushakov. But these are all half-forgotten oldies, and no matter how hard the directors, producers, and set designers tried, nothing breathtaking can be extracted from them. At the same time, powerful historical films began to appear, such as Kingdom of Heaven, which, despite its general stupidity, is still impressive in terms of battle scenes. But what can we say about screen adaptations of naval battles and sailing voyages? Here and there, a sail or two can be seen on the horizon, but overall, there is nothing special. To the delight of fans of pirate romance, Pirates of the Caribbean did appear. The film is entertaining, but, of course, it is not quite what one would expect.

And the creators of Master and Commander were lucky: Without the Rose, a replica of the original ship built in 1970, which starred in the film and was bought by Fox for $1.5 million, the film would not have been made, because there are very few working sailing ships for sale in the world. To put it simply, there are none.

This film is a cut above all the others listed.

The action takes place during the Napoleonic Wars. An English ship encounters a French ship superior in power in the Pacific Ocean. The plot is a cat-and-mouse game, with one trying to catch up with the other. The film is quite measured, which fits well with the theme of slow but beautiful sailing. And if there is such a subgenre as Road Movie, then this is probably Sailmovie. The entire film takes place in travel mode. Unhurried, but damn beautiful.

Amazing attention to detail. The film's “masters and creators” did a great job.

From the very beginning, we watch the changing of the watch: a man with a lamp makes his way between the swaying hammocks, walks across the gun deck, and we can see that each gun has its own name: “Thunderous Billy,” ‘Sudden Death’... A finger taps the hourglass to shake the remaining sand stuck in the upper compartment down. Glasses clink. Dark figures descend from the rigging, cutting through the barely white sky.

Later, almost invisible in the fog, the enemy ship explodes in flashes of fire. You can almost physically feel, and the creators have made every effort to achieve this, how heavy cannonballs break into the deck at breakneck speed. These are cannonballs tearing through the hull, knocking down masts, and tearing apart the ship's interior. Splinters fly in all directions, water gushes through holes in the hold, and they are plugged with sacks, which are hammered into the holes with wooden hammers, waist-deep in water.

A surgeon treats wounded sailors arriving in the infirmary. Instruments fall to the floor, the cramped space of the ship's infirmary is impossible to move through, feet slip on the swaying, blood-covered floor.

And so on, in the same indescribable spirit.

It is practically devoid of adventurous, thoughtless exaggerations. In other words, the action is very realistic, which is especially pleasing in a historical film.

Russell Crowe and Paul Bettany make an excellent pair, having already starred together in A Beautiful Mind. The latter may be remembered for his leading role in Dogville and as the slightly crazy pseudo-Choser in The Knight's Tale.

In short, this is definitely the best “sailing movie” ever made.

Info Video

Codec: HEVC / H.265 (48.5 Mb/s)
Resolution: Native 4K (2160p)
HDR: Dolby Vision, HDR10
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1

Info Audio

#English: Dolby TrueHD with Dolby Atmos 7.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
#English: Dolby Digital Plus with Dolby Atmos 5.1
#Spanish (Latino): Dolby Digital 5.1
#Spanish: Dolby Digital 5.1
#French: Dolby Digital 5.1
#German: Dolby Digital 5.1
#Czech: Dolby Digital 2.0
#Russian: DTS 5.1
#Hungarian: Dolby Digital 5.1
#Thai: Dolby Digital 5.1
#Turkish: Dolby Digital 5.1

Info Subtitles

English SDH, Arabic, Bulgarian, Chinese (Cantonese Traditional), Chinese (Cantonese), Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Estonian, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Icelandic, Indonesian, Italian, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese (Portuguese), Romanian, Russian, Slovenian, Spanish (Castilian), Spanish (Latin American), Swedish, Thai.