The Sword In The Stone 50th Anniversary (Blu-ray) Available For Preorder (1 Viewer)

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Ron, any specs on this one yet? I'm curious if Disney is finally going to go widescreen on Sword in the Stone or if they are going to stick to Academy ratio.

Synopsis: Disney proudly presents the 50th anniversary edition of a spellbinding and beloved animated classic. Conjure up magical family fun with the humor, adventure and Academy Award®-nominated music (Best Score – Adaptation or Treatment, 1963) of The Sword In The Stone – now on Blu-ray Combo Pack for the first time ever!
Take an amazing journey with a young orphan named “Wart” and the extraordinary wizard Merlin. According to legend, only someone with the purest character and inner strength can pull the enchanted sword from the stone and claim the throne of England. Armed with newfound confidence and the power of friendship, Wart discovers his destiny and learns the best magic is the kind you find inside yourself!
Voice Cast: Sebastian Cabot (The Jungle Book, The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh) as Sir Ector, Karl Swenson (The Birds, Judgment at Nuremberg) as Merlin, Rickie Sorensen (Tarzan and the Trappers, Tarzan’s Fight for Life) as Wart, Junius Matthews (The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, Winnie the Pooh and Tigger Too) as Archimedes, Martha Wentworth (101 Dalmatians, The Stranger) as Madam Mim, Norman Alden (The Transformers: The Movie, Back to the Future) as Sir Kay, and Alan Napier (Marnie, Batman) as Sir Pellinor

Director: Wolfgang Reitherman (The Jungle Book, 101 Dalmatians)

Writer: Bill Peet (Cinderella, Dumbo)



Release Date: August 6, 2013 (Direct Pre-book: 6/11; Distributor Pre-book: 6/25)
Product Packaging: 2-Disc Blu-ray Combo Pack (Blu-ray + DVD + Digital Copy), 2-Disc Blu-ray Combo Pack (Blu-ray + DVD), 1-Disc DVD + Digital Copy & 1-Disc DVD
Bonus Features: New Alternative Opening: Where Wart Meets Merlin plus all the original Classic DVD Release Bonus Features including Music and Magic: The Sherman Brothers, Sing-along with The Movie, All About Magic (excerpt), A Knight for a Day & Brave Little Tailor

Ratings: G
Feature Run Time: 79 minutes
Aspect Ratio: 1.75:1
Audio: English 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio, French 5.1 DTS-HDHR, Spanish 5.1 Dolby Digital
Subtitles: English, French & Spanish

Yes, very happy to see this in widescreen at long last.

Disney continues to steamroll through the back catalogue of Classic Animated features this and Robin Hood while not up to the same standards of some, have a very soft spot in my heart, was born in “63”. So the way there used to be the theatrical re-release cycle that Disney had, way back when, these are some of the films I grew up with on the big screen.

This is getting to the point in the animation releases where soon that they are going to have to release there live action films, unless they decide to go a different route and start reworking the Disney Treasure Line of Shorts in HD

And there's the last title I was expecting for the August 3 wave... It's not one of my favorites, but it's fun nonetheless.

The Sword In The Stone is my favorite animated Disney film of all time, I can't wait to have this in my ever growing DVD & Blu-ray collection.

This is going to be a VERY busy year for Disneyphiles who've been waiting for the vault doors to open on their catalog...I understand that the 50th Anniversary release of "Mary Poppins" is slated for release in the Middle East on December 9th...can a 2013 4th quarter US release be imminent???

I tell you a lot of Disney animators are rolling in their graves tonight.

Here is a comparison I made between a web-rip of the iTunesHD version and the screencap from the Blu-ray forum review. (Please look past the obvious compression blocking from the iTunes rip.)

Here are the full images for those who want to take a closer look.

Disney are basically scrubbing the film grain very hard on a number of their animated titles, some people like that, i do not, i cannot buy them like this and will wait for a future release and hope they redo many of them, even some of the titles produced using the CAPS system seem to have their own issues, i'm talking about the ringing seen in Aladdin and Lilo and Stitch, quality control is lacking here.

All that happens when you scrub the grain is the blur factor, seen it on too many Disney animated releases, i was pleased to watch The Aristocats on Channel 5 earlier in the year, it had some detail left in it while the blu ray had the blur factor about it, shame so many people don't notice this or don't care.

darkrock17 said:

The Sword In The Stone is my favorite animated Disney film of all time, I can't wait to have this in my ever growing DVD & Blu-ray collection.

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I wouldn't if I were you.

Here's another doozy from a member of another forum:

iTunesHD:

Blu-ray:


Disney can't be serious!!

Fritz Nilsen said:

Here's another doozy from a member of another forum:

iTunesHD:

Blu-ray:

Disney can't be serious!!

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Is that for real, it looks like someone has taken a photo off their television and reflections are in the image, seriously for real. ?

I have stopped purchasing Disney, haven't purchased in a long time, might buy Pocahontas as i hear it's actually a decent release unlike Aladdin, it's the grain removal/detail removal that offends me the most, i think it's too heavy handed.

A somewhat trusted Disney site Ultimate Disney/dvdizzy review is lying to readers and potential buyers as their screen caps aren't fom the blu-ray or if they are their screen caps are too small to notice the blurry photoshop effect.

http://www.dvdizzy.com/swordinthestone-bluray.html

darkrock17 said:

A somewhat trusted Disney site Ultimate Disney/dvdizzy review is lying to readers and potential buyers as their screen caps aren't fom the blu-ray or if they are their screen caps are too small to notice the blurry photoshop effect.

http://www.dvdizzy.com/swordinthestone-bluray.html

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From their review.

Medium and long shots regularly look soft and lack detail. Certain elements appear to be out of focus at times, like the eyes of Merlin, for instance. Your eyes are called to such imperfections, too, because the rest of the picture looks so clean and sharp. Other times, the whole frame looks splotchy and lacks definition, their lines far from bold. Whether the problem lies in the original production methods or subpar restoration efforts is unclear. The Fox and the Hound showed similar limitations, but it too is a mid-range title not subjected to the work of Disney's highest-profile editions. Of the few other animated Disney films from anywhere near this era that I have reviewed on Blu-ray, The Aristocats looked better, while The Rescuers exhibited similar issues.

They go on to say Disney could have done more to make Sword look better, no, Disney could have done LESS, less grain removal equals less of the blur factor, degraining removes detail and introduces the blur effect into the image.

People need to know that clean does not equal sharp ( as they claim for some scenes ) or better, film grain = more detail = better.

God...

http://www.landofwhimsy.com/

Sums this one up really..............

tele1962 said:

http://www.landofwhimsy.com/

Sums this one up really..............

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Let's see how Disney tries to get themselves out his one, ....oh wait they wont. HOW DARE THE RUIN MY FAVORITE ANIMATED CLASSIC OF THEIRS

I'd like to see some screen caps of the new iTunes HD widescreen that was mention in the review, if that's not been photoshop I might have to cough up 3 bucks and get that version.

I am contacting Disney at this email address, [email protected] to let them know that I was ready to purchase this, a blind buy, but now I won't and will wait for reviews of future releases before I purchase and hope they remedy this situation and do a new transfer that demonstrates they care about their products and their consumers.

Here is what I sent:
The new Blu-ray of The Sword and The Stone is horrible.
I was ready to "blind buy" this Blu-ray, as I have with many Disney animated titles,
but the tools used to degrain this film removed so many details that the DVD now has superior picture quality
and more details and that should NEVER be the case.
The film now looks like a blurry mess. I hope Disney shows that they respect their fans and redoes this release
with a new transfer that represents the film and retains all the details and marks a significant improvement in picture
quality over the DVD, instead of a film with all the grain removed that also took out all the hand drawn details.
I no longer trust Buena Vista Home Video knows how to treat their own back catalog of films, and that greatly saddens and angers me.
If you hate your films, please continue to do them what you did to The Sword and The Stone.
Only someone criminally negligent who has no regard for their own history would release a product like this.
Angrily,
Mark Walker
Die-Hard Disney animation fan