Into the Blu

Star Wars: The Clone Wars

Posted on 06. Dec, 2008 by Brian White.

Much like my recent review of The Love Guru, this will probably be the kindest review you will read regarding the Blu-ray release of Star Wars: The Clone Wars. I will be the first to admit that I thought this movie was a mistake from the beginning, an abomination to the Star Wars franchise and just plain out wrong. I may have been right in every aforementioned aspect or it may solely be up to the eye of the beholder to judge what he or she likes. I too often find my opinions biased and swayed towards the directions of the critics and to my surprise I end up enjoying the particular film in question. [...]

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Wall-E

Posted on 20. Nov, 2008 by Gino Sassani.

Pixar has managed to climb out from under its first less than stellar effort in Ratatouille. The studio took a huge gamble with WALL-E. It was one a lesser successful studio would have been either unwilling or unable to do. While the film contains enough cute moments and clever animated characters to entertain the kids, this film was most certainly made with adults in mind. Don’t worry, there aren’t any kinds of things that would not be appropriate for children. I just am not sure that the style of this CG animation project will hold near the same appeal to a younger attention span. [...]

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Kung Fu Panda

Posted on 15. Nov, 2008 by Gino Sassani.

The CG animation craze has no shortage of lovable and cute animals these days. It seems that the animal kingdom has become the greatest fodder for these family animated blockbuster films. Dreamworks might be in the lead with these kinds of efforts. They’ve given us bears, penguins, and lions among others. Now they deliver perhaps one of their better ideas in a lovable Kung Fu Panda. As much as anything else, you really have to give most of the credit for the film’s success to Jack Black and the wonderful voice cast that support him here. Honestly, the script is pretty simple, and like most children’s films it tends to be oversimplified and rather silly throughout. But give a cast like this an even average script and you can pretty much sit back and watch them go. Okay, maybe sit back and hear them go. [...]

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Sleeping Beauty

Posted on 13. Nov, 2008 by Kristina Kehler.

Young or old, and anywhere in-between Sleeping Beauty is commonly regarded as a childhood classic, a comfort film if you will. Like many other Disney films we remember the vintage animation, the songs, and the often compelling storylines. When Disney announced it would begin releasing its vaulted classics on Blu-ray fans met the news with an outmost enthusiasm and anticipation. For the first time ever classic films including Sleeping Beauty would be available in hi definition, with high expectations of crisp animation and solidified audio Disney had better dress to impress. So how does the Sleeping Beauty clean up after nearly fifty years of entertaining several generations of Disney fans? [...]

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Tinker Bell

Posted on 29. Oct, 2008 by Gino Sassani.

Tinker Bell has been a Walt Disney icon almost since its inception. The character has gone way beyond her appearance in Peter Pan. In the decades since, she has come to represent the magic of Walt Disney and its many incarnations. Seen at the beginning of every Disney title, Tinker Bell is likely as recognizable as Mickey Mouse and his many friends. John Lassiter and the animators of Disney’s new CG animation studios take on this monumental character in the first of at least 5 announced films to feature the little fairy. [...]

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Madagascar

Posted on 18. Sep, 2008 by Gino Sassani.

When Madagascar came to the box office in 2005, I took my young niece to see it. She’s kind of an animal nut, so I expected her to have a pretty good time. What I might not have expected was that I would have a good time. The whole talking animals routine can get pretty tired after a while. With the advent of CG animation on such a large scale there has been a little overload these days. Everybody wants to be Pixar, and while Pixar has found some unique story and character ideas, most studios have resorted to the old hand drawn animation standbys. I’m happy to report that Madagascar was better than I expected, and both of us had a really good time. [...]

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Shrek the Third

Posted on 18. Sep, 2008 by Gino Sassani.

With the release of Shrek The Third on Blu-ray, Dreamworks has continued a rather aggressive slate of films on the Blu-ray format. You may remember that Dreamworks and its distribution partner Paramount came late to the Blu-ray party and had a lot of ground to make up. This was one of those films originally released in HD-DVD and eagerly awaited by many in the surviving format. The video transfer is actually the same master and so will not look any different in Blu. Still, with the addition of a TrueHD soundtrack the new release is an absolute step upward. [...]

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Persepolis

Posted on 20. Jul, 2008 by Bill Geiger.

The interesting thing about reviewing movies is that at any given time you can be handed a movie that is just so out of your usual realm of movie watching. That is what I like about reviewing movies. You get to experience so many different genres than the typical mainstream flick. So, when the time came to review Persepolis, I knew this would be one of those times. However, could my mainstream mind handle the change? [...]

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Justice League: The New Frontier

Posted on 22. May, 2008 by Ryan Keefer.

My exposure to the Justice League (JLA) and to comics as a whole is pretty limited. Sure, I go see Iron Man, Batman and a lot of the other adaptations, and I remember seeing Superfriends growing up, but I was never really a comic book guy so to speak. I do understand and respect the following; it’s just something I never really got into. I also respect the concept of the JLA: you get all of your singular heroes together in one spot and perhaps introduce new villains or have the existing ones get into some epic throwdown? Hell yeah, I say!

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Space Ace

Posted on 06. May, 2008 by Brian Wortz.

When Space Ace showed up on my doorstep, I kicked me heels in a fit of joy. OK, maybe I’m not athletic enough to actually do that anymore, but you get the point. I had seen the previous Dragon’s Lair Blu-ray/HD DVD release and was very curious about the quality, but never took the plunge myself. This was probably due to all of the mediocre PC and console releases I’ve seen and played over the years which had left *mostly* a bad taste in my gaming mouth. But I had high hopes for Space Ace and I am more than pleased with the results.
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The Simpsons Movie

Posted on 07. Feb, 2008 by Ryan Erb.

The Simpsons Movie is the long awaited trip to the big screen for everyone’s favorite American family. Matt Groening the creator of The Simpsons television series has been talking of making a movie since the shows fourth season and it has now just been released. Production on the movie started in 2001, with many of the shows best writers from the earlier season signing on. As a fan of television series I was very pleased that the movie was much more like earlier seasons with its irreverent humour. [...]

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Cars

Posted on 19. Nov, 2007 by Gary Van Auken.

Cars is an animated tale of a world much like ours with one major exception - there are no people, everyone is a car or some variation there of. It is another in the line of extremely well liked and extremely successful films from Disney and Pixar studios. In my opinion it is the worst film in the Pixar line; but of course the most wrinkled 100 dollar bill in your wallet is still a 100 dollar bill. It is the story of a hot shot rookie driver voiced by the always entertaining Owen Wilson. He is all about winning and all about instant gratification. It isn’t until he gets stranded in a small town that is no longer on the beaten path does he realize there is more to life. He finds out that are more important things such as friendship and enjoying the journey along the way. [...]

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Ratatouille

Posted on 08. Nov, 2007 by Ryan Erb.

Ratatouille marks Pixar’s 8th feature film release, fresh off a $552,000,000 world wide box office intake it hopes to hit Blu ray with the quality we’ve come to expect from Pixar. Some of Pixar’s classics dating back to 1995 include Toy Story 1 and 2, Finding Nemo, and The Incredibles, so naturally I have high expectations for Ratatouille. The most noticeable difference in comparison to some of the past Pixar releases, is in the fact that Ratatouille doesn’t boast an A list cast of voice actors. Sure there are a few recognizable names and some respected old timers, but not the usual group you would expect from a Pixar film. That’s not to say anything negative about Ratatouille’s cast, just simply an observation. So with big shoes to fill, Pixar sets out for the second time with Brad Bird as director (The Incredibles) with hopes to engage us into the life of a rat aspiring to become a chef in Paris. [...]

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Surf’s Up

Posted on 26. Oct, 2007 by Gary Van Auken.

Surf’s Up is a movie about a Penguin who is tired of living his normal boring life in Antarctica and dreams of becoming the greatest surfing penguin the world has ever seen. Of course it makes it challenging when there isn’t a single penguin in Antarctica that believes he can do it. The movie, which is completely CG, is shot like a documentary and done extremely well. Sony’s animation studio is really stepping there game up to another level. The main characters in this feel good family flick are voiced by the talents of Shia Labeouf (Transformers), Jeff Bridges (The Big Lebowski), Jon Heder (Napoleon Dynamite), and James Woods (Any Given Sunday). [...]

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Happily N’Ever After

Posted on 13. Jun, 2007 by Ryan Erb.

At one time or another we have all heard a story from the Brothers Grimm, two Germans who are credited with publishing a multitude of classic fairy tales. Their works include Cinderella, Snow White, Hansel and Gretel, Rumpelstiltskin, and Red Riding Hood. All of these and more Grimm tales are the focus of Happily N’Ever After. Going in, I knew very little about this movie, other than how poorly it did in the theatre, and how it was panned by critics; nothing positive. Being a long-time fan of CGI movies, I won… [...]

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Ultimate Avengers Collection

Posted on 17. May, 2007 by Ryan Erb.

The Ultimate Avengers Collection on Blu-ray consists of the two direct-to-video animated films based upon the Marvel comic book The Ultimates. For those not familiar with the comic book, I’m sure you will have heard of more than one of the films’ main characters: Captain America, Thor, Iron Man and The Hulk, to name a few. [...]

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Dragon’s Lair

Posted on 18. Apr, 2007 by Ryan Erb.

Dragon’s Lair made its original debut shortly before my time, so this may come as a shock to some of you from the arcade generation, but I’ve never previously heard of this game. Originally released in 1983 as one of the first ever laserdisc video games Dragon’s Lair was a ground breaking release that for the first time ever actually let you control a fully functioning character rather than controlling a movable object block. So why I haven’t heard of this comes as a bit of a surprise, but then again I grew up with Nintendo which already seems like a much better alternative to Dragon’s Lair. [...]

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