I’ll admit I didn’t see Up in the theater. By the time it was released I was burned out on 3D Animated films and frankly I’m not a big Pixar fan. I know that’s blasphemy to say. While I can appreciate the technical brilliance of the films and the obvious love and care that Pixar puts into them I never connected with them. I didn’t like Wall-E, Toy Story, Monsters, Inc. and I thought The Incredibles was just ok. The Pixar film that I actually love was Ratatouille and Finding Nemo. After catching UP on Blu-ray I have to go along with the crowd.
Movie
The first 11 minutes of this movie is probably one of the best Romantic movies I’ve seen all year with an ending that rips your heart out and it’s all done without much dialogue. It does a brilliant job of setting up the rest of the movie. Next to Star Trek, UP is probably the best film that I’ve seen all year. But man is this movie depressing. The commercials lead you to believe that it’s a “comedy,” and it’s many things romantic, adventurous, sad, a bit hopeful, but funny – not really.
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It’s pretty amazing that I’ve never seen Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs before. Commercials for the movie never grabbed me and honestly I hate the music. So watching this movie on Blu-ray is a brand new experience for me. Snow White is the first Disney Disk (that I’ve seen) that uses something called Disney View. It’s an interesting concept, instead of watching the original black bars that come with the original 4:3 transfer, you have the option of watching it with static colorful borders to fill up your screen. You’d think these borders would be distracting but they are not, the movie theater curtains fit the film fairly nicely. It makes watching a 4:3 Blu-ray more than just tolerable. I’m sure true video files with loathe this feature so it’s nice that you have the option to turn it off.
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Animation,
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Blu-ray Review,
Disney Home Video
The Wizard of Oz finally comes to Blu-ray in a beautiful 3 Disk Emerald and Ultimate Edition packages. I’m not going to waste time reviewing one of the all time great movies and probably the film that I’ve seen the most (over 42 times). It’s the definition of “classic,” and will always hold up to repeat viewings. I wasn’t sure if the 70th Edition version was the restored, remastered print from 1998 ago or a brand new one. So I went back and put in the DVD of the last Ultimate Edition and the difference is stark. After watching the Blu-ray version I couldn’t even bare to look at the old DVD. The opening black and white moments actually weren’t shot in “black and white,” there was a sepia tone (?) tint to it so it’s a little odd when you are used to the old stark/grainy black and white from the past. There’s not a spec of dirt or grain on this, all the costumes and sets look fresh and alive. This is just the opening portion. When they get to Oz, wow, just wow, it’s beautiful. The new blu-ray version is so much sharper, clearer, and cleaner the old 1998 Restored print.
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Warner Home Video
Ok, I’m getting a little annoyed with Fox. For some reason they have stopped sending out Blu-rays for review. It’s an alarming, but not surprising trend that studios are cutting critics out; I think this summer is the summer where there have been more Cold Openings than any in recent memory – especially for most of the garbage released in August. I can certainly understand their reasoning. Why should they screen their crappy films for critics when they know most likely we won’t like it and it still goes on to make hundreds of millions before the word gets out how horrible it is. Terminator, G.I. Joe, Transformers, and X-Men Origins: Wolverine all prove that with enough marketing studios can shovel junk and the masses will lap up. Now they are doing the same thing with providing DVD/Blu-ray screeners and I guarantee you the Blu-ray will probably do gangbuster business. So I actually went out and paid my own money to get X-Men Origins: Wolverine, ok, I Netflixed it.
Here’s the thing, I kind of liked Wolverine in the theaters, I forgave a lot of the more idiotic moments in the movie because I thought the strength of the first two acts outweighed the horrible 3rd act. Sitting through this movie a third time (I watched it on a international flight a few weeks ago) in the comfort of my own home was a real struggle because I knew what’s coming and it’s like this dark cloud that prevents me from enjoying the first 2 acts a third time around. There’s just too much in the movie that makes no sense, it’s frustrating to watch. Like Gambit’s fight with Logan, there’s absolutely no reason for this fight to happen other than the director thought it was cool.
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2009 Summer Movies,
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Here’s the thing, I’m not a fan of Nature. Sure I can appreciate the beauty and splendor of it, but after a few minutes I get bored and quickly annoyed when bugs eat me, I fell asleep during a 3-hour tour of the Grand Canyon. DisneyNature’s Blu-ray release of their movie Earth in 1080p high-definition, 1.78:1 transfer is stunningly beautiful, it’s the perfect material to showcase the Blu-ray difference. The movie tells the “year in the life” of the planet Earth by following a family of Polar Bears, Whales and Elephants. These three families take us on a harrowing journey through nature. You don’t get much cuter than a family of Polar Bears – I want one.
You have to admire Disney’s dedication to this documentary they really spent money on this, it took them over 5 years to make and they visited over 62 countries. Unfortunately this is a very dry documentary with narration by James Earl Jones whose professorial tone made me feel like I was in school. Due to the surprising lack of features, the menu navigation is simple and straightforward, the Audio mix is ok, there’s no wow factor to it, but it is in DTS-HD with translations in French and Spanish 5.1 Dolby Digital. The film’s score is about as generic as you could get. Subtitles are available in English SDH, French and Spanish.
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I’ve spent the past three – four weeks having weekend Marathons, I’m up to season four watching Disney’s recently release Lost Blu-ray sets. I’m not a huge fan the show, I first discovered it on DVD a few years ago, watched the first season in a single weekend marathon and enjoyed it, but never got around to watching the Season Two DVD set. That’s not to say that I don’t like the show, I do, I just don’t love it. The only way I would put up with a show like this is to watch it in big 8 episode chunks. Especially season two where I had to put up with Michael screaming Walt! every few minutes. Walt!
I have to say Disney Home Video has done a fantastic job on their recently released Lost Blu-rays, if, for no other reason than their way cool SeasonPlay option that gives you the ability to pick up your viewing where you left off whether you take the disk out or not. One of the things I’ve been complaining about lately is how the Java BD breaks the caching on most Blu-ray players, namely my PS3. Walt!!! Whenever I accidentally hit the stop button (which is frequently) on the PS3′s crappy remote control my place is completely lost and I’m stuck going through 10 minutes of startup crap before I can even fast forward to my last spot. Well the folks at Disney have figure out a way around this with SeasonPlay. Walt!!!
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Blu-Ray,
Blu-ray Review,
Disney Home Video,
Lost,
TV on Blu-ray
The Jonas Brothers – The Concert Experience Blu-ray package is a 3 Disk Blu-ray set that includes both the 3D and the non-2D version of the concert. The 3D quality is really good and strong. The set includes 4 pairs of paper glasses and they are the old style blue/red glasses that just kill my old woman eyes after about 20 minutes. I wish they used the new polarized glasses that are used in theaters today. Also only certain pieces of the movie are in 3D namely the concert itself, but the "documentary" portions which is basically just them sitting in a hotel room and shots of screaming girls are in 2D. This is a good thing since it gives you a few minutes where you don’t have to use the glasses. Audio options include English, Spanish and Portugues in 7.1 DTS-HD Master Audio. Subtitles are in English, English for the Hearing Impaired, French, Spanish, Bahasa, Malay, Portugues, and some Asian languages. The Picture quality is of course amazing, featuring a beautiful 1080p 1:85:1 transfer. There’s no letter boxing on my 47-inch widescreen.
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