The Gospel According to Mac [DVD]

Football is a religion to many people. But few know the depths of both faiths as well as Bill McCartney, the former head football coach of the University of Colorado and the founder of Promise Keepers, a Christian men's ministry. Uncover this truth-is-stranger-than-fiction story of Coach Mac's controversial national championship run two seasons that followed multiple arrests and strife between his mostly African-American players and the Boulder police, continued with McCartney's own daughter becoming pregnant by the team's quarterback before seeing that same quarterback struck by cancer, and culminating in consecutive Orange Bowl match-ups against Notre Dame. Bill McCartney's passionate and often polarizing beliefs have made him many enemies and many admirers, but it's difficult to deny that he embodies the essential issues facing football in America to this day.

Johnny Cash co-wrote and produced this unusual religious drama, in which he narrates the story of Jesus in both words and song as he observes Spartan re-enactments of the gospels shot in the Holy Land. The Gospel Road was transferred to disc in letterboxed format at the widescreen aspect ratio of 1.85:1; the image has also been enhanced for anamorphic play on 16 x 9 monitors. The transfer is sharp enough to reveal the grain of The Gospel Road's 16 mm origins, but the colors are true and this disc looks far superior to the film's out-of-print VHS release. The English-language audio has been mastered in two formats, Dolby Digital Mono and Dolby Digital Stereo, though the two mixes don't sound dramatically different. The disc also includes optional subtitles in English and Spanish. As a bonus, this edition also includes two radio spots created to promote the film, a gallery of stills, and trailers for other 20th Century Fox titles, including the Cash biopic Walk the Line.