Blu-ray Movie Reviews

When a $5 billion Space Agency probe disappears into an intergalactic wormhole, the agency recruits Ham III, grandson of the first chimpanzee in space, to help retrieve the wayward craft. But Ham is a free-spirited circus performer more interested in zero gravity high jinks than living up to his illustrious heritage. The simian slacker becomes a reluctant hero and learns the true meaning of courage as he and his crewmates, the fearless Lt. Luna and their uptight commander, Titan, risk everything in an effort to save the peaceful inhabitants of a distant planet from an evil dictator.

This film reminded me more of a made for TV movie than a feature release but it seems like any animated feature done in CG gets a wide release these days. This one is about a space probe that ventures through a wormhole and crash lands on an alien planet allowing one alien to take control of a colony with the probes abilities. NASA doesn’t know this but sends some chimps out to scout the planet. But these aren’t any chimps. The film has some funny moments overall but nothing that really stood out. The animation is good but not near the level of the Pixar, Blue Sky or Dreamworks offerings. While the young ones may get a kick of the high strung monkeys, I found the film ultimately passable.

Animation always looks really good in HD and this is really no exception. The animation doesn’t have near the production value of some of the bigger titles we’ve seen lately but the crisp color and great sense of dimension still shine on Blu-ray. I noticed some light banding every now and again but otherwise there was little to distract. The image has a great sense of depth and contrast is excellent. The animation is moderately detailed but at times it was inconsistent in how sharp object were. I don’t know if this was intentional or not but I noticed it quite a bit.

The DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack was far more dynamic than I was expecting from a cartoon like this. Low bass extension is quite deep and the soundstage has a very active quality to it. The sound design was a bit simple in design but the range kept it interesting. The voice work is pretty good overall and there are definitely some familiar voices in there. Surrounds are used aggressively and really add to the experience. I was surprised at how many effective pans there were and how good the imaging was both in the front and rear of the room. A great audio track!

Extras include a funny casting session, a still gallery and the TV spots for the film. There are also WAY too many previews for a bunch of straight to DVD stuff before the film.

While this film didn’t deliver to the level of some of the bigger animated titles out there Fox sure did do a great job with the presentation. The audio track was a nice surprise and like all CG animation it looked great on Blu-ray. If you have young ones, they’ll probably dig it.