HighDefDiscNews

Universal announces plans to bring Richard Curtis’ 2009 British comedy “Pirate Radio” to Blu-ray Disc in March

Justin Sluss — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 19:18:08 +0000

Universal has announced plans to bring the 2009 film “Pirate Radio” (a.k.a. “The Boat That Rocked“) to Blu-ray Disc on March 9th. The film was based on a true story, Written and Directed by Richard Curtis and stars Phillip Seymour Hoffman. Tech specs include full 1080p Hi-Def video and DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. The title is already available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $33.49 price tag. Bonus materials have yet to be announced but stay tuned and we will keep you updated.

CONTEST ALERT! Universal giving away prize packages of Blu-ray titles daily on social networking site Facebook

Justin Sluss — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 15:45:29 +0000

Universal has just launched a contest over on the social networking site Facebook where they will be giving away prize packages consisting of their Blu-ray Disc titles daily (during the duration of the contest, according to the rules listed). For more information on the contest and it’s rules visit THIS link. Good luck in the contest.

Blu-ray Disc Association unveils the logo for “Blu-ray 3D” as part of the 2010 Consumer Electronics Show in Vegas

Justin Sluss — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 14:34:30 +0000

The Blu-ray Disc Association (“BDA“) has unveiled the logo for “Blu-ray 3D” recently as part of CES (the Consumer Electronics Show) going on this week in Las Vegas. You can expect more updates on this later this week as the show progresses. You will also notice that we have made a new logo for BD 3D related news stories and such as well as a new category for them as well. Also, for legal reasons I’ll remind you the logo for “Blu-ray 3D” is property of Blu-ray Disc Association.

Warner plans to bring Richard Kelly’s 2009 film “The Box” starring Cameron Diaz to Blu-ray Disc in February

Justin Sluss — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 13:16:48 +0000

Warner has announced plans to bring the 2009 film “The Box” Directed and Written by Richard Kelly (of “Donnie Darko” fame) to Blu-ray Disc on February 23rd. The film is based on a short story (“Button, Button“) written by Richard Matheson which in 1986 was made in to a “Twilight Zone” episode. Tech specs for this release include full 1080p Hi-Def video on a BD-25 (25 gigabyte single layer Blu-ray Disc) with DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio sound. Bonus materials are set to include a Digital Copy, a standard definition DVD of the film, Audio Commentary by Writer / Director Richard Kelly, “The Box: Grounded in Reality“, “Music Video Prequels“, “Visual Effects Revealed” featurettes and “Richard Matheson: In His Own Words” interactive interview with the original author of the story. The title is not yet available for pre-order but stay tuned and we will keep you updated.

UPDATE: Sony now has plans to bring both the first and second seasons of “Breaking Bad” to Blu-ray in March

Justin Sluss — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 10:46:42 +0000

Previously last month (year as well since it was December and is now January) I reported to you (HERE that Sony plans to bring “Breaking Bad: The Complete Second Season” to Blu-ray Disc on March 16th. I apologize for getting the release date wrong then but those things happen, however I did not foresee this happening. It now turns out that the studio also plans to bring “Breaking Bad: The Complete First Season” to Blu-ray Disc on the very same day.

Tech specs for both releases include full 1080p Hi-Def video in the 1.78:1 aspect ratio with DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio sound. The first season will be on a 2-Disc set and the second season will be on a 3-Disc set. The first season is now available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $31.49 price tag. The second season has been available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $30.99 price tag for a week or so now.

Below you will find a list of the bonus materials set to be included on each season (release).

“Breaking Bad: The Complete First Season” bonus:

# Cast and Crew Commentaries
# Deleted/Extended Scenes
# Making of Breaking Bad
# AMC Shootout – Interview with Vince Gilligan and Bryan Cranston
# Screen Tests
# Inside Breaking Bad
# Vince Gilligan’s Photo Gallery

“Breaking Bad: The Complete Second Season” bonus:

# Cast and Crew Commentaries
# Deleted Scenes
# Inside Breaking Bad – 13 Featurettes About The Making of Each Episode
# Season 1 Recap
# Walt’s Warning Featurette
# “Negro y Azul” Music Video
# “Better Call Saul” Commercial
# The Writers’ Lab – An Interactive Guide to the Elements of an Episode (Blu-ray Exclusive)
# 11 Behind-the-Scenes Featurettes
# Cop Talk with Dean Norris
# Gag Reel
# 6 Breaking Bad Original Webisodes
# Season 3 Sneak Peek
# Vince Gilligan’s Photo Gallery

Warner announces plans to bring the classic 1978 animated version of “The Lord of the Rings” to Blu-ray in April

Justin Sluss — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 09:46:42 +0000

Warner has officially announced plans, in the form of a trade ad (pictured above and found HERE), to bring the classic animated 1978 adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” to Blu-ray Disc day-and-date with the release of the live-action trilogy on April 6th. Tech specs include full 1080p Hi-Def (said to be remastered) video on a BD-25 disc and Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Surround sound. Bonus materials include a Digital Copy of the film as well as an all-new featurette “Forging Through the Darkness: The Ralph Bakshi Vision for The Lord of the Rings.” The title is already available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $20.99 price tag. Stay tuned for any further details involving this title.

New trailer confirms Disney plans to bring “Fantasia” & “Fantasia 2000″ to Blu-ray Disc (likely) later this year

Justin Sluss — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 08:25:21 +0000

A new Trailer (featured below, or found HERE) reveals (or confirms rather) that Disney does have plans to bring “Fantasia” and “Fantasia 2000” to Blu-ray Disc and likely as rumored to be sometime later this year as part of the “Diamond Edition” collection. No official confirmation (aside from this official trailer) yet or a release date but stay tuned and we will keep you updated on any developments in this story. Below you will find the trailer mentioned earlier over on YouTube. Enjoy!

Blu-ray Disc Releases for January 5th, 2010

Justin Sluss — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 06:48:30 +0000

The following titles were released today January 5th, 2010 on Blu-ray Disc:

10 Things I Hate About You (Disney/Touchstone)

Battlestar Galactica: Season One (Universal)

Cheaper by the Dozen 2 (FOX)

Chuck: The Complete Second Season (Warner)

Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs (Sony)

The Final Destination 3-D (Warner/New Line)

The Green Berets (Warner)

Riding Giants (Sony)

RUMOR ALERT! Universal finally has plans to bring the “Back to the Future” trilogy to Blu-ray Disc in July of this year

Justin Sluss — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 04:03:35 +0000

Our friend Bill Hunt over at The Digital Bits are reporting in their “RUMOR MILL” that Universal has plans FINALLY to bring the “Back to the Future” trilogy of films to Blu-ray Disc later this year. A fake trade ad was released by a Spanish site (pictured HERE) that claimed the release was slated for July.

P.S. Don’t bother leaving us stupid comments trying to tell us this is all fake. Bill Hunt has addressed the situation of this trade ad being fake. Also, Universal has verified this information to him and confirmed that the release IS planned for a 2010 release, despite the fake artwork. I’d like to add one more thing though on a serious note. I’d really think it to be appropriate for Universal to donate a portion of the proceeds from the sales of this release to The Michael J. Fox Foundation for research on Parkinson’s. If you have the time, please visit the website for that organization (found HERE). Doing that will put a smile on Fox’s face just like it does mine or yours thinking about owning those classic films he starred in on Hi-Def later this year.

Pandorum – Blu-ray Disc Review

Justin Sluss — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 09:40:08 +0000

has an average rating of 7.0 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
Dolby TrueHD 5.1 & Digital 5.1
ALL in Hi-Def with a Digital Copy
–
– 2009
– 108 minutes
– Anchor Bay (Starz)
–
This uses 28.3GB for the movie out of 39.2GB total.
Street Date: January 19th, 2010

Overall Verdict – A Recommended Sci-Fi

Buy it for $26.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Justin Sluss —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself was Directed by Christian Alvart who also co-wrote the Screenplay. The co-write credits on the Screenplay and the author of original story was Travis Milloy. This unlike most cheesy Sci-Fi films you see churned out these days has a really massive production value to it with amazing sets, good CG animation, and most importantly amazing make-up and special effects done by the geniuses over at the late, great Stan Winston’s company (Stan Winston Studios, Inc.).

The film centers primarily around one member (out of the thousands) on board the space vessel “Elysium” which has been sent off in to deep Outer Space to a far off Earth-like planet because our planet has become overpopulated and eventually destroyed. The astronaut “Cpl. Bower” (played by Ben Foster) awakes from a deep hyper-sleep in his chamber, all plugged up to life support tubes and whatnot. He has no long term memory and is questioning why he has been awoke from his hyper-sleep, where he is and what he is doing there. It’s when another astronaut, “Lt. Payton” (played by Dennis Quaid) awakens also from a deep hyper-sleep that he regains a bit of his memory and this leaves Bower and the audience informed a bit more as to what the vessel is, what it’s mission was. Now the real question lies in where the previous shift of crew members are and why they were not present to explain things during that shift change. Bower decides he will wonder off through the venting system and try to make his way past a door that is blocking the path due to the electrical system being down on the ship. Payton stays back at the “command center” of sorts and communicates with Bower as he makes his way through the ship.

The real big scare here, in terms of horror, comes from the mysterious (alien-like) white creatures that Bower discovers have inhabited the ship and apparently killed a majority of the crew. These creatures look very terrifying and are nothing more than human beings in make-up with prosthetics and such. No huge CG animated enemies here, just believable creatures that are downright scary (as mentioned a few times now). It’s that element of this film that does make it a cross between a Horror and a Sci-Fi but for the most part it is obvious the film is about Science Fiction and the eventual reality of deep space travel and future colonization on other planets.

In closing, “Pandorum” is a very impressive Science Fiction film and it shows that Director Christian Alvart is someone to watch out for. Alvart keeps up the good work, he might give folks like Peter Jackson and Guillermo del Toro “a run for their money”. The acting here done by Ben Foster is phenomenal and the supporting role by Dennis Quaid isn’t one to ignore either. All and all, this proves to be worth checking out if you’re into Sci-Fi and the idea of a future involving space exploration.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 2.35:1 aspect ratio. According to IMDb’s technical specifications under the aspect ratio, this was shot on Super 35mm film using Arricam and Arriflex cameras. The transfer to Hi-Def from Super 35mm film looks good, with a great amount of detail present even in the darkest of scenes. Speaking of dark scenes, the black level is always important in a Sci-Fi set in Outer Space and I’m happy to report that it is solid here which helps with the detail in the visual presentation. The color palette is at times subdued to the dim lighting conditions as well as the fleshtones but for the most part they do hold vibrancy and accuracy. The film’s wonderful set design and visual style conveyed by the cinematography done by Wedigo von Schultzendorff are definitely both done justice here, earning this a solid “4 Star Rating” for overall video quality rating.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in Dolby TrueHD 5.1 & Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround @640kbps. Dialogue is delivered distinctly here throughout the film and requires no volume adjustment what-so-ever. About 30 minutes in to the film or so, once we get our first or second big action (chase) scene you will be treated to some excellent LFE (bass) and rear channel presence in this 5.1 much thanks to the mysterious alien-like white creatures on board the “Elysium“. The sound of these creatures approaching is downright disturbing and some excellent sound design that at times could be almost considered for “demo material“. The overall presentation here in 5.1 is very impressive and the original music by Michl Britsch that makes up the Score is done justice, earning “Pandorum” on Blu-ray a “4.5 Star Rating” for audio quality.

Bonus materials are presented in 1080i High Definition (HD) using MPEG-2 codec for video and Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo sound @192kbps — unless otherwise noted below in the descriptions.

Digital Copy is included on this release which is compatible with PC and Windows Media portable devices. Sadly no support for Mac or iTunes here.
Audio Commentary with Director Christian Alvart and Producer Jeremy Bolt
“The World of Elysium: Behind-the-Scenes Featurette” (13:59 – HD) includes interviews with the Co-Writer / Director Christian Alvart as well as cast members Ben Foster and Dennis Quaid. This proves to be very informative and worth the watch if you enjoyed the film.
“What Happened to Nadia’s Team” (4:30 – HD) sheds a little bit more light on what happened to the previous crew members of “Elysium“. The acting here is not the best but it does help add a bit more to the story itself.
“Flight Team Training Video” (2:45 – HD) again, sheds a little bit more light on what happened but here to Earth and with the space program that got us to this point in the future; depicted in the film. The narration and presentation here are both very impressive and this featurette proves to be very informative and entertaining, even if it is under 3 minutes in length. There’s also a good amount of footage of the sets used on the film near the end of this featurette.
“Deleted & Alternate Scenes” (27:57 – HD) run rather lengthy and are definitely worth watching if you enjoyed the film, as they add quite a bit more to the story itself. Most of these scenes seem to have been cut for time and probably should have been in theatrical cut but then again, there is always the chance of a “Director’s Cut” someday with these scenes put in where they would have gone in the film itself.
“Still Galleries” is comprised of still images of the film during pre-production such as artist concept art and such.
Theatrical Trailer (2:19 – HD) is included.

Overall, the bonus materials are pretty decent. They are ALL in 1080i Hi-Def and have a total runtime of about 50 minutes or so. Plus, you have the inclusion of a Digital Copy which is always nice to see, even if it isn’t compatible with Mac and iTunes. I think fans of the film will be somewhat pleased with the supplemental materials here.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

Beyond A Reasonable Doubt – Blu-ray Disc Review

Justin Sluss — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 06:57:11 +0000

has an average rating of 5.7 on IMDb
1080p in VC-1 on a 25gb disc
PCM 5.1 & Dolby Digital 5.1
include featurettes & Digital Copy
–
– 2009
– 106 minutes
– Anchor Bay (Starz)
–
This uses 18.5GB for the movie out of 20.8GB total.

Overall Verdict – Worth A Rental Fare

Buy it for $22.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Justin Sluss —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself was Directed by Peter Hyams who decided to remake the film based on a 1956 film of the same title. Most folks know our Director (writer of the remake) from his directing credits on films like “2010: The Year We Make Contact” from 1984 and “End of Days” in 1999.

The film’s main character is a TV reporter named “C.J. Nicholas” (played by Jesse Metcalfe) who is romantically involved with a girl by the name of “Ella Crystal” (played by Amber Tamblyn). Ella is the assistant to the D.A. (District Attorney), a high profile lawyer by the name of “Mark Hunter” (played brilliantly here by Michael Douglas). Our lead character, the TV reporter, C.J. decides that his girlfriend’s boss (Hunter) is tampering with evidence to help secure his convictions so he decides to orchestrate an undercover expose (of sorts) by purposely framing himself for a random murder that he picks — because of it’s lack of evidence. This plan to do this expose on the corruption of the D.A. is backed up in the form of video documentation done by C.J.’s friend using a camcorder. They document him buying all of the evidence items (long after the murder has been committed). C.J. tells his friend to not use this footage unless it is needed to avoid a life sentence or death penalty when it comes time to see things out in court.

As you’d expect, this unfolds in the form of a courtroom drama but it isn’t as stereotypical as you’d think. Our lead character is arrested, after purposely covering himself in alcohol and crashing his car while intoxicated. C.J. tells his girlfriend Ella nothing about this so she is torn in what to believe when her boss, the D.A. Mark Hunter is set to convict her boyfriend. This is about all I can tell you about this film without really giving you any “spoilers” but I will say that it is rather enjoyable from start to finish and it does make you think “I guess that is probably what WOULD happen if you tried to do this to expose the corruption of someone”.

In closing, “Beyond A Reasonable Doubt” is a pretty decent crime drama that for the most part seems original in it’s plot (even though it is technically a remake of a 1956 film) and (still) sincere in it’s message (even as a remake 53 years later). Michael Douglas gives a great supporting performance here that is worth seeing if you are a fan of his work.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the VC-1 codec on a BD-25 (25 gigabyte single layer Blu-ray Disc) in the 1.85:1 aspect ratio. As IMDb clearly states in their technical specifications for the aspect ratio, this was shot digitally in Hi-Def (HDTV) using the Red One camera. This camera usually turns out some really impressive material but here it does show off some of the weaker aspects of the camera such as a soft tone, namely due to dim lighting conditions and some obvious pixilation on lines that leads me to believe DNR (digital noise reduction) was applied in post-production or in the Hi-Def transfer for this release. The amount of detail is blurred a tiny bit by this as well, which leads me to saying that it does appear again, soft in its tone as some obvious use of EE (edge enhancement) is evidently visible, likely used to try to make up for the blur but only leads to emphasizing the flaws. By now, it should be needless to say this is not one of the best looking of the ever-growing catalog of films shot on the Red One camera but it does deliver a somewhat decent Hi-Def presentation for the most part. Some positive aspects of the Hi-Def visual presentation though include a somewhat solid black level, accurate fleshtones and a somewhat vibrant color palette — even if it does obviously seem dull and subdued at times. There is undoubtedly a good amount of detail found here because of this being shot in Hi-Def on the Red One camera, especially in close-ups but this detail can be lost to the DNR as I discussed above.

I’ll end my opinions of the video quality with the flaws aside and say that this earns a somewhat decent “3.5 Star Rating” for overall video quality. However — some films look great shot in Hi-Def digitally, specifically on this particular camera but in this case, I honestly think the film would have looked much better shot on traditional 35mm film.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in Uncompressed Linear PCM 5.1 & Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround @640kbps. Dialogue is most important in this crime drama aside from the music that makes up the score and the sound effects (Foley) but sadly the dialogue here has some issues. At times the dialogue being delivered (in the audio mix) does not match up with the lips of the actors on screen (visually) which leads me to believing that a majority of the film has been “dubbed”. This can be very distracting at times, I found personally, but this does not mean you will have to make any volume adjustments throughout the film — the dialogue is at the right volume, it just does not match up to the video footage 100% of the film. I would say in actuality, this issue with the dialogue not matching up to the lips happens only probably about 5 to 10 percent of the film but it is enough to be distracting and honestly, downright bothersome and hurts the overall audio presentation (as I’ll discuss further below). Whoever was in charge of the microphone boom and sound editing here has some blame to hold for these problems. Flaws aside (again here, just like with video quality), the audio mix here does however contain some positive points. For instance the LFE near the end of the film is very climactic and builds up a great roar from your subwoofer to get you into the action happening on screen.

Overall, this gets a decent “3.5 Star Rating” for audio quality. It is a shame about the flaws in the dialogue due to obvious dubbing issues and I have to admit I did “knock” the score because of that; even though this is not the fault in any way of the good folks at Anchor Bay (Starz).

Bonus materials are presented in Hi-Def (HD) video quality using the VC-1 codec and Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo sound @224kbps — unless otherwise noted below in the description.

Digital Copy is included on this release which is compatible with PC and Windows Media portable devices. Sadly no support for Mac or iTunes here.
Audio Commentary by Writer / Cinematographer / Director Peter Hyams and Actor Jesse Metcalfe
“The Whole Truth – The Making of Beyond A Reasonable Doubt” (3:12 – HD)
“Criminal Forensics – The Burden of Proof” (3:39 – HD) while not quite as elaborate and interesting as an episode of “C.S.I.” this does prove to be somewhat informative and worth the watch.
Trailer (2:02 – HD) for the film is presented and features Uncompressed Linear PCM 5.1 Surround sound @4.6Mbps.

Overall, the bonus materials are somewhat rewarding for fans. The audio commentary with Peter Hyams and star Jesse Metcalfe is definitely worth listening to, the “making of” and forensics featurettes are both worth watching as well. The inclusion of a digital copy is nice, despite lacking Mac and iTunes support. The supplemental material here seems a bit way too short in my honest opinion but does hold a few somewhats enjoyable featurettes as well as the audio commentary mentioned earlier.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

The Marine 2 – Blu-ray Disc Review

Brendan Surpless — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 07:02:57 +0000

has an average rating of 5.1 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
include features on the making
–
– 2009
– 95 Minutes
– FOX
–
This uses 28.4GB for the movie out of 41.9GB total.

Overall Verdict – Bad Flick / Good Disc

Buy it for $19.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Brendan Surpless —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself is directed by Roel Reine. “Joe Lindwood” (Ted Dibiase Jr.) and his wife “Robin” (Lara Cox) are relaxing at an exotic resort, which is wife is a sponsor for. Thinking this just may be the vacation that both of them need, everything goes array when a radical group of terrorists wanting revenge for past crimes invades the resort taking hostages. Naturally Joe’s wife Robin is one of them. Joe, a Marine, now must use to training to save his wife and prevent any of the hostages from being killed. What results is a film that plays out like an episode of “24“, only not that good.

The way this works is that if you’ve seen any film where a group takes a bunch of hostages then one person suddenly has the strength and courage to save everyone, then you’ve mostly definitely seen “The Marine 2” before. The plot is extremely basic and essentially borrows cliche after cliche, offering absolutely nothing new to the genre. Every scene plays out like something we’ve seen, only being somewhat updated for the modern audience. In fact, had it not been for Dibiase, really the only saving grace here, I would rate this a .5/5.

Dibiase does a commendable job here doing what he can with the rather stale script and plot. He’s able to carry the film to the best he can bringing whatever amount of quality he can do this otherwise terrible film. Dialogue is laughable at points and the plot feels like something we’ve seen on a season of “24“. Only difference is where “24” has tension, style and substance to its show, “The Marine 2” doesn’t have anything like this. The villains aren’t ever threatening, never do we actually feel like we don’t know what’s coming or that there might be a sudden twist and some of the explosions look extremely fake (look at one of the initial ones). The thing is WWE should be able to create films that are more than dumbed down, dull remakes of material we’ve seen before as their weekly shows (well not as good as they use to be) are still entertaining enough to watch.

In closing, “The Marine 2” is better than “The Marine“, but not by much. I do feel that Dibiase is a capable actor and if perhaps WWE continues to make films and wants him in said films, that they definitely do have a charismatic lead. It’s just a true shame that the plot is so threadbare, having been visited so many times before (and in better ways too.)

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 1:85:1 aspect ratio. The film tends to focus on the type of color palette that goes with each sequence. Whether it be the bright blues of the ocean in the beginning or the dark greens of the jungle toward the middle act, I found the palette to be pleasing on the eye. Detail tends to fluctuate from scene to scene. Perhaps how the film was stylistically shot, but the brighter sequences do hold better detail and image quality. The night sequences, unless focusing on our main characters, tend to suffer a bit. It’s here that there’s an almost dark shade put to some of the characters and locales resulting in an image that is a bit difficult to make out. Grain is kept to a minimum here though as is noise meaning that the film’s print is in rather good condition (which makes sense for a film this new). Fleshtones are fairly accurate but I do feel that contrast levels may have been adjusted because at times it seemed like Joe looked too “tanned”. All in all this earns a “4 Star Rating” and is a solid effort from WWE Studios that fans will be pleased with.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. Just about every aspect of this soundtrack screams action fest. Dialogue is well reproduced with no instance of drop out or anything that requires a volume change. Dynamics are excellent with discrete effects being noticeable in nearly every sequence. Whether it be screams of various people who’ve been captured, helicopters blades or just explosions settling, the rears get quite the workout. Pans are virtually invisible between rears. LFE is deep and immerse and at times quite booming. The film’s score by Trevor Morris blends across the front channels occasionally creeping to the rears. Atmosphere is good as well but not perfect as sometimes the rears have no activity. Still this is only in a few moments. All in all even though the film isn’t the exact best piece of film making, one can’t deny the quality of this track. This earns a near flawless “4.5 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials on this release are presented in High Definition (AVC MPEG-4) with Dolby Digital Stereo Sound.

Village Virtuoso: The Final Fight: This runs 5min15sec and explains how the final ending fight was thought of and finally brought together in an cohesive manner.
The Last Resort: Inside The Terrorists’ Siege: This runs 3min3sec and shows how important the initial terrorist siege was for not only the film, but for the story as well as the shooting of the movie.
East Meets West: This runs 4min44sec and explains the type of preparation that went into the fight sequences in the film.
Production Paradises: Filming in Thailand: This runs 4min15sec and shows us what it was like to shoot in Thailand.
Building a Legacy: Ted’s Story: This runs 5min5sec and shows the legacy Dibiase and his building as a 3rd generation superstar in the WWE being the son of “Million Dollar Man: Ted Dibiase“.
Muay Thai Fight Outtakes: Here we get 6min51sec of outtakes from this fight. An introduction from Director Roel Reine explains that these outtakes were complied together (from different camera angles) as he felt they were too good to be thrown away.
Deleted Scenes: Here we get 2min43sec of deleted scenes. The scenes themselves didn’t really do much for the story. One scene shows a dinner date between Joe and Robin.
Extended Scenes: Here we get 9min20sec of extended scenes. The scenes are presented in HD (using AVC MPEG-4 and Dolby Digital Stereo Sound). The scenes themselves only really have a few dialogue differences not really being that different.
Making the Cut: Deleted Shots Montage: This runs 5min47sec and has an introduction from Director Roel Reine. He explains that these deleted scenes were cut together accompanied by the score from Trevor Morris. I will admit that this montage was actually pretty cool to watch perhaps more for the upbeat, heroic quality of the music more so than the quality of the scenes themselves.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

Sony has plans to bring the latest Roland Emmerich film “2012″ starring John Cusack to Blu-ray Disc in March

Justin Sluss — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 01:28:31 +0000

Sony, in an early alert to retailers, has announced plans to bring the latest film from Director Roland Emmerich, “2012” starring John Cusack to Blu-ray Disc on March 2nd. No tech specs have been officially announced yet nor information regarding bonus materials but stay tuned and we will keep you updated. The title is already available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $27.99 price tag for the “2-Disc Special Edition” version and $27.49 for the “Single Disc” version.

UPDATE: A recent trade ad (pictured HERE) reveals that bonus materials will include a Digital Copy and over 90 minutes of materials ranging from Deleted Scenes, “Interactive Mayan Calendar“, Adam Lambert Music Video and nine other featurettes.

(500) Days of Summer – Blu-ray Disc Review

Danielle Byington — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 23:08:06 +0000

has an average rating of 8.1 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
are over an hour with Digital Copy
–
– 2009
– 95 Minutes
– FOX
–
This uses 28.4GB for the movie out of 42.4GB total.

Overall Verdict – Recommended

Buy it for $24.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Danielle Byington —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself is Directed by Marc Webb, with the writing credits of Scott Neustadter and Michael H. Weber.

The movie opens with an interesting introduction, really pressing its disclaimer that it is not a love story. Through this unique intro we are introduced to the main character, Tom, first seeing him smashing dishes against a counter-top in an emotionless manner within his apartment. Two of Tom’s friends, McKenzie (Geoffrey Arend) and Paul (Matthew Gray Gubler) are present in his apartment, however, Tom only finds it reasonable to stop his blind destruction when his little sister, Rachel (Chloe Moretz), arrives via bicycle to intervene. As Rachel offers her big brother a listening-ear and wise-beyond-her-years wisdom, we are shown the anti-love story between Tom and Summer (Zooey Deschanel).

Tom works as a greeting card creator for a company in Los Angeles, a career that is not exactly his desired occupation, as he later discusses his college education and ambitions to have been an architect. The greeting card company is where Tom first sees Summer, as she unintentionally catches his eye across the office as the new secretary. His friends try to convince him with rumors that the new girl is unfriendly and narcissistic, however, once a headphone-donning Tom coincidentally shares an elevator with Summer, her recognition of The Smiths that blares faintly from the sides of his head viciously hooks him on this potentially interesting girl, though she seems to have no intentions of “reeling” him in. A later encounter with Summer at a company karaoke night shows Tom even more about this girl, as she firmly talks about her disbelief in love and boyfriends against Tom’s word, who tries to press some hope in her cold values.

The movie progresses using inter-title sequences informing the audience of the particular day within the 500 days of Tom’s experience with Summer, jumping forward and backwards within the time frame. We see Tom at both opposite ends of the spectrum in emotions through this style of storytelling, from his ecstatic happiness of meeting Summer, to more somber and angry days as he endures her self-built wall against wanting a relationship.

In closing, “(500) Days of Summer” is one of the more unique romantic-comedies to come forth in the past few years amongst the slew of very generic films of the genre. In all of its unconventionality, the movie certainly has a one-of-a-kind style of storytelling, from the spontaneous backward and forward time-jumping through the number of days involving Tom’s experience with Summer, to the scenes of borderline-documentary styled shorts within the film. These snippets make for an approach that feels different from the standard Hollywood romantic-comedy, drawing on many other artistic inspirations. The casting of Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel makes for a believable on-screen sort-of couple, as their performances of two different ideas of a relationship make for another positive note for the movie. Overall, this film’s unconventional style is sure to be something many audiences will not be disappointed with as it receives a “4.5 Star Rating“.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 2.40:1 aspect ratio. Something you will notice upon viewing at least a portion of the film, even without catching the brief filmmaker’s featurette, is the Director’s use of bland colors within the wardrobe as well as the set design. This itself is cast with mostly a neutral to sometimes warm color palette, primarily noticeable within the many interior scenes involving the office, and the characters’ homes. The one subject that breaks this rule is the character of Summer, who has been appointed by the Director’s artistic intent to wear shades of blue. In contrast to the boring surroundings, the blue-adorning character stands out nearly vividly at times in the bright crisp picture of this High Definition release, and may have appeared even less bland against a black level that was a tad more solid. Fleshtones are generally accurate, perhaps a little more brown or murky under the lighting sources within the interiors of the office, and also in comparison to so many surrounding nude tones in the set design.

As you may have noticed in the screenshots, there a few clips that are not exactly standard in your typical Hollywood romantic-comedy. A number of times the story is interrupted by either the sepia-toned 16MM footage that conveys anything from a 1950’s documentary-style short to a dubbed French short, a split-screen showing the two different worlds of the two main characters, as well as the intertitle sequences. It is a unique aspect adding variety to the film’s video quality, and it also used sparingly enough that it does not distract the audience from the story at hand. Excluding these different post-production editions to the film’s footage, the detail visible within the release is slightly above average. At times, it is apparent that DNR has been applied, with the basically non-existent film grain of the 35MM shot footage, and a slightly smoothed appearance of the expected definition more so in some scenes than others. However, the physical features of actors and other subjects that should bare more detail are not thoroughly waxy as seen in other releases that have been destroyed by excessive use of DNR, it is simply that a decent portion of definition in close-ups is absent. Overall, some pieces of the release’s video quality pushed roughly a half star less than the final verdict, however, it is justifiable that in the end it is worthy of a “4 Star Rating“.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. Basically the primary star of this release’s audio track is its accompanying soundtrack, which when in presentation, provides a clear and bright sound from within the soundscape, using mainly the front channels, as well as some softer tones from the rear channels. Other than the songs that accompany the on-screen story, their are no other significant sources of bass presence, leaving the subwoofer in time-out basically through the release’s runtime. Random foley that matches-up with the various settings and surroundings seen in the film comes through the soundscape clearly, with, for example, the mixture of rustling paperwork and soft conversation from within the open office, which often fills the rear channels rather well. There are a couple of instances in which the sound design shows some nifty effort for the 5.1 audio track, such as a scene in which we see Tom begin to play The Smiths on his computer at the office, which is first only conveyed through the center front channel, and subtly through the left and right front channels, until he turns his speaker volume up, thus spreading the sound of The Smiths to the rear channels as well as growing the volume level conveyed by the front channels. Other than these described topics, there is not an excessive amount of breathtaking audible content here, though what is present is definitely worthy of a “4 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials on this release are presented in High Definition (HD), 1080i, and Standard Definition, all using Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo.

“Commentary by Director Marc Webb, Writer Michael Weber, Writer Scott Neustadter, and Actor Joseph Gordon-Levitt“
“Lost Days of Summer: Deleted and Extended Scenes” (HD, 14:42) includes 9 scenes, as well as an optional commentary track.
“Not a Love Story: Making ‘(500) Days of Summer’” (HD, 29:21) is your basic well-rounded “making-of” supplement, including interviews with the filmmaker and cast.
“Summer at Sundance” (HD, 13:46) follows the cast and crew at its showing at the Sundance Film Festival.
“Audition Tapes” (SD) includes the audition tapes of actors Geoffrey Arend (4:23), and Matthew Gray Gubler (2:38), with optional commentary from the Director.
“Summer Storyboards” (SD)

Summer Effect

Marc Webb

Reality/Expectation

Marc Webb

“‘Bank Dance’: Directed by Marc Webb” (SD, 4:18) is an odd film-short featuring Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel as a plotted bank heist turns into a dance.
“Mean’s Cinemash: ‘Sid and Nancy/(500) Days of Summer‘” (HD, 3:28) is another film short featuring Gordon-Levitt and Deschanel as a play on the violent couple which Summer makes a reference to in the film.
“Music Video: ‘Sweet Disposition’ by The Temper Trap” (SD, 4:01)
“Conversations With Zooey and Joseph” (SD, 12:26) includes 6 topics divided into separate chapters.
“Filmmaking Specials” (SD) includes 6 chapters covering topics such as casting the characters, French film references, and more.
Digital Copy is included on this release which is compatible with both PC and Mac as well as Windows Media and iTunes portable devices.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

Universal has plans to bring the latest Coen Brothers film “A Serious Man” to Blu-ray Disc in early February of 2010

Justin Sluss — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 22:33:44 +0000

Universal has announced plans officially to bring the latest film from The Coen Brothers (Joel & Ethan Coen), “A Serious Man“, to Blu-ray Disc on February 9th, 2010. Tech specs include full 1080p Hi-Def video on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) and DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio sound. Bonus materials are set to include the following listed below as well as obvious BD-Live features such as “My Scenes“.

• Becoming Serious
• Creating 1967
• Hebrew and Yiddish for Goys

UPDATE: This title is now available for PRE-ORDER with a $25.99 price tag over at Amazon.

Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs – Blu-ray Disc Review

Brendan Surpless — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 10:19:27 +0000

has an average rating of 7.4 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
mostly in Hi-Def with a DVD included
–
– 2009
– 90 Minutes
– Sony
–
This uses 21.9GB for the movie out of 36.8GB total.
Street Date: January 5th, 2010

Overall Verdict – Nothing “Cloudy” About This

Buy it for $27.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Brendan Surpless —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself was directed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller. Flint Lockwood (voiced by Bill Hader) is your typical unsuccessful scientist who just knows that his next invention will be the one that will get his name out there. The unfortunate aspect is that no one else really believes this, including his father, especially after the numerous failed attempts (flying rodents and a walking tv). Determined to make something of himself, he builds a machine that essentially makes food when water is added to it. All you do is input into a computer what you want and boom, instant food. Launching this at a town convention, the rocket mistakenly launches into the sky making poor Flint think that he has yet another failed invention on his hands. That is until cheeseburgers start falling from the sky!

Now a local celebrity, Flint has started to enjoy this newfound fame pleasing everyone from local citizens to the town’s mayor. Due to this sudden success of his town, the mayor decides to open up this little place to tourists and good old Flint will be making all the food. This certainly sounds fine and dandy until suddenly spaghetti tornadoes and giant meatballs start falling from the sky. Now it’s up to Flint, weather girl Sam Sparks (voiced by Anna Faris) and his talking monkey to save not only the town but the entire world as well. What results is a charming film that features a solid ensemble of voice talent, all of which will appeal to children.

The real enjoyment of this film comes from the simplicity of the story and the characters. Based on the children’s best selling novel, it’s easy to understand why this film was so successful. We have the standard bumbling scientist that no one ever thinks will do anything right. Some how he does do right, only to soon to do wrong, yet finds a way to fix the problem. This plot is nothing new in any sense, but the charm comes from the characters. Flint, in particular, was not only funny in his early attempts at developing machines but also throughout. He’s that geeky guy no one ever thought would make something of himself. The sequence (around 24 minutes in) where he’s trying to teach Sam how to pronounce the F.L.D.S.M.D.F.R is hilarious. The latter scenes where he attempted to court Sam are also touching too. Speaking of Sam, the ever incredibly charming Anna Faris breathes new life into a character we’ve seen before (the truly smart woman who acts stupid to not sound intelligent).

Overall, “Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs” is a rarity in this day and age. An animated film with both heart, emotion, humor and soul. I’m typically very critical when it comes to animated films, but I found myself enjoying “Cloudy” on many levels. Recommended as a perfect family film and in all reality for all ages.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 2.35:1 aspect ratio. With this being an entirely digitally created film, it should come as absolutely no surprise that this makes for an excellent Hi-Def transfer. Colors are bright and bold featuring solid yellows and blues. Detail is perfect with the entire image having that “3-D” pop we’ve come to expect from animation affairs on Blu-ray. Grain is virtually absent as this was digitally created, the film’s print is obviously in great condition. Facial close-ups reveal accurate fleshtones and contrast levels as well. All in all this is an excellent image earning a “5 Star Rating“.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. Dialogue is well reproduced with no instance of drop out or muddled dialogue. No real required volume changes either. LFE is mostly quiet except during the sequence where Flint’s machine rockets away and the giant fish tank starts to roll down the street (around 16 minutes in), is deep and immersive. Atmosphere is solid as well. The initial storm cheeseburger sequence features both thunder and random falling cheeseburgers, which can all be heard via the rears. Pans are invisible between rears creating a nice sound field. When comparing this to other animated soundtracks, “Cloudy” features a solid track, but not as good as others. All in all this earns a “4 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials are presented in High Definition and Standard Definition with Dolby Digital 5.1 Sound.

BD-Live: As per all Sony titles, BD-Live is included and gives access to trailers as well as information on Sony titles.

Splat Mode: This appears to be using Bonus View (which requires you to be on a “Profile 1.1” or higher capable Blu-ray Disc Player). “Splat Mode” here is an option the viewer can activate that allows you to operate Flint’s Food Throwing Machine. The ‘green’ button changes foods, the ‘yellow’ button wipes the screen clean, the ‘blue’ button exits splat mode and returns to the main menu while the ‘red’ button returns to the movie without splat mode.
Flint’s Food Fight Game: This is a game that allows the viewer to help Flint stop the food storm cooked up by the F.L.D.S.M.D.F.R.! The viewer uses the arrow keys on the remote control to move forward, back, left and right. The enter button fires your cannon.
Commentary with Writers/Directors Christopher Miller and Phil Lord, and Actor Bill Hader:
A Recipe for Success: This runs 10min51sec and is a look at the making of the film. Comments from both actors Farris and writers/directors Miller and Lord are included.
Key Ingredients: This runs 12min39sec and looks into the varying voice talent featured in the film.
Extended Scenes: Here we get 2min36sec of extended scenes. The scenes themselves aren’t fully animated but rather in the final production stages.
Early Development Scenes: These development scenes, which run 5min47sec are early storyboard sequences drawn out instead of fully animated.
Progression Reels: This runs 8min9sec and features introductions by Visual FX Supervisor Rob Bredow. As Bredow tells us in the introduction, his main job was to make sure every scene was completely animated and finished in a coherent manner.
Music Video Here we get a music video for the song “Raining Sunshine” by artist Miranda Cosgrove.
Make it Rain Food: This runs a scant 32sec and is basically a clip for Fighting Hunger from ‘Freedom Hunger’.
Previews: Here we get a previews for a few current Sony releases included “Open Season” as well as newer titles like “Planet 51“.
Digital Copy is provided of the film but is only compatible with PSP (PlayStation Portable) and can be transferred straight from the Blu-ray Disc using a PS3 (which Sony assumes you also own). This sucks that iTunes and Windows Media (Mac and PC) users don’t get a digital copy but oh well at least they included some type of one.
DVD of the film is included which makes this a “Combo Pack“. These are really aimed at families and they expect you to buy this, use the DVD for your minivan or S.U.V. for the kids to watch on trips — away from a Hi-Def set.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

Blu-ray Disc Releases for December 29th, 2009

Justin Sluss — Tue, 29 Dec 2009 08:35:55 +0000

The following titles were released today December 29th, 2009 on Blu-ray Disc:

9 (Universal)

A Perfect Getaway (Universal)

Jennifer’s Body (FOX)

The Marine 2 (FOX)

Paranormal Activity (Paramount)

10 Things I Hate About You – Blu-ray Disc Review

Brendan Surpless — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 04:59:08 +0000

has an average rating of 6.9 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
has “making of” in HD & commentary
–
– 1999
– 90 Minutes
– Touchstone (Disney)
–
This uses 24.3GB for the movie out of 30.8GB total.
Street Date: January 5th, 2010

Overall Verdict – One Not to “Hate”

Buy it for $19.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Brendan Surpless —

The Movie Itself was directed by Gil Junger. Cameron (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), a new kid at school, instantly falls for the beautiful Bianca (Larisa Oleynik). The only issue at hand is that Bianca’s parents refuse to let her date unless sister Kat (Julia Stiles) also dates. If only Kat wasn’t seen by nearly everyone at her high school as the last person they would ever want to date (Kat doesn’t really have the best social skills). Looking to be with Bianca, Cameron enlists the assistance of Patrick (Heath Ledger), a school bully, in hopes of being able to charm both Bianca and Kat with Patrick. What results is a film that is both funny and one that shows the pure talent that the late Ledger had.

Loosely based on William Shakespeare’s story “The Taming of the Shrew”, I had never seen “Things” in its entirety before my junior Shakespeare class in college. Having read “The Taming of the Shrew” in the aforementioned class, I recall my professor saying he was only showing us this film as a companion piece to the story, as even though it was loosely based, it was an interesting twist on the story. I had known of both the plot and that Ledger was in it, but just never got around to it. And what a shame that is.

Certainly one of the highlights is the story. Even though it doesn’t really accurately re-tell the Shakespeare tale, it’s still both highly enjoyable and a real charm mainly because of the chemistry between Kat and Patrick. Stiles and Ledger works as they play off one another perfectly, adding a sense of both wit and style to their performances. We immediately sense the loathing Kat feels towards Patrick, and the indifference Patrick feels toward Kat. Initially it would seem that he wouldn’t even give her the time of the day, but she begins to grow on him leading to him trying to court her. Some of the courting techniques are charming and feature situations that we can’t help but smile at.

Overall, “10 Things I Hate About You” is a rare teen comedy that is both intelligent and funny. It’s all too common for ‘teen comedies’ in this day and age to rely more on ‘uncensored’ footage instead of actual plot. “Things” is a welcome change and is highly enjoyable throughout. Recommended for those looking for a smart comedy instead of slack-jawed humor.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 1:85:1 aspect ratio. The film’s color palette tends to focus on more of the brighter colors of California. Yellows, greens and blues all come off fairly accurate. There are a few sequences where the colors do look overly saturated resulting in a loss of detail/clarity to the image (one such example takes place right around 11 minutes where Bianca jumps in Joey’s car). Fleshtones fluctuate from scene to scene. Some of the characters have rather pale looking faces while others have overly bright looking faces. There are a few moments of “3-D” pop but only a few brief sequences. The film’s print is in good condition for the most part. Grain is kept to a minimum only becoming noticeable during some of the darker sequences. All in all this is a fairly good effort from Disney. Fans will be mostly pleased as this earns a “3.5 Star Rating“.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. With a selection of 90s tunes that I’m sure most of us remember hearing, the provided DTS-HD track is a fairly good effort by Touchstone. The selection of both musical (Patrick singing on the bleachers) and song moments come across the front landscape perfectly. Dialogue is well-reproduced but sometimes does have volume issues making us have to reach for the remote on more than one occasion. Dynamics are kept to a minimum as the film’s sound design does tend to focus on more of a front heavy mix. LFE is pretty much absent except the occasional oomph from the varying song selection. Having seen this on dvd a few years back, I will say that this lossless upgrade is a decent upgrade. Fans will be pleased as this is the best “Things” will ever sound. This earns a “3.5 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials are presented in High Definition with Dolby Stereo Sound.

10 Things I Love About 10 Things I Hate About You 10 Years Later: This runs close to 35 minutes and feature a few moments with rare Ledger screen-tests as well as cast and crew comments on the film.
Audio Commentary with co-writers Karen McCullah Lutz & Kristen Smith and actors Andrew Keegan, David Krumholtz, Larissa Oleynik & Susan May Pratt:

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

Family Guy: Something, Something, Something, Dark Side – Blu-ray Disc Review

Brendan Surpless — Sun, 27 Dec 2009 21:44:17 +0000

has an average rating of 7.6 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
include sneak peek & Digital Copy
–
– 2009
– 54 Minutes
– FOX
–
This uses 12.9GB for the movie out of 33.9GB total.

Overall Verdict – Recommended for Fans

Buy it for $18.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Brendan Surpless —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself is the 2nd episode in the “Star Wars: Family Guy” re-telling “Episode V” coming after the remake of “Blue Harvest” (“Episode IV“), which oddly hasn’t been released yet on Blu-ray. The basic story finds Luke Skywalker (Chris) joining forces with Captain Han Solo (Peter) and Leia (Lois) in the hopes of defeating both the empire and Lord Vader (Stewie). The show retells the plot of the film only adding the humor we’ve come to expect from “Family Guy” with numerous instances of both insanity and pure humor.

I could simply sit here and list all the gags featured in the episodes and why they are truly funny. But I’ll avoid that for obvious reasons. The continuing and honestly lasting charm that “Family Guy” has is its ability to insert random moments of insanity that we never ever question but simply can’t help but laugh at. Take in point this one from “Dark Side“. As the Rebels flee from the Empire, the Millennium Falcon enters an asteroid field and, hilariously I might add, John Burnell from “World’s Wildest Police Video” starts narrating the chase inputing that style from the “Videos” show. This is just one of the sequences that is so completely out there but we just laugh at it, never wondering why it was thrown in there. Moments of complete and utter randomness between characters and their surroundings are what makes “Family Guy” what is has become.

While some of the gags here have been seen on the series (fresh off the top of my head is the gag where R2-D2 (Cleveland) falls off the ship on Dagobah and goes “no, no, no” clearly doing the same exact gag as seen in the series (the joke in the series is that Cleveland, after having his house randomly destroyed by Peter, falls to the ground in his bathtub). Yet even though the show revisits the gags over and over, each time they’re presented in a way that we’ll laugh at at least one or more times. Herman playing Obi-Wan is also another nice touch here as Obi-Wan wants to help Luke (Chris) to both keep in line with the story and because, as evident by the show, Herman is a pervert and likes boys like Chris. Lines are switched out resulting in a similar theme as those presented in episodes we’ve seen before, but still remain fresh.

Overall, “Something, Something, Something Dark Side” is enjoyable throughout, has a few laughs and is a good companion piece to “Empire Strikes Back“. While not completely hilarious as some of the series’ episodes, I still think that fans of the show and both “Blue Harvest” will find a lot to enjoy here. Recommended.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 1:33:1 aspect ratio. With this being entirely digital, there is no grain to speak of. Obviously the print is in perfect condition. There aren’t many “3-D” pop moments but there is a good sense of depth to the image. I will mention that the overall image does look impressive at times (especially when compared to the HDTV broadcast). Like most of its other series’ episodes, the color palette here features mostly brighter colors, all of which are bold, bright and defining. Can’t really speak on fleshtones or contrast levels. Really this is a solid image but one that can’t be compared to the upper echelon of animated offerings on Blu-ray. All in all this earns a good “4 Star Rating“.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. With this being a cartoon, there isn’t that much atmosphere here to mention. The mix does tend to focus on a front heavy mix. Dialogue is reproduced just fine with no instance of drop out. The varying music (all taken from “Empire Strikes Back“) and originally composed by John Williams sounded fantastic. This only makes me wish “Star Wars” would come to Blu-ray ASAP! (come on Lucas!!!). LFE is sparse at best with with only a few thumps and bumps here and there while rears are pretty much only active for occasional background noise. I’ll be honest by mentioning that I didn’t expect all that much here and came out fairly pleased with this DTS-HD track. All in all this earns a “3.5 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials are presented in High Definition with Dolby Digital Stereo Sound.

Audio Commentary with Executive Producers Seth MacFarlane, Mark Hentemann and David A. Goodman, Writer Kirker Butler, Director Dominic Polcino and Actor Seth Green:
Family Guy Fact-Ups: This is a pop-up feature that runs along side the feature-length film. This is definitely worth a watch as not only do they show how many voices Macfarlane did (25!), but also other random little facts about both “Star Wars” and the film in question.
The Dark Side of Poster Art: This runs about 9 minutes in length and shows how the film’s poster art was originally painted.
Table Read: This is a table reading of the first 2 acts of the film, Acts 1 and 2. This runs close to the feature length (about 49 minutes) and has many different takes on the dialogue and scenes.
Sneak Peek: Here we get roughly a 3 minute sneak peek at Episode VI of the series.
Digital Copy: Here included is a Digital Copy of the film playable on PC, iPod, etc.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

Anchor Bay is bringing “Law Abiding Citizen” starring Jamie Foxx and Gerard Butler to Blu-ray in February of 2010

Justin Sluss — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 11:58:21 +0000

Anchor Bay (A Starz Company), in a recent trade ad (pictured HERE), has announced plans to bring the 2009 Overture Films release “Law Abiding Citizen” to Blu-ray Disc on February 16th, 2010. The film was directed by F. Gary Gray (of “Be Cool“, “Friday” and “The Italian Job” 2003 remake fame). It stars Jamie Foxx opposite to Gerard Butler and is rated pretty well over at IMDb, where it currently has a 7.3 out of 10 average rating. Tech specs haven’t been officially announced bu should include full 1080p Hi-Def and (likely) a Dolby TrueHD or PCM lossless 5.1 audio mix. Bonus materials are set to include an “UNRATED Director’s Cut“, behind-the-scenes and special effects featurettes and an audio commentary — according to the trade ad. The title is already available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon, mislabeled as a DVD but featuring the Blu-ray cover art and carrying a $27.99 price tag.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets [Ultimate Edition] – Blu-ray Disc Review

Danielle Byington — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 02:46:03 +0000

has an average rating of 7.2 on IMDb
1080p in VC-1 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
are extensive and include collectibles
–
– 2002
– 161 minutes
– Warner
–
Disc 1 uses 39.1GB total.
Disc 2 uses 16.0GB total.

Overall Verdict – A Must-Own for Fans

Buy it for $31.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Danielle Byington —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself was Directed by Chris Columbus who also directed the first of the film franchise, “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone“, and of course other well-known films (“Home Alone“, and “Mrs. Doubtfire“). The film’s screenplay was written by Steve Kloves who has also written the screenplays of all of the other “Harry Potter” films, excluding “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix“; all of which are based on the novels written by J.K. Rowling.

The second year begins as the summer is drawing to an end, and we are shown Harry (Daniel Radcliffe) living through these dull days at the residence of his muggle Aunt and Uncle, Vernon (Richard Griffiths) and Petunia (Fiona Shaw). On this particular evening, Harry’s Aunt and Uncle are having guests over, and are making every threat possible to their unwanted nephew in hopes of keeping him upstairs and quiet. Harry is very familiar with these situations at their home, and though he is very capable of simply lying upstairs making not a peep, a surprise visitor in his bedroom will prevent the silence from enduring. The magical creature, Dobby (voiced by Toby Jones), is a house elf who has come to diligently warn Harry Potter not to return to Hogwarts this year as danger is sure to find him there. However, as Harry does not understand thoroughly “why?”, the house elf keeps interrupting his own explanation by compulsively beating himself in the head, having been conditioned that his actions are “wrong”. All of the racket created by Dobby of course stirs the evening get-together downstairs, leading to a pudding-cake disaster atop one of the important guests.

Though even Harry himself is still confused about the house elf’s visit and warning, Uncle Vernon of course has no toleration for the events and the family takes further measures to isolate their nephew in his room, believing his “freaky friends” had something to do with the flying pudding-cake. The increased security is however merely laughable to the Weasley boys, who later arrive outside of Harry’s window in their father’s enchanted flying car. Taking him away to their much more pleasant home, Harry spends the brief remainder of the summer here with his best friend Ron (Rupert Grint) until it is time to crossover onto platform nine and three-quarters to board the Hogwarts Express. As the other Weasley family members run through the wall at the train station to appear within the Hogwarts Express boarding area out of the eyes of muggles, each one breezes through, including Ginny (Bonnie Wright), the youngest of the siblings heading towards her first year at the school. However, when Harry and Ron attempt to crossover, it seems that the entrance has been magically sealed, leaving the boys trapped on the muggle-side, and separated from Ron’s parents who could help. Beginning to panic, they think of one crazy last resource; they hop inside the flying car and plan to follow the Hogwarts Express to the school.

After the endured treachery of following the train through flying, and surviving the brutal branches of the Whomping Willow they mistakenly land in, the boys have arrived at Hogwarts. Despite the eventful beginning to the school year, classes proceed, and Harry finds that he is the beloved idol of first year student Colin Creevey (Hugh Mitchell), and is oddly the interest of the new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, egotistical Gilderoy Lockhart (Kenneth Branagh). However, having kept in mind the warning given by Dobby, Harry’s typical routines are interrupted by an ominous voice that it seems only he can hear. These events lead to students being found petrified in the halls, and threatening messages written in blood upon the walls intended to frighten those who are not pure-bloods. Now that the Chamber of Secrets has been opened, no one is exactly sure what or who is lurking within, and of course the strong friendship between Harry, Ron, and Hermione will act as what may be the only defense.

Overall, the second year of the characters’ ordeals at Hogwarts in the form of a movie from the book is mostly a bit campy when compared to the other film adaptions from the series. Possibly, the studio really pushed and impressed upon the production team these particular elements as they were putting perhaps too much focus on their young audience, though all age groups are self declared fans of the franchise, simply using their best marketing opinions to create a higher financial turn over. As the opinion always passes through when a film is based on such a popular book, “Was the movie as good as the book?”; the second “Harry Potter” film does convey its original written medium rather well, at least not leaving those who have not read the series lost in the dust, like perhaps the fourth film and on.

Something that must have been enjoyable from the filmmaker’s perspective when it came to making this second film is that the first “Harry Potter” movie had already established the basics of this other world, and Harry’s general situation of having survived an attack from Voldemort. Being that the franchise was intending to shadow the published works of J.K. Rowling, this left room to not only convey the plots of each year at Hogwarts, but to bring a deeper development of the characters from the books to the big-screen. This also seems to be a highlighted theme within the accompanying supplements, as many reflect the cast’s opinions of the characters they portray, and a general analysis of both returning characters and new characters, and the roles they play in not only the second year, but the 7-year story as a whole. The actors’ dedication, as well as their manner of portraying the essence of these fictional characters as directed (in this film) by Christopher Columbus, certainly is a large part of what has created such a solid fan-base.

Regarding the story of the second year itself, looking at it as both the written format and on-screen adaptation, this was merely the beginning of the twists author J.K. Rowling would be presenting to “Harry Potter” fans. These are not just twists that merely effect the plot’s main idea for that respective year, but brilliant twists that you can look either backward or forward within the 7 years and see a ripple effect of each seemingly strategically placed detail, event, or bit of dialogue. Overall, when looking at “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets” along side the other films of the series that exist so far (all but year seven), this piece of the story earns a “3.5 Star Rating“, being of course an important vessel of the story, but baring a slightly less appealing on-screen story than that of the other “Harry Potter” movies.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the VC-1 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 2.40:1 aspect ratio. The general look of the picture on this release consists of a great amount of clarity and definition, being just seven years of age, what the video quality has to offer here is definitely impressive. The color palette often reflects the applied filters, with an appropriate saturation and moderate vibrancy displayed in many subjects, such as the scenes at the train station, and the scenes of the Quidditch match, displaying the bold shades of each house’s respective colors. The majority of interior shots within Hogwarts are a bit more on the warm side, reflecting the intended golden glow of the candles. Looking back, it seems this use of a warm filter was seen more in the earlier “Harry Potter” films, specifically those directed by Christopher Columbus, almost like as the content got darker, so did the filters that were applied. Regardless, fleshtones of the actors are accurate, and the black level is very inky, as mostly seen in the black robes often adorn by the characters.

One primary reason this film feels so “campy” compared to the others is the CG and animatronics within the film. Obviously, the magical world of “Harry Potter was brought to life based on the descriptions loaned by J.K. Rowling’s written works, and much additional creativity was applied to materialize these fictional characters and creatures. The green-screen work of the flying car, the Quidditch match, and the spastic movements of Dobby still look smooth and realistic in High Definition; notably the details put forth in the texture of the house elf’s skin and ragged attire have really paid off with its Hi-Def transfer. On the other hand, High Definition does show-off less smoothly blended work, such as the screaming Mandrakes when they are plucked from their soil by the students. Also something unique within this film is the black and white transition presented as Harry is sucked into the past and witnesses the events lived by Tom Riddle; definition and clarity within these black and white scenes is retained, however, as Harry himself remains in color in this time travel, the bold red of his sweater looks a little smeared in comparison to other scenes. With a certainly impressive Hi-Def transfer for a film with not merely a cast and bland set, but many elements like the many layers of CG applied, the video quality for this release does prove itself to be worth a “4.5 Star Rating“.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. As you may imagine with a production that had a lucrative budget, the sound design efforts you will experience on this release’s audio track are quite impressive. From the film’s beginning of scenes such as Dobby bashing himself on the head with a dresser drawer and lamp, which provides decent yet appropriate thuds from the front channels, to the first appearance of the flying car making its whooshes about the soundscape. Staple subjects of the “Harry Potter” world are done justice as well, such as the shifting staircases that lead to the dormitories, which make for a clear stone-moving-against-stone foley accompanied by a moderately heavy rumble from the subwoofer; also not to be forgotten, the Quidditch match between Gryffindor and Slytherin is an impressive exhibit of what the audio track on this release is worth, with abundant swooshes from the players upon their brooms passing by bouncing about within the soundscape, along with the subwoofer thuds that convey the striking of the Beaters batting at the Bludgers. The subtle echoing effects of voices such as those of Moaning Myrtle and the Basilisk do present a nice reverb as well, mostly heard from the front channels, and occasionally popping up in the rear channels as the on-screen subjects may pass around. Overall, the audio quality for this release earns a definite “4.5 Star Rating” for a rather impressive use of the soundscape.

Bonus Materials are included on all three discs, including two Blu-ray discs, and one DVD. The supplements are presented in both High Definition, as well as Standard Definition, using Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo.

Digital Copy of the film is included on a fourth (DVD-ROM) disc. This is compatible with both iTunes and Windows media portable devices, both Mac and PC. As always, these digital copies are only valid for one year after the release date, so this will expire on December 8th, 2010.

Disc 1:

BD-Live is included on this release which requires the user to be a “Profile 2.0” capable Blu-ray Disc Player for internet connectivity. Once connected, you’ll be able to get the latest trailers from the studio (in this case Universal) as well as share scenes with your friends, chat with “My Chat” or even record your own commentary track via BD-Live and Universal’s Hi-Def website.
Both the Theatrical & Extended Versions of the Film
“In-Movie Experience With Director Christopher Columbus” (Included on the Theatrical Version) includes “Picture-In-Picture“, Storyboard Comparisons, and Still Galleries, all of which take an intensive look at the production of the film from many aspects, including green-screen work.

Disc 2:

“Creating the World of ‘Harry Potter‘, Part 2: Characters” (1080i, 1 hour, 20 minutes) discusses bringing the essence of the characters from the books to the big-screen.
“‘Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets‘ Revealed” (SD, 13:02) examines new ideas the filmmaker had for the second round, new obstacles of film making, and bring the cast back together.
“Screen Tests” (HD, 11:53) includes one screen test of Daniel Radcliffe, and one of the trio, Radcliffe, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint.
“Deleted Scenes” (HD, 17:02) contains a nice sum of 19 scenes.
“Teaser Trailer” (SD, 2:06)
“Theatrical Trailer” (HD, 2:11)
“TV Spots” (SD, 9:01) includes 17 TV spots.

Disc 3 (DVD):

“Game Preview” (2:30) includes 6 clips from the “Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets” video game.
“Additional Scenes” (17:41) includes 19 scenes.
“Lockhart’s Classroom” a supplement all about Professor Lockhart and how great he is, including a “Photo Gallery” (12 pictures), “Certificates” (37 seconds), and “Required Reading” (51 seconds).
“Extra Credit” is a brief preview giving details to the variety of mini-games available on this disc when inserted in your PC’s DVD-ROM.
“Behind Hogwarts” includes:

Conversation With J.K. Rowling and Steve Kloves

Dumbledore’s Office

Build a Scene

Tour Dumbledore’s Office

Interviews With Students, Professors, and More

Gallery of Production Sketches

“Activities” includes four interactive supplements:

The Chamber Challenge

The Forbidden Forest Challenge

Colin’s Darkroom

Tour Diagon Alley

“Spellcaster Knowledge” is an interactive game that shows the viewer various clips from the film consisting of characters casting spells. The clip pauses before the spell’s effect takes action, and you must guess from a list of choices what the spell’s outcome is.

Physical Bonus Materials:

Two Character Cards are included; the entire collection is obtainable through owning all 7 years of the “Harry Potter” Ultimate Editions.
“Creating the Characters of ‘Harry Potter‘” is a 48-page hardcover book included with the release.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

Summit Entertainment plans to bring the 2009 movie adaptation of “Astro Boy” to Blu-ray in March of 2010

Justin Sluss — Fri, 25 Dec 2009 02:23:27 +0000

Summit Entertainment, in an early alert to retailers, has announced plans to bring the 2009 computer animated film adaptation of (the comic book series) “Astro Boy” to Blu-ray Disc on March 16th, 2010. The film features the voices of Freddie Highmore (as the lead character), Nicolas Cage, Kristen Bell and many others. No tech specs or information yet regarding bonus materials but the title is already available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $24.49 price tag. Stay tuned for further information regarding this release (in the form of updates).

Brendan’s Top 10 Blu-ray Releases of 2009

Brendan Surpless — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 22:48:26 +0000

Brendan Surpless here.

I can’t believe another year has come to a close so quickly. 2009 was an interesting year for the Blu-ray format. Not only did we have rock-bottom prices on players from many manufacturers, Sony finally allowing bitstreaming of lossless audio on the PS3, numerous classics being released, but also the announcement that 3D is coming sooner than we’ve expected (especially with the recent release of James Cameron’s EXCELLENT “Avatar“). With that said, here you’ll find my personal list of the Top 10 Blu-ray releases of 2009.

#1 – “UP” – Disney

has an average rating of 8.5 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 MA & DTS-HD 2.0 MA
are great with a DVD & Digital Copy

#2 – “Knowing” – Summit Entertainment

has an average rating of 6.7 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
are ALL in 1080i Hi-Def with BD-Live

#3 – “District 9” – Sony

has an average rating of 8.4 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
are ALL in HD & include a PS3 Demo!

#4 – “Braveheart” – Paramount

has an average rating of 8.4 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
Dolby TrueHD 5.1
are over 2 hours & partially HD

#5 – “Fight Club” – Fox

has an average rating of 8.8 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
with NEW exclusive content & DVD ports

#6 – “Inglorious Basterds“- Universal

has an average rating of 8.5 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
are mostly Hi-Def with Digital Copy

#7 – “Rocky: The Undisputed Collection” – MGM

rated 8.0, 6.7, 6.2, 5.9, 4.4 & 7.4 on IMDb
1080p in MPEG-2 & AVC on SIX discs
DTS-HD 5.1 MA & PCM 5.1
includes an extra disc with new content

#8 – “Funny People” – Universal

has an average rating of 7.2 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
include over 11 HOURS of footage

#9 – North By Northwest – Warner

has an average rating of 8.6 on IMDb
1080p in VC-1 on a 50gb disc
Dolby TrueHD 5.1 & Dolby Digital 5.1
with a “DigiBook“, DVD ports & more!

#10 – John Adams – HBO

has an average rating of 8.9 on IMDb
1080p in VC-1 on THREE 50gb discs
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
are in Hi-Def & include Trivia Tracks

Article written by: Brendan Surpless

Extract – Blu-ray Disc Review

Brendan Surpless — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 20:54:57 +0000

has an average rating of 6.7 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
only has deleted scenes & “making of”
–
– 2009
– 92 Minutes
– Miramax (Disney)
–
This uses 44.8GB total.

Overall Verdict – A Comedic Misfire

Buy it for $24.49 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Brendan Surpless —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself was written and directed by Mike Judge (known for the comedic classic called “Office Space“). Joel (Jason Bateman is the owner of the moderately successful Reynolds Extract plant in the middle of nowhere. While this might sound like a good laugh to you and I, Joel is at a crossroads. He loves his wife Suzie (Kristen Wiig), but her 8 O’Clock tie-up (ie if he’s not home by 8 he’s not getting any) has him contemplating what he should do. Best buddy and local bar owner Dean (Ben Affleck) convinces Joel (after a mistakenly induced horse tranquilizer pill) to hire a gigolo to have an affair with his wife all so he can be okay with having an affair with new employee Cindy (Mila Kunis). Add to it that a freak accident leaves his most devoted employee “Step” (Clifton Collins) debating on whether or not to sue Joel, and you have quite the formula for what sounds like an all around hilarious movie. However, what results is a film that surely does have more than a few laughs but hugely misfires on overall impact mainly because the film all too often jumps from scene to scene leaving the viewer wondering what the hell just happened.

What made “Office Space” work on the level it did regardless of repeated viewings was that the film was not only a rich satire on cubicle work but also a poke at corporate america (“with every decision you make, you should ask yourself. IS THIS GOOD FOR THE COMPANY.”) It’s items like this, perhaps wrong on my part, I expected out of “Extract“. Early previews made the film look quite funny and I’ll admit it, the film is quite funny in some parts. Take for example the scene where Joel is convinced to smoke pot by Dean. Clearly having no prior experience in this, the whole scene is just hilarious with the big guy yelling at Joel to inhale. And let’s not forget the extended amount of exhale from the big guy. Obviously overdone but damn hilarious. And then the next immediate scene is just not funny at all, a random collection of sequences that somehow has to do with the film. This is what kills the potential lasting impact “Extract” may have had for both Judge and “Space” fans. I won’t certainly say that every single sequence in “Office Space” is downright hilarious (in my opinion the first half of the film works far better than the latter half), but at least each scene worked with one another. “Extract” has too many sequences where you just wonder what direction the story was trying to take. Almost like Judge tried to put far too much into the script. And this is a true, true shame as the supporting cast is by far the best part here.

Ben Affleck, Mila Kunis, J.K. Simmons, Jason Bateman, Kristen Wiig and David Koechner. An all-star supporting cast would most definitely make for a super fun comedic affair no? Well, the no is right. And that’s a damn shame in my book. While I will admit that each try their absolute best with Simmons and his calling everyone ‘dinkis’ being quite the riot, their overall impact won’t really be remembered simply because the film just isn’t that funny. All too often Koechner’s character, as Joel’s annoying neighbor, was trying to channel Lumbergh (hell he even had a “if you could get me that check tomorrow, that would be great.”). Rule #1 is you don’t try to recreate characters from your past efforts, especially one’s like the legendary Bill Lumbergh! Bateman definitely did steal the show, which comes as no surprise as “Arrested Development” might be one of the best comedies to ever be created. His wife Wiig wasn’t doing much for me but her ending piece with Joel’s neighbor was both shocking and funny. Affleck and Knuis was both more subdued in their supporting roles but did add a bit to some of the humor (more how Affleck’s character knew so much about different pills despite never taking them).

Overall, “Extract” is a mind-boggle of a film. I figured with both Mike Judge and an excellent supporting cast including Affleck and Simmons, that we might have a home run here. Perhaps my expectations were set to high (I consider “Office Space” to be one of the best comedies ever), but I was sorely disappointed here.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 1:85:1 aspect ratio. The main issue here is that while this is the best “Extract” will ever look, the transfer just lacks anything that makes hi-definition what it is. The black level is somewhat solid and fleshtones are somewhat accurate, for the most part, but still the color palette has been toned down a bit or altered in some way (likely in post-production). I’m not sure if this was caused by the way the film was shot (as IMDb has no information on camera usage) or was a post-production decision. Detail is lacking as well with fluctuations between great (outside shots of the extract plant) to poor (interiors of the plant). The transfer is faithful to Judge’s intentions, but perhaps I expected more especially considering his “Office Space” looks great. All in all this earns an average “4 Star Rating” for overall video quality.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. The provided DTS-HD track is better than the provided video transfer but not by that much. While surrounds do kick in during some of the musical sequences, I expected far more atmosphere here. Granted this is a comedy and most do tend to focus on the front channels, but this one barely ever extended itself to the rears. I will say that dialogue is well reproduced and won’t require any sort of of volume change. LFE is pretty much absent here never really becoming active. Even the film’s score, which in most comedic affairs will provide a bit of LFE, was no help here. The odd aspect is that with a setting like a busy bottling plant, you would expect a bit more activity here no? Well it seems almost like they shot the scene then added in all the extras and what not afterwards as this bottling plant is strangely quiet. It’s items’ like this make this track a big disappointment earning a decent “3 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials are presented in High Definition and Standard Definition with Dolby Digital 5.1 Sound.

Deleted Scene (SD): Here’s a very brief deleted scene (40sec) that is kind of funny.
Extended Scenes: Here’s more extended scenes (4min29sec) that are enjoyable but not really the kind of scenes that will merit further viewing.
Mike Judge’s Secret Recipe (HD): This runs 10min48sec and features the cast and crew speaking on the making of the film.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

Image Entertainment bringing the 2009 film “House Broken” starring Danny DeVito to Blu-ray in March of 2010

Justin Sluss — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 17:54:36 +0000

Image Entertainment, in an early alert to retailers, has announced plans to bring the 2009 film “House Broken” starring Danny DeVito and directed by Sam Harper to Blu-ray Disc on March 30th, 2010. This comes first as great news considering earlier this week people were saying the studio/distributor was close to filing for bankruptcy. Word is now the company is selling $30 million dollars in stock to avoid filing “Chapter 11″. With that financial news regarding the company out of the way, I’ll say that tech specs and bonus materials are currently not yet announced. The title is already available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $24.99 price tag. Stay tuned for further details.

Universal bringing “Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant” with John C. Reilly to Blu-ray in February of 2010

Justin Sluss — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 02:26:28 +0000

Universal has announced plans to bring the 2009 film “Cirque du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant” directed by Paul Weitz and starring John C. Reilly to Blu-ray Disc on February 23rd, 2010. Tech specs include full 1080p Hi-Def and DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio sound. Bonus materials are set to include Deleted Scenes, “A Guide to Becoming a Vampire“, and “Tour du Freak” featurettes as well as obvious BD-Live portal.

UPDATE: This title is now available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $25.99 price tag.

Blu-ray Disc Releases for December 22nd, 2009

Justin Sluss — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 15:56:26 +0000

The following titles were released today December 22nd, 2009 on Blu-ray Disc:

(500) Days of Summer (FOX)

All About Steve (FOX)

American Pie Presents: The Book of Love (Universal)

Beyond a Reasonable Doubt (Anchor Bay/Starz)

District 9 (Sony)

Extract (Disney/Miramax)

Family Guy Presents: Something Something Something Dark Side (FOX)

It Might Get Loud (Sony)

Sony announces plans to bring “Breaking Bad: The Complete Second Season” to Blu-ray Disc in early March of 2010

Justin Sluss — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 20:07:17 +0000

Sony, in an early alert to retailers, has announced plans to bring the very popular series “Breaking Bad” (created by Vince Gilligan) to Blu-ray Disc in the form of “Breaking Bad: The Complete Second Season” on March 16th, 2010. No word yet if they have any plans to bring the first season out or tech specs on this release. The title is available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $34.99 price tag. Stay tuned for further details on this TV show release.

District 9 – Blu-ray Disc Review

Justin Sluss — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 17:34:27 +0000

has an average rating of 8.4 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
are ALL in HD & include a PS3 Demo!
–
– 2009
– 112 minutes
– Sony
–
Street Date: December 22nd, 2009
This uses 22.8GB for the movie out of 45.7GB total.

Overall Verdict – A Solid Recommendation

Buy it for $17.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Justin Sluss —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself was Produced by Peter Jackson (of “The Lord of the Rings” live-action trilogy films fame), co-wrote and Directed by Neill Blomkamp. The screenplay was co-wrote by Terri Tatchell and as mentioned, Blomkamp. The film started out as a short and basically a project that came of the original plan to make a “Halo” video game adaptation motion picture, originally then said to have Jackson serving as director or producer. That project got canceled and instead of wasting this momentum to do a Sci-Fi, Jackson put his producing efforts and funding behind this concept created by Blomkamp & Tatchell. The result is undoubtedly one of the most unique Sci-Fi films made in the past few decades, with lots of obvious messages in it’s story and also political undertones about the situation in South Africa where the film takes place. Now I know, as far as Sci-Fi films go, especially ones about an alien “first contact” situation, it may sound a bit weird to be in a South African setting but keep in mind two things; First and foremost, the filmmaker (Neill Blomkamp) is originally from South Africa and secondly he uses this in his film to convey his message and to prove that we are (mostly as Americans) stereotypical to think the first alien contact would come in the form of a U.F.O. over The White House in Washington, D.C. — that only happens in Roland Emmerich films.

The concept itself spawned actually from co-writer/director Neill Blomkamp’s 2005 6 minute short film “Alive in Joburg“. Sadly this original short is nowhere to be found on this Blu-ray Disc release but I felt this was worth mentioning where the story originated specifically for those interested. Another thing worth mentioning is that Blomkamp learned most of his 3D skills using software made by the man who plays our lead character in the film, Sharlto Copley who was also a friend previous to this film.

The film for the first act and a bit of the second act has mostly a documentary style approach to it following our main character “Wikus Van De Merwe” (played brilliantly by Sharlto Copley) who works with the “MNU” (short for “Multi-National United“), a large corporation put in charge by the South African government of controlling the alien population that is left in the town of Johannesburg in an area called “District 9” — where the film gets it’s name. As we learn from the early bit of the film in documentary style interviews with “Wikus” and others, the U.F.O. originally appeared above the city of Johannesburg during the mid-1980’s and appeared to stuck or not capable of communication. The South African government sent in military to the U.F.O. and had them blowtorch an opening in the vessel, only to find the ship’s inhabits in very poor weak condition. Much like immigrants from another country are treated, our illegal (literal) aliens are put in to this large camp to be kept away from the human inhabitants of the city.

This plan has worked for now twenty years until now, as we are in the present day setting (presumably 2009) where our main character and worker for MNU has been put in charge of evicting the alien inhabitants and moving them to a new location, more like a concentration camp. This is where the real action starts and our film really develops it’s strong story focusing mainly around “Wikus” and a couple alien characters.

In closing, as I said earlier, “District 9” is undoubtedly one of the most unique, innovative Science Fiction (Sci-Fi) films I have seen in the past few decades. What is so crazy about that is that this didn’t have some huge insane budget, just a very talented crew of filmmakers, CG animators, motion capture actor(s) and so forth. If you missed this in it’s theatrical run or just want to witness it again (and again), pick up “District 9” tomorrow (December 22nd, 2009) on Blu-ray Disc from Sony.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 1.85:1 aspect ratio. First and foremost, the black level here is very solid which helps bring out a great amount of detail, especially in close-ups. The obvious amount of CG (computer generated) animation for the aliens and their ship looks very realistic, almost comparable to such huge blockbuster Hollywood films such as “Transformers“. The color palette is very vibrant here, especially in shots that are meant to be cinematic — more-so than the documentary style footage. The documentary style footage does look great but has a different look to it as it was shot on a hand-held Sony EX1 Hi-Def digital camera. The cinematic style footage was shot digitally on a Red One camera in Hi-Def. The fleshtones are accurate, with our main character “Wikus” serving as a great comparison piece to our alien co-stars.

Overall, the blend between the documentary and cinematic styles of this film works out great and delivers an extremely impressive Hi-Def visual presentation on Blu-ray Disc; enough to earn it an almost perfect “4.5 Star Rating” for overall video quality. Kudos to Sony and of course the Director, Director of Photography and so forth for a job well done.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. LFE is present but nowhere near it’s peak during the first act of the film, as it is more of a documentary style during that act (the first 30-45 minutes or so). Dialogue is distinct and delivered perfectly throughout, never requiring any volume adjustments of any sort. Once we get to acts 2 and 3 of the film (the last hour or so), the LFE really starts to rattle and let you know your subwoofer is on. The amount of rear channel presence throughout the film (all 3 acts) is very impressive and enough to keep you very involved with the action happening onscreen. The audio presentation is at times (namely acts 2 and 3) worthy of being called “demo material” and with that being said, it really should come as no surprise that this earns a perfect “5 Star Rating” for overall audio quality. Again, just as I said for video quality, kudos to the folks at Sony and the film’s sound designer(s) for a job well done.

Bonus materials are ALL presented in High Definition (HD) using the AVC MPEG-4 codec for video and Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo sound @192kbps unless otherwise noted.

BD-Live is included on this Sony Blu-ray Disc release which requires the user to be on a “Profile 2.0” capable Blu-ray Disc Player with internet connectivity. This release includes a number of BD-Live enabled features such as “movieIQ” & “cinechat“.
Audio Commentary with Director/Co-Writer Neill Blomkamp
“Joburg From Above: Satellite and Schematics of the World of District 9 – Interactive Map” allows you to look at the different types of technology, aliens in such in the film as you watch using the arrow keys and “enter” button on your remote. It should go without saying, because of the subtitle, that this is an interactive feature and not featurette.
“Deleted Scenes” (23:28 – HD) may be in Hi-Def but its not as good of quality as the film itself is presented in. These scenes do prove to be entertaining, a bit more informative into this Sci-Fi fantasy world and are worth the watch if you enjoyed the film.
“The Alien Agenda: A Filmmaker’s Log” (34:19 HD) gives us a great glimpse at how this project came to be and how Peter Jackson (of “The Lord of the Rings” live-action film trilogy fame) who offers a good interview. Most importantly though we get interviews with the Director/Co-Writer Neill Blomkamp discussing doing a film based in South Africa as well other interviews with cast and crew members.
“Metamorphasis: The Transformation of Wikus” (9:52 – HD) is pretty interesting if you like to see how make-up and “old school” special effects are applied and such.
“Innovation: The Acting and Improvisation of District 9” (12:05 – HD) takes a look at the improvisation and documentary style blend used here and what it took to get it to be just right.
“Conception and Design: Creating the World of District 9” (13:18 – HD) should be self-explanatory by it’s title.
“Alien Generation: The Visual Effects of District 9” (10:18 – HD) should be self-explanatory by it’s title.
Digital Copy is included on this release first on the Blu-ray for Sony PlayStation 3 owners to transfer a digital copy to their PSP (PlayStation Portable). For the rest of us, we get a digital copy on a 2nd DVD-ROM disc which is compatible with both PC and Mac, Windows Media and iTunes portable devices.
“God of War III Demo” is included for Sony PlayStation 3 users. This is the demo from E3 this year and lasts a good 15 minutes or so, depending on how good you are at the game. Once you complete the demo you will get a short little “making of” style featurette from a couple of the guys that are working on the game. This is a FIRST from Sony to include a PS3 Demo on a Blu-ray Disc release and I hope its the first of many to come. This is a really cool bonus feature for PS3 owners — especially since you can’t download this yet on the PlayStation Network, it seems to be exclusive to this release and the E3 trade show.

Overall, the bonus materials we get here are very impressive (ALL in Hi-Def) and pretty lengthy. The digital copy and the PS3 Demo (of “God of War III“) inclusions are also very awesome — for those capable of enjoying those features. Fans of the film will definitely be pleased with the supplemental materials found here.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

Summit Entertainment plans to bring the 2009 horror film “Sorority Row” to Blu-ray Disc in late February of 2010

Justin Sluss — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 22:14:07 +0000

Summit Entertainment has plans, according to an early announcement to retailers, to bring the 2009 horror film “Sorority Row” to Blu-ray Disc on February 23rd, 2010. No tech specs or bonus materials have yet been announced but the titles is already available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $24.49 price tag. Stay tuned for further details regarding this release.

Paramount apparently plans to bring “South Park: The Complete Thirteenth Season” to Blu-ray in March of 2010

Justin Sluss — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 17:21:21 +0000

Paramount, in an early alert to retailers, has announced plans to bring “South Park: The Complete Thirteenth Season” to Blu-ray Disc on March 16th, 2010. Tech specs have yet to be announced officially, but let us hope they include 1080p Hi-Def instead of the 1080i on the past season. Bonus materials haven’t been officially announced yet either but word is that each episode will contain at least “mini-commentaries” from Trey Parker & Matt Stone. The title is already available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $40.49 price tag. Stay tuned for more details and in the meantime, watch full length episodes from this season over at South Park Studios.

SHOUT! Factory announces plans to bring the Joe Dante directed 1978 film “Piranha” to Blu-ray in April of 2010

Justin Sluss — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 16:54:55 +0000

Distributor SHOUT! Factory has announced plans, in an early alert to retailers, to bring the 1978 Joe Dante directed, Roger Corman (executive) produced film “Piranha” to Blu-ray Disc on April 6th, 2010 — as part of the “Roger Corman Cult Classics” collection. No tech specs or information on bonus materials yet but stay tuned and we will keep you posted. The title is already available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $19.49 price tag. Most of you probably know Director Joe Dante from directing some great 1980’s films like “Gremlins“, “The Howling” and “The Burbs“.

A Perfect Getaway – Blu-ray Disc Review

Brendan Surpless — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 22:13:16 +0000

has an average rating of 6.5 on IMDb
1080p in VC-1 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
only includes an Alternate Ending
– &
– 2009
– 98 minutes & 108 minutes (UNRATED)
– Universal
–
This uses 44.8GB total.
Street Date: December 29th, 2009

Overall Verdict – A Well-Crafted Thriller

Buy it for $26.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Brendan Surpless —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself was written and directed by David Twohy (known for directing both “Pitch Black” and “The Chronicles of Riddick“). Cliff (Steve Zahn) and Cydney (Milla Jovovich) are a newly married couple spending their honeymoon on a Hawaiian island. While hiking to a nearby beach, they overhear of a gruesome murder involving a recently married couple. Along the way they meet another couple, Nick (Timothy Olyphant) and Gina (Kiele Sanchez), both who view one another as somewhat odd. To make matters even worse it’s announced that the killer may have escaped to another island, making both couples wonder if they can trust one another. Is everyone exactly who they seem or does something deeper lurk? With sudden twists and a rather shocking conclusion, what results is a well-crafted thriller with all-around convincing performances.

Thrillers can either be really good (this one) or really bad (one off the top of my head is “Prom Night“). Where a film like “Night” completely fall apart is that the performances were dull, lacked passion or anything worth merit and the story was turtle paced. “Getaway“, on the other hand, is a well-paced, written movie with smart twists and sudden turns that will keep the audience interested throughout. I had heard many positive cheers for the film before seeing it in theaters this past August. Not only was this film genuinely scary at points (not like a “Paranormal Activity” per say), but it was actually intelligent and didn’t ever take its audience for granted. Never does “Getaway” feel it should drop little hints about what is to come or who is really hero or villain. Instead “Getaway” moves along with a fluid pace and keeps us guessing throughout as we don’t know which character is which. There are numerous instances where each could play either side of the card. And each do this with ease.

The performances here really capture the essence of the film and do make it into something more than what it ever could be. After all think about this. After the film concluded, did you ever stop and think ‘wow, that’s the most original thriller I’ve ever seen’. Probably not, but the performances really help to bring this above the a-typical thriller. Most notable are both Olyphant (who is quite underrated in nearly all of his roles) and Jovovich (who successfully plays off the sudden twists and delivers them home with a sense of truth). I can’t really speak too much on what makes their roles what they are without giving away major plot points, however I will note that these performances are quite solid.

Overall, “A Perfect Getaway” is the perfect (pun intended) getaway after a long day at the horse race. With performances that capture the tense theme of the film, beautiful locales and a plot that keeps you guessing, “A Perfect Getaway” is well worth a rental for those who love thrillers and are looking for a fun, well-made movie.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the VC-1 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 2:35:1 aspect ratio. The single handed best aspect of this transfer are the wide shots of the varying Hawaiian islands. They show the true sense of high-definition as well as the detail the transfer has to it. The close-up detail, whether it be the locales or the characters, all looked excellent. Fleshtones were solid while contrast levels were accurate. The characters all have a somewhat golden look to them but one can assume this is more to capture the essence of the Hawaiian heat. The film’s color palette tends to focus more on the warmer colors like the blues of the ocean water and the greens of the forests. Grain isn’t really all too present really anywhere throughout the film. This could either be a suspect of DNR or perhaps how the film was shot (IMDb doesn’t have any information on this). The only slight aspect that holds this back is towards the end of the film there’s a few blips on one of the characters (look for it during the final helicopter scene). Besides that this is a faithful transfer that is identical to the theatrical experience. All in all this earns a fantastic “4.5 Star Rating“.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1. The provided DTS-HD track perfectly captures the Hawaiian landscape. Dialogue is well reproduced with no instance of drop out. There are a few moments where the viewer might need to increase the volume a bit due to the background noise, but this doesn’t occur more than once. LFE is solid when present but I expected a bit more here especially considering the vast locale. LFE only really occurs toward the latter part of the film when things become tense. Dynamics are well spread through the rears and pans are excellent with effect blending well between left rear and right rear. Atmosphere is good as well with numerous instances making us feel like we’re watching from the background (items like birds chirping and background dialogue create a solid sense of us being there). All in all this is a fine effort from Universal earning a “4 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials are presented in High Definition (VC-1 codec) with Dolby Digital 2.0 Sound.

BD-Live: Here, as per other Universal titles, BD-Live capable players (2.0) are able to access their BD-Live Center where one can download bonus content and view their latest trailers. Also included is their new pocket Blu, which gives iPhone and iPod Touch users access to exclusive bonus content from their devices.
Alternate Ending: Here we get to see what director Twohy had planned for the original ending to the film. The clip runs 2min39sec and is an interesting alternate take on the character played by Milla Jovovich.
D-Box motion code is include for those with the equipment capable of decoding this.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

BREAKING NEWS! Blu-ray Disc Association announces final specifications for 3D which will be compatible with the PS3

Justin Sluss — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 15:59:10 +0000

The BDA (Blu-ray Disc Association) today has announced the final specifications on 3D in Hi-Def and they include mention of Sony’s PlayStation 3 console being already capable of decoding 3D content. They also go in to some detail as to how the content will be encoded and delivered to consumers on other Blu-ray Disc Players, some of which will mean the consumer needs to upgrade to a new BD Player with 3D capabilities. We’ll have more information on this as it is going to be heavily promoted next month at CES (the Consumer Electronics Show) in Vegas.

UPDATE: Home Media Magazine and Video Business have both posted very in-depth articles (found HERE and HERE). Both articles are very much worth reading as they have further discussion and details on this finalization of the specs for 3D on Blu-ray announcement and interviews we couldn’t get. Plus, I’ve actually had the pleasure (at trade shows and whatnot) of personally meeting both the writers of those articles on separate occasions; great folks at both publications.

Below you will find the majority of the PRESS RELEASE from Blu-ray Disc Association.

LOS ANGELES–(BUSINESS WIRE)–The Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) today announced the finalization and release of the “Blu-ray 3D” specification. The specification, which represents the work of the leading Hollywood studios and consumer electronic and computer manufacturers, will enable the home entertainment industry to bring the 3D experience into consumers’ living rooms on Blu-ray Disc, the most capable high definition home entertainment platform.

“Throughout this year, movie goers have shown an overwhelming preference for 3D when presented with the option to see a theatrical release in either 3D or 2D,” said Victor Matsuda, chairman, BDA Global Promotions Committee. “We believe this demand for 3D content will carry over into the home now that we have, in Blu-ray Disc, a medium that can deliver a quality Full HD 3D experience to the living room.”

The “Blu-ray 3D” specification fully leverages the technical advantages of the Blu-ray Disc format to deliver unmatched picture quality as well as uniformity and compatibility across the full range of Blu-ray 3D products, both hardware and software. Notably, the specification allows every Blu-ray 3D player and movie to deliver Full HD 1080p resolution to each eye, thereby maintaining the industry leading image quality to which Blu-ray Disc viewers are accustomed. Moreover, the specification is display agnostic, meaning that Blu-ray 3D products will deliver the 3D image to any compatible 3D display, regardless of whether that display uses LCD, Plasma or other technology and regardless of what 3D technology the display uses to deliver the image to the viewer’s eyes.

“From a technological perspective, it is simply the best available platform for bringing 3D into the home,” said Benn Carr, chairman, BDA 3D Task Force. “The disc capacity and bit rates Blu-ray Disc provides enable us to deliver 3D in Full HD 1080p high definition resolution.”

The Blu-ray 3D specification is also designed to allow PS3 game consoles to play back Blu-ray 3D content in 3D. Additionally, the specification supports playback of 2D discs in forthcoming 3D players and can enable 2D playback of Blu-ray 3D discs on the large installed base of Blu-ray Disc players currently in homes around the world.

“In 2009 we saw Blu-ray firmly establish itself as the most rapidly adopted packaged media format ever introduced,” said Matsuda. “We think the broad and rapid acceptance Blu-ray Disc already enjoys with consumers will be a factor in accelerating the uptake of 3D in the home. In the meantime, existing players and libraries can continue to be fully enjoyed as consumers consider extending into 3D home entertainment.”

The Blu-ray 3D specification calls for encoding 3D video using the Multiview Video Coding (MVC) codec, an extension to the ITU-T H.264 Advanced Video Coding (AVC) codec currently supported by all Blu-ray Disc players. MPEG4-MVC compresses both left and right eye views with a typical 50% overhead compared to equivalent 2D content, and can provide full 1080p resolution backward compatibility with current 2D Blu-ray Disc players. The specification also incorporates enhanced graphic features for 3D. These features provide a new experience for users, enabling navigation using 3D graphic menus and displaying 3D subtitles positioned in 3D video.

The completed specification will be available shortly and provides individual manufacturers and content providers with the technical information and guidelines necessary to develop, announce and bring products to market pursuant to their own internal planning cycles and timetables.

Warner announces plans for Blu-ray Disc / DVD “Combo” releases & a slew of “Double Feature” releases for Q1 2010

Justin Sluss — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 02:37:01 +0000

Warner has just issued a PRESS RELEASE announcing plans to bring some Blu-ray Disc / DVD “Combo” releases and a slew of “Double Feature” Blu-ray Disc releases in 2010.

The “Combo” (both Blu-ray Disc and DVD) releases will be standard starting in Q1 of 2010 on all new theatrical releases. The releases will include a BD (Blu-ray Disc), a DVD and a Digital Copy of the film. Below you’ll find specific details on this (taken from the press release).

Beginning in the first quarter of 2010, Warner Home Video will be releasing its entire Theatrical New Release slate as Blu-ray combo packs, containing a Blu-ray Disc of the film with exclusive special features and exciting BD-Live interactivity, a standard-definition DVD and a Digital Copy of the film. For no additional cost, Blu-ray combo packs offer consumers significantly more value by merging the unsurpassed quality of Blu-ray with the convenience of being able to watch the film in any format, on just about every playback device.

Also, starting in Q1 of 2010 the studio will start issuing “Double Feature” releases. The first titles set to receive this treatment are going to street on February 23rd, 2010 and include “Dirty Harry” & “Magnum Force“, “Analyze This” & “Analyze That“, “Presumed Innocent” & “Frantic“, “Miss Congeniality” & “Miss Congeniality 2” and last, but far from least — my own personal favorites — “Grumpy Old Men” & “Grumpier Old Men“. Each double feature release will carry a $24.98 MSRP.

None of these titles are yet available for pre-order listing, nor do we have complete details on the bonus materials or tech specs but check back and we will try to keep you updated.

Lionsgate already has plans to bring the Syfy original mini-series “Alice” to Blu-ray Disc in March of 2010

Justin Sluss — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 19:42:21 +0000

Lionsgate has officially announced plans to bring the 2009 Syfy original mini-series “Alice” (based on the classic “Alice in Wonderland” story) to Blu-ray Disc on March 2nd, 2010. The mini-series premiered earlier this month and stars Caterina Scorsone as “Alice“, Kathy Bates as “The Queen of Hearts“, Tim Curry as “Dodo” and Harry Dean Stanton as “Caterpillar” to just name a few cast members. Tech specs are not yet confirmed but if it’s any indication from previous Lionsgate releases, I’d say to expect full 1080p Hi-Def and a DTS-HD Master Audio track in a 5.1 or 7.1 configuration. Bonus materials also have not yet been announced, but stay tuned and we will keep you updated.

UPDATE: This title is now available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $20.99 price tag.

Warner gives more proof that “The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy” is coming to Blu-ray in April 2010

Justin Sluss — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 21:12:31 +0000

Warner (New Line) has just issued a trade ad (pictured above) that serves as even further proof that they are in fact bringing “The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy” to Blu-ray Disc on April 6th, 2010. As you’ll see in the ad, this will feature a Digital Copy of each film (in it’s theatrical form) and contain bonus materials well over 7 hours in length with BD-Live title specific interactivity as well. The trilogy (box set) is already available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $69.99 price tag.

UPDATE: For those true fans out there curious what the bonus materials will exactly contain, how many discs it will be on and so forth I’ve contained a complete bit of info taken from the press site, click on the continue reading below to see this, as I had to hide it from the front page as it runs RATHER lengthy.

Product Type: Sell Through
Pack Count: 2
Media Quantity: 9
Disc Configuration: BD – 50, DVD 9
Packaging Type: Slipcase – (3-6 disc) BD Case
Run Time: 557
Product Language: English
Subtitles: English, Spanish, French, German, Portuguese, Czech, Slovenian, Romanian, Croatian, Bulgarian, Polish, Russian, Hungarian, Latvian
Aspect Ratio:
Original Aspect Ratio – 2.40
Sound Quality:
Stereo – English
Dolby 5.1 MLP – English
DVD Features:
“Disc 1 Fellowship of the Ring Feature
Trailers
“The Lord of the Rings: Aragorn’s Quest” Game Trailer
“The Lord of the Rings” Trilogy Supertrailer]
“The Lord of the Rings: War in the North” Game Trailer

“Disc 2″ Welcome to Middle-Earth: Houghton Mifflin In-Store Special
Quest for the Ring: FOX TV Special
A Passage to Middle-Earth: SCI-FI Channel Special
Finding Hobbiton
Hobbiton Comes Alive
Believing the World of Bree
Ringwraiths: The Fallen Kings
Rivendell: The Elven Refuge
Languages of Middle-Earth
Two Wizards
Music of Middle-Earth
Elijah Wood, Viggo Mortensen,,Orlando Bloom,,Cate Blanchett,,Liv Tyler,
Ian McKellen
Weathertop: The Windy Hill
MTV
Fellowship
To Ten/AFI
Phenomenon
Academy Nomination
Epic Oscar
Enya “May it Be” Music Video
Special Extended DVD Edition Preview
Behind the Scenes Preview of “The Two Towers”

“Disc 3 The Two Towers Feature
Trailers
“The Lord of the Rings: Aragorn’s Quest” Game Trailer
“The Lord of the Rings” Trilogy Supertrailer
“The Lord of the Rings: War in the North” Game Trailer Only

“Disc 4 On the Set “The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers” – Starz Encore Special
Return to Middle-Earth: WB Special
“The Long and Short of It” A Short Film Directed by Sean Astin
The Making of “The Long and Short of It”
Forces of Darkness
Designing the Sounds of Middle-Earth
Edoras: The Rohan Capital
Creatures of Middle-Earth
Gandalf the White
Arms and Armor
The Battle of Helm’s Deep
Bringing Gollum to Life
New Power, Another, Event, Dream Darkness, Return,Strike,Countdown,,One
World Review, The Wait is Over
Review B/Golden Globes
Gollum,Supreme Review
Review A/Globe, Good Top 10
Top 10 Review, Emiliana Torrini “Gollum’s Song” Music Video
Special Extended DVD Edition Preview
Behind the Scenes Preview of “The Return of the King”

“Disc 5 Return of the King Feature
Trailers
“The Lord of the Rings” Trilogy Supertrailer
“The Lord of the Rings: Aragorn’s Quest” Game Trailer
“The Lord of the Rings: War in the North” Game Trailer

“Disc 6 The Quest Fulfilled: A Director’s Vision
A Filmaker’s journey: Making “The Return of the King”
National Geogrpahic Special – “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King”
Aragorn’s Destiny, Minas Tirith: Captial of Gondor
The Battle of Pelennor Fields, Samwise the Brave
Eowyn: White Lady of Rohan, Digital Horse Doubles
Heart/Frodo, Every Path, Test, Aragorn, Time, Every Step, Sword, Decided
Time Review
Decided Review
Step Golden Globes
Globe Noms
New Epic Globe
Special Extended DVD Edition Preview

“Disc 7 DCOD – Fellowship of the Ring

“Disc 8 DCOD – The Two Towers

“Disc 9 DCOD – Return of the King

Blu-ray Disc Releases for December 15th, 2009

Justin Sluss — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 14:10:30 +0000

The following titles were released today December 15th, 2009 on Blu-ray Disc:

G-Force (Disney)

The Hangover (Warner)

Inglourious Basterds (Universal)

The Mel Brooks Collection (FOX/MGM)

The Other Man (Image Entertainment)

Star Trek: The Original Series Season 3 (Paramount)

Taking Woodstock (Universal)

Universal plans to bring the Vince Vaughn film “Couples Retreat” to Blu-ray in 2010 just in time for Valentine’s

Justin Sluss — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 22:14:11 +0000

Universal has announced plans to bring the 2009 romantic comedy “Couples Retreat” starring Vince Vaughn to Blu-ray Disc sometime in early Q1 of 2010, the ad says “just in time for Valentine’s Day”. With that being said, I’m guessing sometime like early February it will get as a release date. No tech specs yet but judging from their previous releases I’d say expect full 1080p Hi-Def and DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. Bonus materials are set to include BD-Live (with “Pocket Blu“), Digital Copy and such, but no title specific supplemental content has been mentioned as of yet, just those features.

UPDATE: Universal has just announced an official release date for this — February 9th, 2010. A PRE-ORDER listing is now available over at Amazon with a $25.99 price tag.

Anchor Bay announces plans to bring Michael Moore’s “Capitalism: A Love Story” to Blu-ray in March of 2010

Justin Sluss — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 21:49:48 +0000

Anchor Bay (A Starz Company) has announced plans to bring the 2009 Michael Moore documentary “Capitalism: A Love Story” to Blu-ray Disc on March 9th, 2010. Tech specs include full 1080p Hi-Def video in the 1.78:1 aspect ratio and Dolby TrueHD 7.1 Surround sound. The title isn’t yet available for pre-order but stay tuned and we will keep you updated. Bonus materials are set to include an exclusive featurette on the Blu-ray, as well as a Digital Copy of the film and plus the 80 minutes or so of standard DVD bonus materials which are listed below (taken from the PRESS RELEASE).

• Harvard Professor Elizabeth Warren on How Wall Street Got Away with Murder
· The Man Who Might Save Flint
· U.S. Congressman Elijah Cummings on Why We Should Consider Discarding Capitalism
· Pulitzer Prize-winning NY Times Reporter Chris Hedges on Capitalism: the Killer
· Father Dick Preston on Why the Rich Man Can’t Buy His Way Into Heaven
· What if We had Listened to Jimmy Carter?
· Michael Pollan (The Omnivore’s Dilemma) and People Who Grow Food Without Capitalism
· “You Talkin’ to Me?” – Taxi Drivers in Wisconsin Go All Crazy for Democracy
· The Ideas Behind a Worker-Owned Business
· Here’s an Idea: The People’s Bank of North Dakota
· Miami Max Has a House for You

UPDATE: This title is now available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon with a $35.99 price tag. Apparently the truth doesn’t come cheap.

9 – Blu-ray Disc Review

Brendan Surpless — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 16:07:32 +0000

has an average rating of 7.1 on IMDb
1080p in VC-1 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
include BD-Live and U-Control
–
– 2009
– 80 minutes
– Universal
–
This uses 42.1GB total.
Street Date: December 29th, 2009

Overall Verdict – A True Gem/Highly Recommended

Buy it for $24.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Brendan Surpless —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself was produced by Tim Burton (“The Nightmare Before Christmas“) and Timur Bekmambetov (“Wanted“) and was directed by Shane Acker. The world as we know it has seemingly come to an end. Humanity has been nearly wiped out thanks in part to a scientists creation gone mad. Trying to fix this error in humanity final days, he gives his final creation life. These 9 creatures now must band together and wade throw an entirely unrecognizable barren landscape of darkness and machinery if they hope to change the course of history. What results is a truly excellent animation effort that, while dark in its tone, needs to be seen.

While watching “9“, I continuously found myself amazed by what was on screen. Not necessarily because of the stunning visuals (which they truly are, more on that later) but more how the film was able to take a dark and serious tone and turn it into something that, hopefully, will reach a far bigger audience than it previously has. The real charm and long-lasting appeal here came both in part from the story and the wide-array of voice talents. The story, while certainly nothing new (more of a less-violent spin-off of “The Terminator” series where machines have eliminated their human counterparts), was still refreshing enough to be interesting. Perhaps in part because of just how the film created a world of barren nothingness into something that has heart. As each of the ‘9′ band together in hopes of destroying these machines and surviving, we feel for everyone of them. Emotion in animation is honestly only really ever dealt with in Pixar films, which help to make them longer and more impacting in the long run.

Instead of banding together random voice actors, the creators of “9” brought in voice talent that not only added substance to their roles but made us actually believe in the emotion. Both Plummer as “1” and Wood as “9” were the two standouts here. Clearly having opposite ideas of what needs to be done in order to survive (more of a sit back vs. stand up and fight), the emotion was felt in their performances. Animation efforts that lack this (*cough* “Shrek” *cough*) end up resulting in studios that are relying too much on pretty visuals instead of overall impacting quality. And this is where and hopefully why “9” will have a lasting place in the tops of modern animation.

Overall, “9” is a stunning effort from producers Burton, Bejmambetov and director Acker. All three have banded together to create a story that isn’t exactly fresh in our minds but have brought a new take on this through performances that had pure emotion and impressive visuals. While this film wasn’t the biggest success during its theatrical run, I truly hope this finds a bigger audience here on Blu-ray.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the VC-1 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 1:85:1 aspect ratio. Created inside of DeLuxe laboratories according to IMDb, a film like “9“, as expected, looks stunning in hi-def. The film’s color palette, focusing more on the darker side of the spectrum, features bold and inky blacks. Even though all of the film does have that post-apocolyptic feel to its color range, detail is never really lost. In fact just look at our first screenshot capture “here for evidence. This close-up of the designers finger shows each little texture. With this film being digitally created, there’s no grain to really speak of and the film’s print is in immaculate condition as well. There are numerous instances of “3-D” pop as well creating an image that is perfect for demo material. While some may not say this image is as demo worthy as other animation titans like Pixar films, one can’t deny that is truly an extraordinary transfer earning a “5 Star Rating“.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in English DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1. The real amazement of this track is how well it balances everything. Dialogue is expertly reproduced with no instance of drop out. Even though some may complain that the voice actors (like Wood) do speak a bit low, I found that with my AVR at a comfortable 55 with the Center at a +2db, dialogue was never an issue. Dynamics are excellent as well. Such an example is the initial attack by the machines. Here not only are the dynamics great creating a really solid sense of atmosphere (and a 360 degree sound field) but the LFE is also deep and immersive. With my ED sub set at 35%, the bass output was some of the best I’ve seen out of any title this year (with the possible exception being “ROTF“). Pans between rears are fluid as each effect balances itself perfectly. In a word this is a stunner of a track, certainly my new demo FILM considering it’s short length. This earns a perfect “5 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials are presented in both Standard Definition (MPEG-2 codec) and High Definition (VC-1 codec) with Dolby Digital 2.0 Sound.

BD-Live: Here, as per other Universal titles, BD-Live capable players (2.0) are able to access their BD-Live Center where one can download bonus content and view their latest trailers. Also included is their new pocket Blu, which gives iPhone and iPod Touch users access to exclusive bonus content from their devices.

U-Control: Also included here in their patented U-Control, this time giving access to Picture In Picture. Director Acker gives us a behind-the-scenes take on the creation of the entire film all while the film plays.

Deleted Scenes (SD): Here we get 7min24sec worth of deleted scenes that aren’t fully animated but rather rough cuts. Each are definitely worth checking out as they do delve a bit more into the film.
9 – The Original Short (SD): Here is the original 2005 short that runs 10min33sec. This is the short that director Acker was nominated for an Academy Award for.
The Long and Short of It (HD): This runs 16min28sec and looks how Acker turned the above 11 minute short into a full-length 80 minute feature. Everything from script development to budgets are talked about here.
The Look of 9 (HD): This runs 13min12sec and gives us a glance into the physical texture look of “9“.
Acting Out (HD): This runs 4min54sec and shows how animation director Joe Ksander animated “9’s” unique human characters.
Audio Commentary with writer/director/animator Shane Acker, animation director Joe Ksander, head of story Ryan O’Loughlin and editor Nick Kenway:

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

Panasonic TH-65VX100U Plasma HDTV – Hardware Review

James Segars — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 18:07:00 +0000

“Panasonic’s sixty-five inch Plasma might not be the biggest on the market, but it is a gorgeous set all the same.”

NOTE: This is just our third Hardware Review so let me describe how we will be doing things. You can view the Hardware View in either HTML (Web) format below or you can download the Adobe Acrobat PDF file presentation by clicking the image below. The second option reads more like a magazine hardware review. This PDF layout was created by myself James Segars (with the help of Justin Sluss) and will be the style that all our future hardware reviews will be published in, as well as the basic HTML below.

this requires Adobe Reader to view.

With continual and frequent advances in LCD/LED technology, the abandonment of Pioneer’s Kuro/ELITE Plasma line, and potentially game-changing energy conservation legislation looming overhead it would appear that the days of Plasma Display Technology are numbered. Moreover, the high-cost/high-value paradigm that has long since ruled the Home Theater market has been forced to evolve under the pressure of a stressed economy with people instead opting for low-cost/high-value products whenever possible.

This is sad not only because of the hard times faced by all, but also because an exceptional display technology is facing extinction, or at the very least, exclusion from major retail outlets because the market might not be “viable” in the not-so-distant future.

I myself, am a huge advocate for Plasma because I believe that it offers unparalleled picture quality, and the finest black levels to date. Plasma ensures a reference quality viewing experience regardless of the content or the viewing conditions/angle, one that will leave an everlasting impression on you.

Thankfully, in spite of everything, Panasonic is clearly intent on keeping the Plasma technology alive, offering up new, bigger, better and thinner plasma displays than ever before. One such plasma display, the new TH-65VX100U, was sent to me for review. Over the course of my two week loan I did my best to put it through its paces and at the end of it all, I began to wonder what might happen if I had an extra $6,250 dollars laying around. Assuming this was excess cash, money that was not going to be missed, would I opt to purchase the display? Would it be worth it?

— Review by: James Segars —

ARRIVAL AND UNBOXING

One sunny afternoon in early October, a mysterious crate showed up at my house (see picture above). I was told that there would be some helping hands to move the display into the living room, but none were provided. Luckily, the crate had casters on the bottom, and the entire weight (plasma included) was just slightly over two-hundred pounds and while that is certainly too heavy for one person to lift and navigate around the house I was fortunate that my brother was in town (thanks, Mike).

Once inside, I flipped and twisted the clamp locks on the front half of the removable crate, and repeated it on the rear half. After this, all that was left of the crate was the base. I debated whether or not I should remove the unit from the crate entirely, but I found it all-too convenient to simply keep the Plasma on this movable platform. And so I rolled the display into place in front of the living room window, locked the wheels down, and began running the necessary power and HDMI cables in order to get the display up and on.

Before I proceed, I’d just like to say that I hope that every owner of this Display gets one of these fantastic crates to go along with their set. This packaging far exceeds the standard heavy-duty cardboard that most every display is shipped in these days. Consider if you will, the fact that with this crate, you can safely and assuredly move or ship your Plasma anywhere in the world (the airport stickers on the exterior of the case would certainly support this theory) without fear of damaging it. Personally, I think that’s a dream come true, so much so that if there were an option to have this type of crate over a traditional throw-away box, I would throw down the extra cash (if necessary) just to have one of these on hand.

A “CERTIFIED” TWEAKER

First and foremost, it should be stated that I am not ISF (Image Science Foundation) certified, nor am I a trained THX Professional calibrator. I am — like so many AV/HT enthusiasts — a self-taught “tweaker.” I use that word to describe my standing in the world of calibration professionals because I am not certified and true professionals would have a cow if every “tweaker” proclaimed themselves a “calibrator” — but at the same time, I am very passionate about the science and the craft of calibration. Therefore, because I possess a basic knowledge and a genuine interest in display calibration, I feel that I am qualified more than the average consumer to inform them about how the process works. Also, every disc I use to evaluate my displays are available for purchase and they won’t set you back any more than a typical Blu-ray might.

I feel that this is extremely important to mention for a couple reasons: 1) Anyone can perform the most basic calibration processes with the help of the on-disc tutorials or help pages, and 2) Through these basic adjustments, you should be able to get roughly ninety-percent of the total potential out of your display, and if not, you can rest assured that you will have a far better picture than you did when you started in the factory default mode (most of the time, anyway). Now, while you can get close to perfection with consumer grade calibration tools/discs, it should be obvious that they are not an alternative to professional calibration, instead it should be considered a supplement at best. In other words, the only way you can be sure that you are getting the maximum performance or the perfect picture out of your HDTV/Projector is if you fork over the cash to have your display professionally calibrated by certified and trained professionals.

PICTURE MENU/TWEAKING

Well, now that you know about my background and perhaps a little bit about calibration, it’s time to get down to my findings regarding the TH-65VX100U. Much to my surprise, there were very few setup options for the Plasma. I was expecting to find a dizzying array of variable settings, but the picture menu for this display was relatively simple. I imagine most of the advanced controls are tucked safely away in the engineer (hidden) menus, and rightly so.

No matter, I went about calibrating and adjusting the display as best I could with my disc-based patterns. Once more, I was surprised to find that the display didn’t require much adjustment beyond the factory default picture settings. This is good for two reasons: 1) Panasonic has seen fit to turn loose a Plasma that requires very minimal picture adjustment (instead of juicing, and boosting the brightness/saturation) and 2) because the out-of-box defaults are within earshot (mostly) of the tweaked settings, calibration is quick and easy, and if you should so choose (although we won’t recommend this) you can bypass the tweaking process altogether.

Any way you slice it, the picture quality — with or without calibration — can be extremely stunning. In setting the picture menu, I opted for the “Cinema” setting, boosted the “Picture” value, dropped the overall brightness a bit down after running a variety of High/Low Pluge (Picture Line-Up GEnerator) patterns, upped the Tint value by one tick after evaluating color/tint patterns through a blue filter, adjusted the color temp. to “normal”, and left the Sharpness at zero (didn’t notice any pronounced halos on the overscan/sharpness patterns).

ADVANCED MENU

As for the advanced menu, I left much of this untouched if only because I don’t have the proper equipment or know-how to do a lot of the advanced color adjustments. Nonetheless, it’s important to double check the input level, black extension and gamma settings on your set. These two settings can drastically affect your perceived black levels — ranging from uber-crushed to terribly washed out. I found that with my all of my input devices, I achieved the best results with an input level of “0”, gamma setting of “2.2”, and black extension at “0”. Your results may vary, so it’s important to toggle through the settings (preferably while looking at a Pluge pattern instead of a random film freeze frame) but just know that if the settings are not quite right, your picture could suffer significantly. Of course, when in doubt (or if you don’t like what you’ve done) simply restore the factory defaults by (in this case) clicking on the “Normalize” button at the top of the advanced picture menu.

NOISE REDUCTION

The last item I’d like to touch on inside the Advanced Menu is “Noise Reduction”. Over the course of my two-week evaluation, I tried virtually all combinations of settings under the noise reduction submenu. As for your basic options, you can choose from: OFF, MIN, MID, MAX, or ADV (Advanced). In the end, I opted for no noise reduction at all, but I’ll come back to that in a minute.

For the first week however, I was content with using the ADV setting, and further tweaking the levels of noise reduction categories even further. If you’re like me, and you’re so inclined to explore the advanced Noise Reduction menu, you’ll find that you can tweak each primary category of noise reduction (Video Noise, Block Noise, Mosquito Noise) individually and in incremental values no less, from OFF, to MIN, to MID, to MAX. Through the use of Qdeo’s HD Evaluation disc, I found these settings (Video – MID, Block – MIN, Mosquito – MIN) to yield very pleasing results, with satisfactory noise reduction, while still maintaining a very detailed picture.

However, outside of the evaluation materials, I found the Noise Reduction to be a bit too intrusive and troublesome. At first glance — particularly if there was minimal movement in the frame — everything seemed to be perfect, but if there was a decent amount of movement, or fast moving action, it appeared as though the noise reduction was trying to play catchup with the image on screen, blurring the detail ever-so-slightly — something that we (as Blu-ray reviewers) are trained to look for. I hadn’t noticed it right away, but as usual when you take notice of a irritating anomaly, it’s impossible to NOT see it. And so I ended up turning off the Noise Reduction altogether. Typically, I prefer to disable Noise Reduction when and wherever possible, but I figured that I should give it the benefit of the doubt here on this display.

The way I see it, a slightly noisier/grainier picture is far better than a waxy/scrubbed picture. I know I’m not alone in that preference, but I also know that there are more than few people that can’t stand grain and noise. As for the latter, we’ll just have to agree to disagree.

NOTE: A COMPLETE LIST OF MY SETTINGS ARE LISTED AT THE END OF THE REVIEW FOR YOUR CONVENIENCE.

SO GOOD IT HERTZ

Moving on, I wanted to test the handling of 24p(hz) video from my Blu-ray player. With a quick look to the “Signal” menu, I confirmed that the display was indeed accepting and displaying the 24hz signal correctly. Interestingly, but not entirely desirable (so far as I could tell), you can toggle the Refresh Rate from 100hz down to 50hz in the Signal Menu, but you can only do so when the display is being fed 24p/hz content. I dropped the refresh rate to see what effect it would have on the picture, and it caused the picture to flicker quite distractingly. On the flipside, with the 100hz refresh rate (where the display is otherwise locked) the 24hz/60hz signals were free of any apparent flickering, and by all accounts very true to source.

SCALING/DE-INTERLACING

As for scaling, the display wasn’t quite up to snuff, but I can hardly fault it because this is a feature that should really be handled by the output device, in my opinion. Using the display as your scaler should be a last resort option. Nonetheless, I dropped the output resolution of my HD DVR to 480i and witnessed a smattering of feathering artifacts and blurred detail as the display scaled the SD content as best it could.

Now, with regard to de-interlacing capabilities, the display fared much better, but I would stop short of saying “exceptional.” Using the Spears & Munsil Edge Adaptive De-interlacing test patterns and video material, I found that there were simply more edge-adaptive artifacts when the display was doing the heavy lifting (de-interlacing). This is not to say that the de-interlacing was poor, I actually found it to be pretty good, but the bottom line is that your respective output devices will look their best when they are outputting a progressive (1080p) signal.

Normally, this shouldn’t be a problem, but because HD cable is still output exclusively in 1080i, and in my case, the HD-A30 I use has issues outputting progressive material (firmware update introduced horrible jaggies/feathering), 1080i is the best way to go, and so it’s important that displays should be able to de-interlace properly — and in an ideal world, they should be able to do it flawlessly.

ODD FINDINGS

With the calibration/evaluation process mostly out of the way, after having cycled through countless patterns and evaluation videos, I felt like I had a pretty good handle on this set, and its capabilities. While it is, by and large, a positively stunning set, and its size alone will easily distract and woo you, I noticed a couple small anomalies.

The first is an odd horizontal darkening/additive effect that can be seen when a bright bar/line/object is on the screen. The area to the left and right of the bright object is darkened slightly, but noticeably. In normal viewing conditions, I didn’t notice this effect, in fact it is almost exclusively restricted to simple and limited color schemes (white/black, white/green, etc…). I’ve included pictures of this under the “Miscellaneous Pictures” section at the end of the review. As I said before, it isn’t noticeable under normal viewing conditions, and it is most definitely not a deal breaker for me, but I felt I should make note of it all the same.

Next, I noticed a slight smearing/blurring effect, surrounding bright colors moving rapidly against dark backgrounds. As for an example of this, imagine a brisk panning shot (in any direction) in a pitch black basement, save for the light of a single desk lamp. This blurring delay/smearing is minimal, but definitely noticeable if you’re looking for it. As for what it looks like, it reminds me ever so slightly of the ghosting effect you would see on older VHS camcorders as bright lights streaked across the screen. To be perfectly clear, it is nowhere near that extreme. I don’t want to alarm anyone, or dissuade any potential buyers, but I do think that it too is worth mentioning even if its a minor nuisance.

Lastly (and this is most likely related to the previous anomaly) I found that scrolling vertical/horizontal text occasionally suffered from this ghosting/smearing effect when the text was moving very fast. When it moved at a normal pace, it was next to impossible to spot the effect.

Very Lastly, for those of you that are wondering, there are no speakers built into the display. I hardly think this is a shortcoming or cause for complaint because if you’re throwing down the money for an A-Class Plasma Display you should probably have a dedicated Home Theater setup to compliment the unit. Even still, there are L/R speaker output jacks on the rear of the display should you decide to connect an existing set of speakers, and pass the audio through the unit.

GENERAL USAGE/VIEWING

My viewing evaluation method was broken up over the course of two weeks. During that time I sampled/viewed over fifteen films on blu-ray/hd dvd as well as select video games and HD cable (FiOS) programming. As for my settings, they are listed at the end of this review for your convenience.

• Week One •

Viewed: Transformers, The Dark Knight, Zodiac, Paris Je T’aime, Baraka, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, The Phantom of the Opera, and Uncharted (PS3 Game).

When it comes to judging a plasma television, you’d be entirely remiss or irresponsible if you managed to neglect feeding it the Blu-ray titles that feature the best, deepest, inkiest blacks on the market. Naturally, The Dark Knight was one of the first on my “to watch” list, and the display soared through the movie with notable ease.

Because there is no dynamic iris (as you might find on front projectors) and no dynamic contrast, you are guaranteed a definitive black level throughout, or in other words, you will bear witness to an exceptionally consistent image where bright images shine, and the darkest scenes are perfectly detailed, with outstanding shadow delineation and stellar black levels. No where was this more evident than with The Dark Knight, which as the title suggests, spends much of its running time wallowing in the shadows of Gotham city.

I particularly like throwing this film at displays because it serves as a litmus test — or bullshit detector if you prefer. Most TV’s handle bright images very well, but if you throw up a scene from The Dark Knight, they simply struggle to reproduce all of the detail found in the deep, dark extremes of the film image. Simply put, it is no easy task, and this Plasma blew me away, to the point where I almost considered swapping out my front projector… almost.

As for the rest of the week’s viewing material, I was primarily concerned with evaluating the color accuracy/saturation with titles like Baraka, Paris Je T’aime, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, shadow delineation and fine black level details in Zodiac, and The Phantom of the Opera, and lastly, I just had fun playing through the first Uncharted game (in time for the sequel’s arrival) and watching Transformers to cap off the week.

All in all, I found that the display presented the wide variety of material wonderfully, and I admittedly had a very hard time prying my eyes away from it throughout the first week, and this isn’t because of the size factor. I am — although I’m almost ashamed to admit it — essentially desensitized to big screens since the installation of my 104” front projection screen.

No, the real magnetism or appeal of the display comes from its exceptional color reproduction, image brightness, and vacuous black level. Positively splendid.

• Week Two •

Viewed: Casablanca, Cloverfield, 2001: A Space Odyssey, Youth Without Youth, Blade Runner, The Godfather, Batman Begins, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.

Having chewed through a variety of challenging films in the first week, I decided that I’d throw an even greater assortment of films at the display during the second week of evaluation; a dizzying array of classic pictures from different decades, up to some of the most recent digitally photographed films of the modern age.

I was genuinely pleased with the resulting image quality. Whether it was the impeccable reproduction of the finely detailed classics like Casablanca, and 2001: A Space Odyssey or the colorful and revealing presentation of the animated classic, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, this Plasma display “wowed” me thoroughly.

When it came to some of the darker fare (Batman Begins, Cloverfield and Blade Runner) the set performed perfectly in line with my expectations that had been established over the course of the first week’s viewing. All of the dark sections of the image were solid — without being crushed — and finely detailed wherever intended.

Lastly, with Youth Without Youth — one of my favorite Blu-rays — the display presented the all-digital image to perfection, preserving its slight video glaze while also lending a certain filmic look to the material at the same time, and the same is true for Cloverfield (which can be particularly problematic for some displays to present accurately). As the two week evaluation drew to a close, I realized that my time with the display was soon to be over, and that the time would soon come when I had to say…

SO LONG, FAREWELL

I’ll be honest. It was no easy task to say goodbye to this stunning Plasma display. If I had the disposable income that would warrant or provoke a purchase such as this one, I would surely drop the necessary money to keep the display. It’s a wonderful piece of hardware, and Plasma is a fantastic display technology, and it would make a fantastic addition/alternative to my current home theater setup with the front projection system. However, the reality is that I don’t have the funds to make that dream possible. I’m also very content with my front projector (HC4900) and the image it provides me. Still though, I can’t argue with the fact that this display positively destroys my projectors black levels. It’s simply no contest. But of course, there are always going to be pros and cons, ups and down in the world of displays. At the end of the day, you just have to determine what you’re willing to sacrifice in order to get what you want out of your system. As for me, I chose a larger (projected) image with satisfactory blacks, over a smaller image with some of the best blacks. Sure, I’m over-simplifying the differences between the two display technologies/methods (front projection vs. plasma) but that’s what it ultimately came down to for me — that and the fact that most entry plasmas were twice the cost of my projector when I bought it.

Price is still a major hurdle for many people when it comes to plasma tvs, and sadly I don’t foresee that changing in the future. But quite honestly though, I don’t see that being a problem for Panasonic either. With the market almost exclusively theirs — after Pioneer’s surprise departure — and a slew of new and exciting advancements in their Plasma line-up, including the forthcoming 3D Plasma displays, there’s plenty to get excited about and assuredly plenty of benefits that plasma can lay claim to if only to secure itself a cozy little niche, and a dedicated fan base — myself included.

This Plasma may not be perfect in every way — taking into consideration the various issues mentioned previously — but it is a stunning set nonetheless.

• Evaluation Hardware/Sources •

Playback Devices:

Toshiba HD-A30 HD DVD player
Oppo BDP-83 Blu-ray Player
Playstation 3 – 40gb System

Calibration/Evaluation Discs:
Digital Video Essentials HD Basics
Qdeo HD Video Evaluation
Spears & Munsil – High Definition Benchmark
HQV HD Evaluation – HD DVD

• Finalized Settings •

Note: These values should be taken at face value. I am not a certified ISF or THX professional.

* Settings: Picture Menu (Cinema), Picture (+15), Brightness (-9), Color (0), Tint (+1), Sharpness (0), Color Temp (normal), Color Management (off)

* Advanced Settings: Black Extension (0), Input Level (0), Gamma (2.2), AGCAGC (off), W/B HIGH (r-0, b-0, g-0), W/B LOLOW (r-0, b-0, g-0), 3:2 Pulldown (off), Noise Reduction (off)

Product Images:
click a thumbnail below for a larger view

Warner (New Line) finally plans to bring “The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy” to Blu-ray in April 2010

Justin Sluss — Sun, 13 Dec 2009 15:54:49 +0000

Peter Jackson fans will be happy to know that Warner (distributor and parent company to New Line) apparently finally has plans to bring “The Lord of the Rings: The Motion Picture Trilogy” to Blu-ray Disc on April 6th, 2010 with a $99.98 MSRP. This is according to an article in this week’s issue of Video Business (said article found HERE). As said before, when previously announced and then delayed, this will contain the Theatrical cuts of the film and not the “Extended Cuts“. Fans will have to wait until “The Hobbit” film (recently delayed) hits theaters before they will see those “Extended Cuts” hit Hi-Def. Bonus materials are going to be quite lengthy at over seven hours and the box set will span across 9 discs total. Each film will include a Digital Copy as well. A PRE-ORDER listing is available over at Amazon with a $69.99 price tag.

Magnolia announces plans to bring John Woo’s 2008 film “Red Cliff” to Blu-ray in 2 different versions late March of 2010

Justin Sluss — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 19:19:09 +0000

Magnolia Home Entertainment has announced plans, in an early alert to retailers, to bring the 2008 film “Red Cliff” (a.k.a. “Chi bi” by it’s Chinese title) directed by John Woo to Blu-ray Disc on March 30th, 2010 in two different versions. The first version (found HERE) will be the cheapest at $20.99 and includes the U.S. version of the film that has a 148 minute runtime. The second version is the “2-Disc International Version” (found HERE) which has a $24.49 price tag and a whopping 288 minute runtime. Both titles are available for PRE-ORDER over at Amazon. Tech specs have yet to be announced as well as bonus materials but stay tuned and we will keep you updated.

Disney apparently has plans to bring both “Toy Story” & “Toy Story 2″ from Pixar to Blu-ray Disc in March of 2010

Justin Sluss — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 17:30:32 +0000

Disney, in an early alert to retailers, has announced plans to bring Pixar’s “Toy Story” and “Toy Story 2” to Blu-ray Disc on March 23rd, 2010. Tech specs have yet to be officially announced but you can expect full 1080p Hi-Def and at least a lossless 5.1 (or possibly 7.1) sound mix for each film. Stay tuned for further details, such as an official press release — expected likely later this month. Bonus materials are set to include DVD combo packs for each film and the following listed below.

“Toy Story” bonus materials:

* Toy Story 3 Sneak Peek: “The Story”
* Buzz Lightyear Mission Logs: Blast Off
* Paths to Pixar: Artists
* Studio Stories:
o John’s Car
o Baby AJ
o Studio Stories: Scooter Races
* Buzz Takes Manhattan
* Black Friday: The ‘Toy Story’ You Never Saw

“Toy Story 2” bonus materials:

* Toy Story 3 Sneak Peek: “The Characters”
* Buzz Lightyear Mission Logs: International Space Station
* Paths to Pixar: Technical Artists
* Studio Stories:
o ‘Toy Story 2′ Sleep Deprivation Lab
o Pinocchio
o The Movie Vanishes
* Pixar’s Zoetrop
* Celebrating Our Friend Joe Ranft
* BD Live-Portal

UPDATE: Both titles now have PRE-ORDER listings over at Amazon with each carrying a $27.99 price tag. Click on their titles or the (temporary) cover art above to find the pre-order listing links.

Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian – Blu-ray Disc Review

Brendan Surpless — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 11:19:45 +0000

has an average rating of 6.0 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
are in HD with a DVD & Digital Copy
–
– 2009
– 105 minutes
– FOX
–
This uses 20.1GB for the movie out of 37.6GB total.

Overall Verdict – Bad Sequel / Great Presentation

Buy it for $19.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Brendan Surpless —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself was Directed by Shawn Levy (known for the first film in the series, “Night at the Museum“). This sequel finds Larry Daley (Ben Stiller), a former night watchmen at the Museum of Natural History, getting himself involved in more mayhem. As we learned in the first adventure once the lights go out at night, all the exhibits come to life resulting in quite the interesting shift for Larry. When he learns that these famous exhibits are set to be retired to the Smithsonian Institution, it’s up to Larry to figure out how he can keep all his friends here with him. What results is a film that surely will please kids, but I don’t imagine that many adults will find much substance here minus the visual effects.

While “Museum” is visually impressive at times due to interesting effects, I couldn’t ever find myself getting involved in the film. Perhaps it was because of the film’s plot, but more I think it was because of the varying characters. The film’s historical characters, with the exception of Amy Adams as Amelia Earhart, were flat out boring and annoying (especially Azaria as Kahmunrah). Surely one might think that Azaria, who can be funny with his varying voice talents, would bring a sense of humor to the film. Perhaps I’m in the minority here but I found him to be dull throughout. The voice was silly and distracted me quite often instead of bringing me into the film’s world. I will say that Adams was interesting and was one of the saving graces of the film. She has a sort of charm to her that drew me into her. While the acting wasn’t anything fantastic, I did find myself enjoying the moments she was on screen (even though the kind of forced love between her and Larry felt weird at times).

Overall, “Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian” didn’t do anything for me. While the visuals were clearly impressive, the story was lackluster and the acting was dull (I mean come on they repeated the don’t touch that gag two times). Which is a shame because Stiller can be a capable actor (evidence is “Tropic Thunder“). Perhaps this was more of just a paycheck for all those involved as “Smithsonian” lacks any real long lasting charm that would merit repeated viewings. While I was disappointed by the film, I will say that FOX has put together a solid V/A presentation for it. Read on…

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 2.35:1 aspect ratio. While I wasn’t a fan of the film, I will say that the technical aspects of the film are nearly perfect. Up first is a stunning 1080p transfer. Shot using a variety of cameras according to IMDb, “Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian” has quite the pleasing image quality. Containing numerous instances of “3-D Pop” that we love to look for, the image has a truly great film-like quality to it. Detail is impressive, whether it be faraway night shots of the Capitol Building or up close shots of Larry. Fleshtones are also accurate and haven’t been overly pumped up resulting in our characters looking real. Contrast levels are solid as well. Grain levels are kept in check as well only slightly becoming noticeable during some of the wider night shots. My only real slight negative is that I did notice what appears to be a few specs on the film’s print in one sequence around 20 minutes in (this was a shot of the exterior of the museum). Besides that, this is an excellent transfer earning a “4.5 Star Rating“.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. Fairing equally as well is the included DTS-HD audio track. Dialogue is reproduced perfectly with no instance of drop out or hard to hear dialogue. Right from the beginning, the film’s score by Alan Silvestri sets us up for that adventure theme with upbeat, heroic like music. The score has been positioned nicely across the front channels, occasionally creeping to the rears. Dynamics are solid throughout thanks in part to the varying museum objects we come across. Pans between the rears is also impressive as the effects smoothly blend between left rear to right rear. LFE is active giving us deep, immerse bass that does put us right in the middle of the action; however, I figured there would be a bit more bass response during the movie. The ending battle sequence, for fans, will be a demo scene as the sound field created here (even though I wasn’t a fan) is impressive. All in all this earns a “4.5 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials are presented in High Definition 1080i video, using Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo (and Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround for the Theatrical Trailer).

Gag Reel: Here we get 8min10sec of gags that are mostly funny, especially the stuff from Jonah Hill.
Deleted Scenes: Here we get 12 different deleted scenes including one alternate ending that run a total of 26min44sec. The scenes are worth a watch once through but don’t really do much for the film’s quality in the end.
Curators of Comedy: This is a behind-the-scenes feature with Ben Stiller that runs 27min52sec and looks into the varying set pieces as well as the film’s cast.
Museum Scavenger Hunt Game: This is a trivia track that runs throughout the film quizzing viewers on events while the movie plays.
Phinding Pharaoh with Hank Azaria: This runs 4min50sec and is a series of screen tests with Azaria.
Cherub Bootcamp: This runs 3min53sec and shows the transformation the Jonas Brothers went through to make it into the film as cherubs.
Historical Confessions: Famous Last Words: This runs 6min29sec and has the film’s historical character speak on their legacies. This is decently funny for one quick spin.
Museum Magic: Entering the World of the Photograph: This runs 5min41sec and is easily the best feature here. Director Levy and effects supervisor Dan Deleeuw speak on how they developed the infamous VJ-Day photo.
Secret Doors and Scientists: This runs 15min58sec and has a few scientists from The American Museum of Natural History speak on their typical day in the Museum.
Cavemen Conversations: Survival of the Wittiest: This runs 4min18sec and has the three cavemen grunt in response to varying questions.
Show Me the Monkey Featurettes: These run 17min59sec and are split up into three different sections and focus on the monkey in the film and the behind-the-scenes it took with trainers and the monkey Crystal.
Gangster Levy: This runs 1min57sec and features the director Shawn Levy discussing the Al Capone display in the museum featured in the film.
FOX Movie Channel Presents ‘Making A Scene’: This runs 9min36sec gives you a behind-the-scene glimpse at the set which is supposed to be the museum.
FOX Movie Channel Presents ‘World Premiere’: This runs 5min9sec and is the premiere of the film on the red carpet and such.
Audio Commentary: We get two different commentaries, one with director Levy and the other with writers Robert Ben Garant and Thomas Lennon.
DVD of the Film: Here, on the 2nd disc, is a DVD copy of the film.
Digital Copy: Found on the 3rd disc is a Digital Copy of the film that is playable on PC, iPod, etc.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

G-Force – Blu-ray Disc Review

Brendan Surpless — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 10:09:33 +0000

has an average rating of 4.8 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
are in HD with a DVD & Digital Copy
–
– 2009
– 88 minutes
– Disney
–
This uses 42.1GB total.
Street Date: December 15th, 2009

Overall Verdict – Family Friendly / Worth A Rental

Buy it for $19.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Brendan Surpless —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself was Directed by Hoyt H. Yeatman Jr. (more known for being a visual effects supervisor). The basic premise of “G-Force” revolves four special agent guinea pigs named Darwin (voiced by Sam Rockwell), Blaster (voiced by Tracey Morgan), Speckles (voiced by Nicholas Cage) and Juarez (voiced by Penelope Cruz). Having been trained by Ben (Zach Galifianakis), G-Force’s latest assignment revolves around Leonard Saber (Bill Nighy). Saber, CEO of the world’s largest appliance manufacturer, plans to use these appliances in order to take over the world. G-Force’s goal is to gather proof of this pending destruction in hopes of getting the government to stop Saber. All seems to be proceeding smoothly until the government shuts down G-Force and our lovable guinea pigs are brought to a pet shop. Now it’s up to G-Force to escape and help Ben gather evidence in order to stop Saber before it’s too late. What results is a film that will certainly please children, but I don’t imagine anyone else will find much to enjoy here.

Going into “G-Force“, I never once expected anything that would be genre ground-breaking nor overly entertaining. Once the film was finished, I never once found myself looking at my watch (ie the film wasn’t boring) but instantly realized that this wasn’t a film I’d be revisiting every again. The issue with this was that all of the voice actors didn’t ever inject any real charm or style into their performances. In fact it felt like they were just reading the script literally waiting for the cash to hit their bank accounts. And this is a real shame as there are capable films where the voice actors add substance to their performance. Case in point is Jack Black in “Kung Fu Panda“. Now one might think comparing the two isn’t fair as they both aren’t animated films, but the comparison here is that Black adds not only humor but weight to his character making us believe what’s occurring. In “G-Force“, there isn’t one instance where I ever felt the voice actors cared. On the other hand the real actors, like Nighy and Galifanakis, were fine in their roles with Galifanakis adding a bit of laughter to the film.

On the bright side though, I will mention that the story, while nothing original in the least sense, did keep me entertained for the entire duration, which is something to say considering I wasn’t enamored by the characters. Interest in the story probably stems from involvement of Jerry Bruckheimer, a veteran of the action/adventure staple. Even though Bruckheimer does tend to recycle this type of material over and over again, for some reason it’s always watchable at least once through. He’s able to mix action and story into something we want to watch. It’s just a shame that “G-Force” uses all the cliched stereotypes (one such example is a guinea pig of each race) that we’ve seen numerous times before.

Overall, “G-Force” is best viewed as an evening rental fare if you have kids around you. Adults won’t find much substance here, but kids will certainly be laughing thus pleasing parents. Even though there are FAR films you could rent for kids (***AHEM “UP“***), if they must see “G-Force“, just give it a rental and save your cash for other films.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte, dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 2.40:1 aspect ratio. A film like “G-Force“, mixing live action with digital effects, is a perfect choice for a hi-def release. Shot using a range of different camera according to IMDb, the film has a fairly realistic feel to it. Detail throughout is excellent, with numerous instances of “3-D” pop that we love to look for. Facial closeups result in accurate fleshtones and solid contrast levels. The film’s color palette, mostly focusing on the brighter side of the spectrum, features deep, inky blacks. The colors of our furry little pets all look great, being digitally created. Some of the darker sequences, like those when G-Force invades the lab, do lose a bit of detail here and there. There’s also a bit of grain in these sequences but nothing that overly effects the image. All in all, minus this one little speed bump, this is a fantastic effort from the folks over at Disney earning a “4.5 Star Rating“.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in English 5.1 DTS-HD. Coming in a notch below the film’s video transfer is this including DTS-HD track. Dialogue is reproduced just fine with no instance of drop out or any real scene that would require a volume change. LFE is solid but I expected a bit more considering this was an action/adventure film. Don’t get me wrong the LFE is present but never is it really deep and immersive, more of a little oomph here and there. Dynamics are good as well with excellent pans between rears. Effects do arrive from the rears creating a fine 360 degree sound field, one that does put us right in the action (especially during the chase towards the end of the film). With that said, I will mention that this track is good for the material at hand, I just feel that fans/audiophiles will come out feeling a bit disappointed. Still this earns a “4 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials are presented in High Definition 1080i video, using Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo (and Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround for the Theatrical Trailer).

Cine-Explore with Darwin, Blaster & Their Creator: This is a behind-the-scenes picture-in-picture that runs along side the film.
Bruckheimer Animated: A Look Back at his CG Work: This runs 3min12sec and has Bruckheimer speak on the film’s visual effects.
Access Granted: This runs 7min52sec and has director Yeatman give us a behind-the-scenes tour into the labs that helped create the film.
G-Farce: This is a series of bloopers and flubs that run a total of 1min49sec.
Deleted Scenes: Here we get a series of deleted scenes that, surprisingly, aren’t that bad.
Music Videos: 3 Music Videos for different songs are included here. “Jump” by Flo-Rida ft. Nelly Furtado, “Ready to Rock” by Steve Rushton and “Go G-Force“.
Blaster’s Boot Camp: This runs 4min41sec and gives a glance into what it takes to become a member of G-Force.
G-Force Mastermind: This runs 4min13sec and shows us how the film’s original concept was developed thanks in part to Yeatman’s son.
DVD of the Film: Here, on the 2nd disc, is a DVD copy of the film.
Digital Copy: Found on the 3rd disc is a Digital Copy of the film that is playable on PC, iPod, etc.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

A Charlie Brown Christmas – Blu-ray Disc Review

Justin Sluss — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 12:57:12 +0000

has an average rating of 8.4 on IMDb
4×3 1080p in VC-1 on a 25gb disc
Dolby Digital 5.1 @640kbps
include bonus special in Hi-Def & more
–
– 1965
– 25 minutes
– Warner
–

Overall Verdict – A Holiday Recommendation

Buy it for $18.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Justin Sluss —

A Clip:

The Movie Itself, or Christmas television special rather, was the first animated feature based on the characters from the “Peanuts” comic strip created by Charles M. Schulz — who also wrote the story for the TV special. The holiday special was Produced and Directed by Bill Melendez who would be the first and most known man for bringing the “Peanuts” to television and the big screen in specials and feature-length films later after this. Such other works that Melendez served on as director include “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown” Halloween TV special a year later in 1966, the film “A Boy Named Charlie Brown” in 1969, the film “Snoopy Come Home” from 1972 and even modern stuff like “He’s a Bully, Charlie Brown” which was a TV special from just 2006.

The story to the Christmas TV special starts with “Charlie Brown” telling “Linus” that he is not feeling in the “Christmas spirit” so his blanket wielding thumb-sucking friend lends some advice on the real meaning of Christmas. “Lucy” and the other girls manage to convince Charlie Brown in to directing their Christmas play and put him in charge of finding the Christmas tree, which leads to him and Linus bringing back a tiny tree with about only 10 or 20 so total pine needles on it. As you can imagine this doesn’t go over too well with Lucy and the rest of the gang. Fans of the comic strip or other specials, films will be happy to know the whole “Peanuts” gang is here including “Schroeder“, “Pig-Pen“, “Violet“, “Sally” and of course “Snoopy“. The only folks missing are “Peppermint Patty“, “Marcie“, “Franklin” and Snoopy’s friend “Woodstock” which make appearances in later specials, shows and films.

In closing, its definitely easy for me to say that “A Charlie Brown Christmas” is one of my favorite holiday TV specials of all-time. It’s great to see it finally come to Hi-Def in this Blu-ray Disc release which I can say is a “Holiday Recommendation” for sure! This is a definite treat for all ages.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the VC-1 codec on a BD-25 (25 gigabyte single layer Blu-ray Disc) in a 4×3 aspect ratio of 1.37:1. Because this is in the aspect ratio it does have black bars (pillars) on the left and right of the screen on HDTV displays, this is normal for 4×3 content. This transfer from 35mm film to Hi-Def looks pretty darn good with really sharp black outlines, thanks to a solid black level (like ink) that showcases the wonderful amount of detail to the first animated feature done featuring Charles M. Schulz “Peanuts” comic strip characters. To say the color palette is vibrant would be an understatement. This is full of color with strong emphasis on the bright white snow, the green of christmas trees and decorations as well as the color red, the color of jacket “Charlie Brown” chooses to cover up his famous yellow and black striped tee shirt in the winter setting.

Fans will be pleased with this video quality, as it is an improvement over the original DVD release in terms of detail and the amount of dirt and such cleaned up. There is still a relative amount of visible film grain and dirt present here though, that just seems to be stuff on the actual animation cells themselves. F.Y.I. for fans of the “Peanuts” films wondering why this is not in 16×9 (Widescreen) like them, it was afterall a TV special so they did the animation in a 4×3 (here, 1.37:1 aspect) ratio. The amount of detail here now present in Hi-Def in comparison to the previous DVD release is pretty impressive, as mentioned earlier and is definitely enough to earn this a decently solid “4 Star Rating” for overall video quality. Let us only hope they bring more “Peanuts” shorts and films to Hi-Def on Blu-ray Disc and that they look as good as this does.

Audio Quality on this release is sadly only presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround sound @640kbps, as opposed to a lossless Dolby TrueHD mix which would have been nice for the film’s wonderful score of music done by Jazz musician Vince Guaraldi such as the famous “Linus and Lucy” number. The dialogue is delivered distinctly throughout and requires no volume adjustments. The music that makes up the score and the few musical numbers all make decent use of the rear channel speakers in the 5.1 soundscape as well as contain a decent amount of LFE (bass). Its not something that is going to leave you too amazed but it is definitely nice to see the TV special get a 5.1 mix, even if it is sadly not a lossless one. This earns a somewhat decent “3 Star Rating” for overall audio quality. It gets the job done and does the music somewhat justice.

Bonus Materials on this release are presented in both Hi-Def (HD) video and Standard Definition (SD) video — both using the VC-1 codec. As for sound it’s Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo @192kbps unless otherwise noted below.

Digital Copy of the film is included on a DVD-ROM on a 2nd disc which is compatible with both PC and Mac, Windows Media and iTunes portable devices. As with all digital copies, this is limited to a certain time period. Here it is two years (according to the back of the box), so it will expire on October 6, 2011 in this case.
“A Christmas Miracle: The Making of A Charlie Brown Christmas” (15:59 – SD) includes a great interview with Producer and Director Bill Melendez discussing how the film came to be.
“It’s Christmastime Again, Charlie Brown” (23:00 – HD with Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround sound @640kbps) is another holiday TV special from 1992. It’s awesome to see that this gets Hi-Def and 5.1 audio treatment just like the old 1965 TV special. This is not quite as good as the ‘65 special but it still was written and directed by the same folks, Schulz and Melendez.

Overall the bonus materials are pretty decent actually, but nothing amazing (all to majorly impressive). You get an additional holiday TV special featuring the “Peanuts” characters that was essentially the sequel to our feature here presented in the same 1080p Hi-Def video and Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround sound. Plus, you get a couple nice other supplemental materials, the Digital Copy of the feature TV special and also the “making of” featurette which proves to definitely be worth the watch. Fans of all ages will be pleased.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

DEAL ALERT! FOX says “make it a Blu Christmas” by offering coupons to discount $3 to $10 off select Blu-ray titles

Justin Sluss — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 09:59:07 +0000

FOX is going to be issuing some coupons soon to discount the purchase of select Blu-ray Disc titles from the studio during the holiday season — a total of $130 in savings. The following titles and discounts will be offered, taken from a press release.

Offers include $3.00 off the hottest Blu-ray Discs like action-packed hits Fight Club and Independence Day, family fare including Home Alone and Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, classics such as Patton and Miracle on 34th Street and many, many more. Receive $10.00 off Blu-ray box sets including X-Men Trilogy, Rocky: The Undisputed Collection, The Mel Brooks Collection and Die Hard Collection just to name a few.

More information (the coupons to print out) can be found on this over at SmartSource.com — they are right on the front page of the site currently, not too hard to find. There you’ll see SOME of the offers mentioned above, such as:

$3 OFF of “Mash“, “Say Anything…“, “M*A*S*H“, “Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid“, “Cast Away“, “The Longest Day“, “Street Kings“, “The French Connection” and “The Siege“.

I cannot find the $10 off coupons though. I’m not sure if they have expired or are coming soon or what.

DEAL ALERT! Amazon has “LOST” Seasons 1 through 5 bundled on Blu-ray as today’s Deal of the Day for $108.99

Justin Sluss — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 09:38:42 +0000

Online retailer Amazon has “LOST: Seasons 1 – 5” on Blu-ray Disc as today’s Gold Box “Deal of the Day” on sale for just $108.99 total. That’s all five seasons of one of the greatest shows on TV in recent history for just roughly $21 a season or so, plus you get season 5 which just came out today. Be sure to act quick on this even though it is the deal of the day it may be limited to Amazon’s quantity of these bundles they have in stock (or had in stock, if this sells as good as I think it will).

Also, some good news for those of you who pre-ordered this at a slightly higher price, Amazon has agreed to issue a refund to you for the price difference. More information on that HERE.