The 6th Day was one of only a handful of here-and-gone movies starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, a rather surprising development considering the film is chock full of action scenes. Ah-nuld and action normally bring out the box office best, but such was not the case with this film. With its release on Blu-ray Disc, The 6th Day clearly tried to reach new viewers, a mission that got a huge assist from D-BOX Technologies, which has included its Motion Code support directly on the disc.
The 6th Day wraps the subject of cloning in a thick blanket of edge-of-your-seat action. The story poses some intriguing moral questions about cloning and identity, in spite of the action-film guise hiding the depth pretty well. Peel away the action, and this is easily the most emotionally and morally complex movie Schwarzenegger has ever attempted. But really, how many people want to strip away the action from a Schwarzenegger film? Not too many, particularly the folks at D-BOX.
The D-BOX Motion Code in The 6th Day is well done, much like an audio track in a five-star action film: sure, it’s “loud” and a bit over the top, but that experience is par for the course and fits the film well. To be frank, the D-BOX support flat-out improves the Blu-ray experience and really adds to the fun factor of a film that would arguably fall by the wayside without it.
Like the movie itself, the D-BOX Motion Code track starts out subtly, with slight thumps in the chair coinciding with the background music and a subtle heartbeat. Rather than stay subtle, the Motion Code then jumps into a rather disorienting first-person sequence in which the viewer sees a football game through the perspective of the quarterback. Although the crunches of each tackle feel fine, most of the motion coincides with the first-person camera movements, something D-BOX wisely avoided in Cloverfield (LINK GOES HERE) but opted to implement in this opening sequence.
Fortunately, most of the D-BOX Motion Code in The 6th Day doesn’t come from first-person scenes but from tried-and-true driving and action scenes. From a helicopter swooping through canyons to the rumble of an auto-piloted truck, nearly every vehicular scene in The 6th Day includes Motion Code support. D-BOX has masterfully simulated the feeling of flight when in the helicopter, but without question, the best vehicle scene — and in fact the best D-BOX scene in the entire movie — comes from a high-speed chase around Schwarzenegger’s neighborhood as he’s pursued by would-be assassins.
In this scene, Schwarzenegger and his pursuers turn corners at 50mph, bang into one another’s cars, crash through houses and careen down stairways as the D-BOX code mimics each sensation with surprising accuracy. At the scene’s conclusion, Schwarzenegger jumps off a cliff, triggering a slow-motion feeling that reinforces the diverse range of motion capable in the D-BOX platform. Again, to return to the audio track reference, this scene’s motion is “loud,” but nowhere else in the film is the Motion Code so downright fun that it literally brings a smile to your face. That happened to us twice while watching this scene.
The D-BOX support also extends to gunshots and wrecks, with more than a few explosions that lend themselves well to the D-BOX experience, but vehicles really are the focus. However, although those scenes are each well done, they’re infrequent enough that you’ll occasionally forget the movie has D-BOX support in the first place and thus be startled a bit when a thump or jolt reminds you that the Motion Code is there.
Although it was deep for a Schwarzenegger film and tackled the complex moral and ethical questions of cloning, The 6th Day was never going to win any Academy Awards for acting or screenplay. However, with its release on Blu-ray Disc, The 6th Day has been injected with new life in the form of D-BOX Motion Code support, and the move largely pays off. Without D-BOX support, The 6th Day would likely be as forgotten on Blu-ray as it was in the theaters. With D-BOX support, it’s got at least one scene that you will likely remember for months.
Buy The 6th Day on Blu-ray
- Score: 8.2
- The first-person opener is awkward, but the gunfights and helicopters are great, and the high-speed chase is one of the most entertaining D-BOX scenes we’ve experienced.
— Jonas Allen
