This Dr. Seuss/Chuck Jones collaboration has become a holiday classic for families around the world. Paired with the bonus feature Horton Hears a Who!, the DVD makes for a package that fans of any age can appreciate. The standard format presentation of the two titles is the original, intended aspect ratio, since both titles were made for television. The video quality is more than acceptable, but the print used for How the Grinch Stole Christmas shows signs of wear. Colors across both titles are generally translated well, and no digital flaws distract from viewers' enjoyment. The music and sound for Horton Hears a Who! seem to have aged better when it comes to preservation of the original elements. The dialogue, narration, and musical numbers in How the Grinch Stole Christmas don't seem to convey a full, dynamic range (fans might remember Boris Karloff's narration sounding more ominous many years ago). The bonus features provide little of interest. The "Scene Selections" menus allow instant access to all 16 chapters of both titles (32 in all). The "Pencil Tests" show only three drawings from each title and are big disappointments. The Grinch Trivia Test is a short, for-kids-only affair, presented in a hard-to-read typeface. The "Trivia" section, which should really be called "Biographies," gives brief biographies of Chuck Jones, Dr. Seuss, Boris Karloff, and June Foray. Fans and newcomers alike will be thrilled with this DVD, but anyone looking for supplemental material will have to search elsewhere.
This reviewer is a member of the Best Buy Tech Insider Network Program. This invitation-only program provides BestBuy.com reviewers with manufacturer-supplied products for the purpose of writing honest, unbiased and usage-based reviews. Outside of receiving products to test and review, Best Buy Tech Insider Network Reviewers are not compensated in any other way.
For Like Mike, which isn't much more than a NBA promotional piece, Fox has done an admirable job on this family oriented DVD. The picture, with both a 1.85:1 anamorphic transfer on one side and the full-frame version on the other, is very natural looking. Colors are well-saturated and detail is precise. There aren't any noticeable distracting elements, resulting in a fine transfer. The 5.1 Dolby Digital English track is adequate for a film like this. There is a some separation of the channels, but for the most part it plays in the front speakers. Often the track seems more in line to appease a certain audience, primarily due to the subject matter. Music is often loud, occasionally muffling the dialogue. Probably the real surprise here is the number of extras that are included. Both sides of the disc contain a commentary by director John Schultz and actors Lil Bow Wow and Jonathan Lipnicki. Is it a good commentary? Not really. There are some interesting notes about the production, but generally Lil Bow Wow comes off as a cocky star and Lipnicki just narrates the scenes he's in. Schultz does what he can, but there's not much you can discuss about this film. On the widescreen side there is also a nice featurette called "Off the Hook and on the Set" which chronicles the production, from rehearsals to scoring the film. On the full frame side are the other extras which include a six-minute "fluff" piece containing interviews with cast, crew, and NBA players. In addition are three deleted scenes with optional commentary from Schultz, a music video from Lil Bow Wow, and a trailer, of all things, for Daredevil. Strangely enough, a trailer for this film isn't included. While Like Mike is certainly not a bad film, this disc is well-produced, making it a good reason to watch the movie.
This reviewer is a member of the Best Buy Tech Insider Network Program. This invitation-only program provides BestBuy.com reviewers with manufacturer-supplied products for the purpose of writing honest, unbiased and usage-based reviews. Outside of receiving products to test and review, Best Buy Tech Insider Network Reviewers are not compensated in any other way.
Sylvester Stallone returns to the character which made him famous in this wildly successful sequel. Rocky III starts with the Italian Stallion so famous that his likeness is everywhere, including pinball machines. Fame and complacency soon cause Balboa to lose his title to young thug Clubber Lang (Mr. T), who inadvertently causes the death of Rocky's beloved trainer, Mickey (Burgess Meredith), before their first championship bout. After sinking into a depression, Balboa must regain the love and support of his family, as well as the elusive "eye of the tiger," the hungry need to beat the opponent which former foe Apollo Creed (Carl Weathers) teaches him during this film's de rigueur training sequence. In the end, Balboa faces off against Lang for a second time. "Eye of the Tiger," the theme song Stallone commissioned from the band Survivor, became a huge hit single.
This reviewer is a member of the Best Buy Tech Insider Network Program. This invitation-only program provides BestBuy.com reviewers with manufacturer-supplied products for the purpose of writing honest, unbiased and usage-based reviews. Outside of receiving products to test and review, Best Buy Tech Insider Network Reviewers are not compensated in any other way.
This reviewer is a member of the Best Buy Tech Insider Network Program. This invitation-only program provides BestBuy.com reviewers with manufacturer-supplied products for the purpose of writing honest, unbiased and usage-based reviews. Outside of receiving products to test and review, Best Buy Tech Insider Network Reviewers are not compensated in any other way.
This reviewer is a member of the Best Buy Tech Insider Network Program. This invitation-only program provides BestBuy.com reviewers with manufacturer-supplied products for the purpose of writing honest, unbiased and usage-based reviews. Outside of receiving products to test and review, Best Buy Tech Insider Network Reviewers are not compensated in any other way.
Donald Petrie's Mystic Pizza was one of the harder-to-find laserdiscs for many years, having appeared (and promptly disappeared) from Image Entertainment, so this DVD is a double treat, solving the rarity problem with a low-priced, high-resolution edition of a beautiful movie. This edition looks great -- though one sort of longs to see how this picture might look in high-definition -- and sounds very good; this release, from 2001, marked the point where DVDs began catching up to laser in terms of sound. It's also been encoded with 16 chapters, which is barely adequate for a picture like this -- it gets there by not dividing the credit sequence off from the introduction to the restaurant, or Kat's first meeting with her employer from the vignette with her mother, little matters like that which make this disc a little less valuable than it otherwise might be. It opens to the menu automatically on start-up and the bonus features include the original trailer and a choice of French and Spanish subtitles, English and Spanish stereo surround, and French mono.
This reviewer is a member of the Best Buy Tech Insider Network Program. This invitation-only program provides BestBuy.com reviewers with manufacturer-supplied products for the purpose of writing honest, unbiased and usage-based reviews. Outside of receiving products to test and review, Best Buy Tech Insider Network Reviewers are not compensated in any other way.
This two-disc set contains every episode from the first season of the hit MTV reality show The Osbournes. Each episode is presented in the original broadcast aspect ratio of 1.33:1. The English soundtrack is rendered in Dolby Digital Surround. French subtitles are accessible, and the soundtracks are closed-captioned. Supplemental materials include commentary from the entire family on many of the episodes, unaired footage, interviews, an Ozzy translator, and many other humorous extras. This is an excellent set for fans of the series.
This reviewer is a member of the Best Buy Tech Insider Network Program. This invitation-only program provides BestBuy.com reviewers with manufacturer-supplied products for the purpose of writing honest, unbiased and usage-based reviews. Outside of receiving products to test and review, Best Buy Tech Insider Network Reviewers are not compensated in any other way.
This reviewer is a member of the Best Buy Tech Insider Network Program. This invitation-only program provides BestBuy.com reviewers with manufacturer-supplied products for the purpose of writing honest, unbiased and usage-based reviews. Outside of receiving products to test and review, Best Buy Tech Insider Network Reviewers are not compensated in any other way.
This reviewer is a member of the Best Buy Tech Insider Network Program. This invitation-only program provides BestBuy.com reviewers with manufacturer-supplied products for the purpose of writing honest, unbiased and usage-based reviews. Outside of receiving products to test and review, Best Buy Tech Insider Network Reviewers are not compensated in any other way.
This reviewer is a member of the Best Buy Tech Insider Network Program. This invitation-only program provides BestBuy.com reviewers with manufacturer-supplied products for the purpose of writing honest, unbiased and usage-based reviews. Outside of receiving products to test and review, Best Buy Tech Insider Network Reviewers are not compensated in any other way.
Yes!! It is very much worth it. They make your tv look the very best that it can in your setting. I would recommend anyone doing this with a tv 42" or larger.