Product Description

In a quaint French village during the late 18th century, Belle, a bright and beautiful young woman, finds escape from her ordinary life, and the advances of a boorish suitor, Gaston, by reading books. Meanwhile, off in a castle in the distance, a cruel young prince is cast under the spell of an enchantress who turns him into a tormented beast, while transforming his servants into animated household objects. In order to remove the curse, the Beast must discover a true love who will return his affection before the last petal falls from an enchanted rose. When Belle抯 inventor father stumbles upon the Beast抯 castle and is taken prisoner, Belle comes to the rescue and agrees to take her father抯 place. With the help of the castle抯 enchanted staff, she sees beneath the Beast抯 exterior and discovers the heart and soul of a human prince.

As stunning as the Blu-ray release of The Lion King 3D may be, it's Beauty and the Beast 3D that boasts the most complete and consistent 3D conversion, as well as the more technically sound 1080p/MVC-encoded 3D presentation. (If only be an extremely small margin.) Once again, I was taken by the intuitive quality of Beauty and the Beast's 3D transformation; as if the film were created with a future conversion in mind. Trees sweep past the foreground as forests and mountains plunge into the distance, the houses and carts lining the streets in Belle's picturesque French village retreat into the background while anxious villagers all but step out of the screen, the Beast's servants spin and leap through a startlingly three-dimensional castle, its hallways and chambers exhibit tremendous depth, and unforgettable scenes like the Belle and Beast's ballroom dance are as eye-popping and engrossing as any true fan of the film could hope for. The cinematic shots that rely on CG are particularly striking and, perhaps for the first time, the CG doesn't seem slightly out of sorts. It lovingly cradles the hand-drawn characters, lifting them up and out without drawing unwanted attention to itself. It's as if all of the various elements of Disney's 1991 classic have finally come together into one spectacular whole. I'll even go so far as to say that Disney's conversion and subsequent presentation are so brilliantly executed, the 3D so carefully implemented, that the majesty of the resulting image will convert many a skeptic and 3D holdout.

There aren't very many issues to speak of either. A hint of exceedingly minor ghosting is present (mainly during the "Be Our Guest" song-n-dance sequence), a bit of faint aliasing accompanies a handful of quick pans, and some negligible blink-and-you'll-miss-it banding appears in a pair of passing shots. However, and this is a crucial however, the oh-so-brief and fleeting hiccups that occur simply don't register. If I weren't scanning the image with an icy heart and a critical eye, I doubt I would have even noticed. My wife certainly didn't, and she's as quick on the draw as I am when it comes to random problems and split-second anomalies, no matter how trivial they may be. Beauty and the Beast 3D looks that good. Belle and her new friends have a roundness, a fullness to them that makes them so much more than flat characters springing to attention in a pop-up book. The same could be said of the Beast's castle, its grand halls, the surrounding forests and Belle's idyllic cottage; there's a volume and presence to each one that goes beyond mere depth to create the illusion of relatively real space and tangible environments. No small feat considering we're dealing with a hand-drawn animated feature. By its very nature, traditional animation relies on stacking elements one on top of the other and tricking the eye to reasonably convincing ends. But Beauty and the Beast's conversion accomplishes the seemingly impossible. It doesn't merely separate the elements into stacked plains, it lends each one its own mass and dimensionality. It's difficult to describe, honestly, but it's easy on the eyes and even easier to enjoy.

Artifacting, ringing, compression issues, print damage, restoration oddities, aberrant noise, flickering... nothing slithers into view that would warrant even a half-point reduction in score. And, lest we forget the untold beauty and immeasurable richness of the film's storybook palette, the film itself has never looked more vibrant, more alive. The silky sheen of a golden gown, the ethereal glow of an enchanted rose, the foreboding shadows of a moonlit forest, the warmth of an ornate ballroom, the startling flash of lightning; every splash of color, every vivid primary, every hearthy hue, every rosy cheeked face, earthy tuft of earthy fur and billowing cloak is immaculate. Flawless even. And detail? Not to lose myself to the siren call of hyperbole, but oh, the detail. The fine textures and brush strokes that lend the film's hand-painted backgrounds such personality have been impeccably rendered, the tiniest imperfections in the animators' lineart have been preserved and reproduced with care, and every nuance and subtlety is sharper, more refined and ultimately more satisfying than ever before. As remastered catalog titles go, I couldn't be happier. As 3D conversions go, I couldn't be more impressed. As 3D Blu-ray releases go, they don't get much better than Beauty and the Beast 3D.

3D Blu-ray DVD Movies Disc - Beauty and the Beast Disney Cartoon Features

Video
Video codec: MPEG-4 MVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1

Audio

Subtitles

Discs
50GB Blu-ray Disc
 

Package Content

3D Blu-ray DVD Movies Disc(50GB) - 3D Blu-ray DVD Movies Disc - Beauty and the Beast Disney Cartoon  x 1