Ferngully: The Last Rainforest 30th Anniversary Blu-ray Review

Restored for its 30^th Anniversary, Shout Factory’s new Blu-ray release of Ferngully: The Last Rainforest will satisfy the film’s fans.

The Production: 4/5

Deep within the Australian Rainforest, a group of faeries led by Magi Lune (Grace Zabriskie) have lived in peace, protecting the forest and helping it to thrive. As Magi tells her young apprentice Crysta (Samantha Mathis), it was not always this way. At one time, they did battle with Hexxus (Tim Curry), who fed off of pollution looking to destroy nature with the help of humans, but has been sealed up in an old tree for many generations, and humans have not been seen in Ferngully since. One day, while exploring a part of the forest unfamiliar to her, she meets Batty Coda (Robin Williams), a fruit bat that has escaped from a laboratory where he had been experimented on by humans. Off in the distance, Crysta sees plume of smoke approaching the forest. Loggers are making their way towards Ferngully as part of a deforestation project, and when Crysta arrives on the scene to investigate, she is captured by a teenage boy Zak (Jonathan Ward), and ultimately saves him when a tree is about to fall and crush him by miniaturizing him to her size. Fascinated by meeting a human for the first time, she and Batty take Zak back to the village. Meanwhile, the two loggers running the leveller cut down the tree that was imprisoning Hexxus. Now free, Hexxus takes control of the leveller, gaining strength from the machine’s toxic fumes and exhaust, heading straight towards Ferngully. Can Crysta and her friends save Ferngully from utter destruction?

Ferngully: The Last Rainforest was released theatrically in the spring of 1992 with modest success, gaining a cult following over the last three decades thru home video releases. Produced and financed independently by Australian insurance company FAI, the film was originally distributed by Twentieth Century Fox, with worldwide distribution rights transferring to Shout! Factory late last year.

Many have compared the storyline of Ferngully to another Twentieth Century Fox film, Avatar. Having rewatched this film for the first time on nearly 15 years, I’d agree. Both films share the same message about the environment, with the main plot being big industry and mankind intent on destroying our own natural resources, but Ferngully is definitely more family friendly. While the animation never quite matches the quality of what Disney and Amblin (soon to become DreamWorks Animation) were putting out at the time, it is a definite leap above other independently produced animation of that era, most of which was for television. The environmental message of the film definitely helped attract some key voice talent to the cast, in addition to those previously mentioned, including Christian Slater, Cheech Marin, Tommy Chong, Kathleen Freeman, and Geoffrey Blake. Director Bill Kroyer (who would later be one of the top animation directors at visual effects house Rhythm & Hues) was also abler to attract some big musical talent, including composer Alan Silvestri, Thomas Dolby (who wrote most of the songs), Sheena Easton, Elton John, Raffi, and Tone Loc (who performs a song composed by Jimmy Buffett).

Video: 4.5/5

3D Rating: NA

As director Bill Kroyer mentions in the optional introduction to the film, for its 30^th anniversary, Ferngully received a new 4K scan and “restoration” that was used as the source of this new release. This is a definite improvement over previous home video releases, and the new 4K-sourced scan down converted to an AVC-encoded 1080p file, is much more vibrant and free of any dirt build-up that was noticeable on the 2012 Fox Blu-ray release. Cel dirt has not been cleaned up or scrubbed, and there is still a nice layer of film grain visible. Detail is often times too good, revealing some of the shortcuts made in the animation. Otherwise, this is a gorgeous transfer.

Audio: 4/5

Ferngully was originally mixed in Dolby Stereo SR with a matrixed surround channel. The default 5.1 mix, in DTS-HD MA, is nearly identical to what was included on the 2012 Fox Blu-ray. The track has a sense of immersion, with sounds often emanating around you with only the occasional use of a discrete location for a sound. The front soundstage is wide with good separation and placement of dialogue (although that is mostly from the center channel). Silvestri’s score and most of the songs featured in the film  make good use of the surrounds, too (the main exception is Elton John’s Some Other World which appears over the closing credits, but that has always sounded flat, even during its theatrical release and on the soundtrack CD). LFE is barely present, but then again this was originally a stereo mix from the early 1990s. Shout! Factory has included a 2.0 stereo track in DTS-HD MA, but I cannot confirm if it is the original stereo mix or a fold-down of the 5.1 track.

Special Features: 4/5

All of the special features from prior releases have been included, plus a newly recorded introduction by the director.

**NEW** Introduction with Director Bill Kroyer (1080p; 5:10): Accessible when you hit PLAY on the menu screen, Kroyer welcomes the viewer to this newly restored 30^th anniversary edition, sharing many pencil sketches as well as character and animation tests.

Audio Commentary: Accessible from the Setup menu, Director Bill Kroyer, Art Director Ralph Eggleston, and Coordinating Art Director Susan Kroyer discuss how the film came to be, the casting, different animation techniques used in the film, etc.

“Seed of the Story” – Script-to-Screen Comparison (upscaled 1080i; 8:06): A look at the evolution of some key sequences from the film, from screenplay to storyboards to completed animation. With optional commentary by screenwriter Jim Cox.

“From Paper to Tree” – Making of Featurette (upscaled 1080i; 29:53): Originally produced for a special edition DVD release, this making of special combines new (at the time) and archival interviews with the cast and crew.

“Behind the Voice: Toxic Love” – Multi-Angle Scene Study (upscaled 1080i; 2:41): A multi-angle presentation of Hexxus’ musical number, from final animation, pencil sketch animation, recording studio, and split screen of all three.

Original Featurette (upscaled 1080i; 5:57): An EPK piece on the making of the film. The upscaling suffers from some major interlacing issues, though.

If I’m Gonna Eat Somebody (It Might As Well Be You) Music Video (upscaled 1080i; 4:17): Rapper Tone Loc performs the song in front of a group of children with clips from the film interspersed throughout.

Theatrical Trailers and TV Spots (upscaled 1080i; 7:07): The first trailer appears cropped at 2.39:1 (obviously to screen with “scope” films), while the second trailer appears stretched to fill a 2.39:1 screen. The third trailer appears to be an international home video trailer (the title is Ferngully: The Adventures of Zak and Crysta) originally 4:3 but stretched to 16:9. The three remaining TV spots are in 4:3 and appear normal.

DVD Copy: The movie in 480i with the same audio options (except in lossy Dolby Digital) and all of the above special features with the exception of Behind the Voice: Toxic Love.

Overall: 4/5

Ferngully: The Last Rainforest has never looked as good as it does in this 30^th anniversary edition. All of the special features from previous releases have been carried over, plus a new into by the director.

FernGully: The Last Rainforest – 30th Anniversary …

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Todd Erwin

Todd Erwin has been a reviewer at Home Theater Forum since 2008. His love of movies began as a young child, first showing Super 8 movies in his backyard during the summer to friends and neighbors at age 10. He also received his first movie camera that year, a hand-crank Wollensak 8mm with three fixed lenses. In 1980, he graduated to "talkies" with his award-winning short The Ape-Man, followed by the cult favorite The Adventures of Terrific Man two years later. Other films include Myth or Fact: The Talbert Terror and Warren's Revenge (which is currently being restored). In addition to movie reviews, Todd has written many articles for Home Theater Forum centering mostly on streaming as well as an occasional hardware review, is the host of his own video podcast Streaming News & Views on YouTube and is a frequent guest on the Home Theater United podcast.