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The Pennsylvania Miners Story

While this true-life account of the events that took place in a Pennsylvania mine in the summer of 2002 does have its moments, there's a feeling that some of the more engrossing details were truncated to fit a two-hour time slot for television, commercials included. With a cast made up largely of unknowns, we get the story of the miners who were trapped within dangerous, life-threatening conditions for a number of days, after punching through a shaft that withholds millions of gallons of water. The performances are all pretty good, and the characters well-developed, but the production feels a bit rushed, and one gets the notion that all of this could have been better had there been more time devoted to it.

Not bad, but not so good, either. The image is measured at 1.33:1 fullframe, with the best quality coming from scenes taking place above ground. Here colors are nicely saturated and contrast very good, with sharp edges to boot. The subterrainean sequences, however, are riddled with film grain and murkiness, with a lack of clarity and depth. ***

The sound comes in Dolby Digital 5.1, but might as well have been a 2.0 track. Front-heavy and congested, this one features an abundance of sound effects that could have been ultra-creepy and used to enhance the atmosphere of dread, but alas, surround usage is almost null and void, and deep bass is absent for the most part. Dialogue also sounds very unnatural in places.