Disneys Atlantis - worth picking up? (1 Viewer)

[Tom Koegel]

No pan and scan on the CE. DD and DTS tracks. Disc Two is all supplements all the time. Disc One is the 16:9 enhanced movie, with the video and audio commentary discussed above. Very nice disc set. On the attention to detail front, it's probably the only disc I've ever seen that plays the 4:3 previews properly on a widescreen set in full mode. (Not that 4:3 trailers are a plus, but one of them is for the Imax version of Beauty and the Beast, which I think is 4:3 to start with.)

On the movie, I missed this one in the theater--my five year old went with the nanny when this was in the theaters--but it was an enjoyable 96 minutes on home video tonight. It's a mystery to me why it didn't do particularly well. I suppose it was too grown up for the littlest kids and not "cool" enough for the older ones. The comparison to Titan A.E. was apt, but I thought this had more wit about it. The writing wasn't on the level of the Pixar films--not by a long shot--but there were quite a few grown up laughs. Along those lines, I found the second-in-command lieutenant/aide to the Howard Hughes-type character, as well as the lead Atlantean woman, well . . . pretty darn attractive. Not in the Jessica Rabbit category, but I bet a few dads in the audience awoke from their slumber when the bad girl strolls onto the screen.

 

[Sean Oneil]

Good to hear, Tom Thanks for the heads up.
I will be picking the CE version up tomorrow.

 

[Jimmy Nugent]

Despite all the negative reviews, I bought the CE sight unseen. Glad I did. Great sound, image and story. I was somewhat leery about picking it up since the animation style was said to be anime inspired. Unfortunately I must be the only living person who does not care for the anime style of art. Thankfully, the style of animation here reminded me more of Aeon Flux, which I really like.

The only down side to this is that I feel the story and some of the scenes were a little too adult for kids. I don't feel comfortable letting my 4 and 6 year old boys watch this just yet. Maybe in a couple of years.

When all is said and done, I can easily recommend this to fans of Disney animation!

Jimmy

 

[Mark Cappelletty]

I picked up the CE today, but only because of the Fry's misprice, getting it for $16.99 as a pricematch at Beast Buy. It's a good film, but my big beef with it involves the divergent styles of character animation, with Milo's "Disney"-esque look decidedly different from the anime-look of the Hispanic mechanic and the femme fatale, who looks like she just stepped out "Aeon Flux." The background animation is stunning though and the disc is astonishing-looking.

 

[Troy LaMont]

Yes, yes. I think the DVD is excellent. I for one like the story a lot.

The sound is kick-ass!! Wonderfully deep bass, aggressive use of surrounds!

Someone mentioned that it was Titan A.E. underwater, which I can see the correlation.

A good reference disc for anyone interested in animation and a good movie too.

Troy

 

[Ron-P]

The family and I sat down last night
and gave the CE a spin. What a great,
fun movie. Even my 5 year old was
enthralled, of course she loves action
movies like this. She even got bored
with Spy Kids because it was too slow
for the most part.
But Atlantis was a complete surprise.
I bought it sight-unseen and was not
in the least let down. The story is
entertaining and kept me interested.
The video quality is of course near
perfect, if not. The dts track is also
excellent. Very dynamic with excellent
use of the surrounds. Quite a few
sequenes would make great demo material.
Peace Out~

 

[Tony_Faville]

This is one of the better looking and sounding animation DVD's I have personally seen in awhile. The beginning sequence itself works the surrounds like crazy and looks awesome.

Now if I had the time to sit back and watch it all I would be happy.

For the record, I did go with the 2-disc CE....more of a DTS snob than I thought I was.

 

[Alex Yang]

Sold, I'm going to order my copy right now... I was originally going to pass on this movie because I heard it did really REALLY badly in the theater...
But thanks to ALL the positive reviews and endorsements here I'm going to be picking up the CE version...
Thanks again!

-Alex

 

[Peter Loan]

Hey, didn't expect too much out of this movie but for $17 plus a $5 gift card at Best Buy, I thought why not. I normally check out the transfer quality and sound when I get my movies but I ended up watching the whole movie through. I enjoyed it a great deal! Great job Disney!

 

[Ray Chuang]

I think what made the DVD really nice was the fact the transfer was a full digital to digital transfer, so all the details that sometimes can be lost even from the digital master to the 70 mm print are still there. That's why the background animation was so amazingly clear.
It's actually a much better movie than people think--some reviewers panned it because it was so unlike any Disney movie since the great revival of Disney animated features that began with The Little Mermaid back in 1989. I think the major concerns from reviewers was the fact the first 15 minutes of the movie felt a bit rushed; the Disney animators could have added more time to--

--explain why Milo Thatch is stuck in his current position at the Institution, more time on why Helga Sinclair was chosen to pick up Milo and how she got into Milo's apartment, and a longer exposition from the time Milo agrees to go on the the expedition to the time the Ulysses is launched.

I think once they rectify the faults I mentioned in the spoiler space, this is a movie that is definitely a candidate for an IMAX very large screen treatment. Imagine seeing Atlantis itself on a screen 4-5 times what you normally see in a theater?

 

[Steve_AA]

I too wasn't going to pick this one up until I read some of the positives people have been posting about the CE. Got it at BB along with the $5 coupon card. Seemed to be a ratio of about 10:1 of single disk:CE.

I saw this last summer in the theater and generally enjoyed it, but the presentation was too dark in that particular theater. My 2cents on why it didn't do that well at the box office:

1. Not a Disney animated musical

2. Rated PG (kept a lot of the little kiddies away because it wasn't #1 above.)

 

[WoodyH]

I haven't had a chance to go through Disc 2 yet, but I can add to the praises for the the first disc - watched it with my girlfriend last night (2nd time for me, 1st for her), and it looks absolutely beautiful!
As for the movie - I enjoy it a lot, but the similarity to other films did stand out to me, though they didn't detract from the film. The most blatant I saw was the opening sequence (post-destruction, basically Milo's introduction) and it's similarities to Stargate, as Neil mentioned (this stood out to me even when I saw it for the first time in the theater)...you could almost interchange Milo with James Spader's character! Additionally, I think it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to swap out Mole with the 'mad scientist' character from Titan A.E. (Leguizamo's voice, I can't remember the character's name). As I said, though, while I definitely noticed these elements, they most certainly did not distract from my enjoyment of the movie.
While it is, of course, up to each individual parent to make this choice, I might be slightly hesitant to show this one to very young kids, though. There's a reason this is Disney's first PG cartoon since The Black Cauldron (if I remember correctly) - from the (ahem) 'va-va-voom!' stylings of the primary female accomplice and Kida, to the level of violence (I can't think of another Disney animated film - or possibly film in general - with a 200+ body count!), to the absolutely flat-out hilarious one-liners either muttered under someone's breath or heard in the background (especially the radio woman's lines...). I have to admit, in my mind these are all very good things, it's been nice to see Disney being willing to aim their features at a more adult audience, and I hope that the lack of box office on Atlantis doesn't deter them from continuing this trend - but it might want to be taken into account when determining the viewability of this one for young'uns.
Now - what I really want to know - do the supplements provide a backstory for Mole?

: You don't wanna know! Audrey - you shouldn't have told me. But you did. And Milo trust me - you don't wanna know.

 

[Shayne Lebrun]

It did poorly because it isn't a kids movie; hell, you watch 3/4ths of a city get horribly slaughtered in the first five minutes! Good stuff.

I was somewhat leery about picking it up since the animation style was said to be anime inspired. Unfortunately I must be the only living person who does not care for the anime style of art. Thankfully, the style of animation here reminded me more of Aeon Flux, which I really like.

That's kinda amusing, because the 'anime art style' was inspired (wholly) by Bambi.

 

[Jimmy Nugent]

That's kinda amusing, because the 'anime art style' was inspired (wholly) by Bambi.

True or not, I fail to see the connection. In my opinion they are vastly dissimilar, sharing only exagerated eye size as a common characteristic. This is endearing in baby animals and infants but does nothing for me otherwise. Not to mention that, in my opinion, Bambi was smoothly and skillfully animated while the limited amount of anime I've seen appears somewhat crudely rendered. I'm obviously in the minority considering anime's astounding popularity. Just not my cup of tea- Disney inspired or not.

Jimmy

 

[Sean Moon]

Actually, an American comic book artist, Mike Mignola, designed the characters and a lot of the movie. You can see examples of his work here...http://www.hellboy.com/hbgallery-comics.html
Gallery of covers to his Hellboy comics. Mignola has been around since the 80's. Very cool style...he was the main reason I was so excited to watch Atlantis.
I just wish the film used more of mignola's extreme shadows style.

 

[Romier S]

I think the major concerns from reviewers was the fact the first 15 minutes of the movie felt a bit rushed

Those are my thoughts at least. Besides that I think Atlantis is still a very underrated movie and I really enjoyed what was there. It just really needed another 20 minutes or so at the end to really get a good climax going ((a little more delving into the history of Atlantis would have been great before they started the finale.).
PS Oh and the DVD is fantastic by the way!!

 

[Sean Oneil]

I went ahead and picked up the CE edition. What a great disc!

However, I did notice that it is improperly flagged (I really wish this sort of thing would STOP already) in that it reads the frames as video rather then film ...so those of you with JVC progressive, or similar models that have a hard time handling improperly flagged material -go ahead and lock your player into 'Film' mode for this one. Once that is done, It's all good. You may not even notice that it is improperly flagged, as it still looks good when playing back in 'video' mode, but there is a slight shimmer to the image that was eliminated by going to film mode -it looks razor sharp, just a bit of EE and breakup, but great stuff nontheless.

One other thing, I have to disagree with DVD File on the soundtracks. To my ears, the DTS track sounds better. Everything sounds fuller and smoother, or less 'tinny' then the DD track. You can really hear a difference if you listen to the brass and string instruments, and the percussion playing in the soundtrack from time to time. Nice bass, and an overall outstanding mix. Having watched and listened to both tracks though, I can say that they are both outstanding mixes (maybe even the same one?).

So, having been curious about this film myself, and then seeing it and then picking it up and enjoying the CE version even more, I would say give it a shot. If you are a Disney fan, I am almost certain that you will enjoy this disc.

 

[Ray Chuang]

The climax of the film felt REALLY rushed

Now, if Disney were to fix the problems of the first 15 minutes of the movie and extend out the climax like you suggested, it would be a MUCH better movie! It'll be nearly 30 minutes longer, but then we all like it more.

 

[Ron-P]

However, I did notice that it is improperly flagged (I really wish this sort of thing would STOP already) in that it reads the frames as video rather then film ...so those of you with JVC progressive, or similar models that have a hard time handling improperly flagged material -go ahead and lock your player into 'Film' mode for this one.

I did not notice this. Everytime I glanced over at my JVC-S60 the little green light was on, never saw it go red. I've watched the movie twice now. I do not have the player locked in film mode.
Peace Out~

 

[Ken_McAlinden]

This is a wonderful disc. I agree with Romier's disagreement with Ray. The opening is nearly perfect. It's the ending that feels rushed. They don't hit quite the right story beats and rely on too much rapid exposition that only makes sense if you don't think too hard.
Altogether an entertaining film and a very well produced DVD, though. The amount of detail in the early scene where Milo arrives at Whitmore's house and follows Helga in a long shot across the entrance hall with the fireplace in the middle was more than I though my television was capable of rendering.
Regards,