Most Dolby Atmos movies don’t actually make much use of the height channels. If you look at the channel activity graphs of Dolby Atmos movies—which I’ve been doing more often than I should admit lately—you’ll notice that most movies have almost constant activity around the five or seven horizontal channels, but only occasional spikes of activity in the height channels. Dune 2 is a good example.
I would like to point out right at the start that this does not mean that these are bad Dolby Atmos soundtracks. On the contrary – and that is why Dune 2 has become a staple in our AV receiver and soundbar testing process, and is one of the entries on our list of the best Dolby Atmos scenes to test your system with. Just because height channels exist doesn’t mean they should be used all the time. In many ways, it makes more sense to keep them around so they have the most impact on the occasions they are used.
But that does explain why it can be a bit of a bummer to go from playing a Dolby Atmos demo clip, where the height channels are used almost constantly for maximum “cor-blimey” effect, to a film that takes a more subtle approach.
Fortunately, some films make more generous use of the height channels of a Dolby Atmos system, and the 2016 film “Deepwater Horizon” is one that I discovered recently.
Look further
I am aware that some reading this will have seen “Deepwater Horizon” when it came out, but during The Hollywood Reporter Calling it a box office flop seems a bit harsh, but it’s fair to say that this film went over the heads of many people, particularly those of us in the UK for whom the real Deepwater Horizon disaster was perhaps a little less dramatic.
The disaster in question is the catastrophic destruction of the titular Deepwater Horizon oil rig, which exploded in 2010, killing 11 workers and releasing around 50 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. The film, which claims to be a fairly accurate retelling of true events, focuses on the apparent arrogance of BP executives on board the rig at the time, the subsequent disregard for safety protocols, the resulting series of massive explosions, and some amazing acts of heroism in hindsight.
You might think that the Atmos effect would be most noticeable during the explosions—and there is a lot going on during this phase of the film—but there are several great uses of Atmos beforehand, particularly in the CGI clips of the sea floor, where you’re audibly catapulted beneath the waves and the muted bubbling, creaking, and roar of a submersible propeller fills the room.
What does “Deepwater Horizon” What’s particularly unusual, however, is the drawn-out nature of the Dolby Atmos sections. The disaster begins around 52 minutes in with a liquid eruption that, on a good system, sounds like being at the bottom of a waterfall. From there, things only get worse for the Deepwater Horizon, but better for your system. The explosions come thick and fast, getting increasingly violent and turning from liquid to fire, and they’re packed with audibly three-dimensional objects and effects, like debris smashing into glass and bouncing off metal struts.
This sequence lasts around 10 minutes, and you might reasonably expect the best of the atmosphere to be over, but the best is yet to come. When a character regains consciousness in the bowels of the facility, the room is filled with the detailed sounds of destruction – a hissing short circuit over there, dust and plaster here, a wailing siren over your shoulder, and the distant thud of collapsing beams and struts. It’s less bombastic than all that explosive stuff, but arguably more impressive from a 3D audio perspective.
Even aside from the soundtrack, it’s a pretty good movie. John Malkovich’s attempt at a Cajun accent is distractingly bad and the focus on action makes the film seem a little more superficial than the tragedy probably deserves, but it’s certainly not a stinker that you have to slog through to get to those Dolby Atmos treats.
All this makes “Deepwater Horizon” a Dolby Atmos demo disc par excellence, and I highly recommend picking up a copy (the 4K Blu-ray sounds much better than the stream I bought from the Apple TV Store, as expected; but the stream is still good) if you want to put your system through its paces or just hear it at its best.
MORE:
Here are the the best Dolby Atmos movies of the decade so far
Check out our lists of best Dolby Atmos soundbars And AV receiver
