monsters vs aliens

I just happened to see this movie a few weeks ago at a small theater in Tuscon, AZ with my young son while visiting the in-laws. In overall tone it kind of reminded me of The Incredibles in that it has a stylized late 50's/early 60's sci-fi sensibility to it. The plot is basically our government has a secret task force composed of a handful of "monsters" with various (questionable in some cases!) super powers who are called upon to fight off an alien invasion which leads to one highlight midway through the movie involving a battle on the Golden Gate Bridge that will probably be a nice home theater demo segment.

While I wouldn't say it approaches The Incredibles (or any Pixar film) as far as quality and holding a viewers attention from start to finish, there was a few decent, entertaining parts to it that would for me, make it a good 2nd viewing via a rental.

T.B.

IMO you can't compare Pixar to other CG animation studios, it's just not fair to the other guys.

While not as good as Kung Fu Panda it is worth a purchase. This one actually uses 3D to create a sense of scale that just isn't possible with traditional displays. The first 3D movie that made me see its utility.

The audio on this should be solid too, to the audio in theaters matched the scope of the movie.

EDIT - The bits is reporting that the 3D is only for the BOB extra not the movie. Paramount loses points for this with me. Even though they are correct that the current 3D technology isn't adequate, that doesn't excuse them from leaving it off. I bet my money it's because they can't figure out how to put two different versions of a film on a single disc.

Rented and watched this one last night....... at my young son's request!

As expected, the a/v quality is top notch. Lot of rear speaker surround effects throughout. Image looked a bit soft to my eyes but I think that's more due to the film itself and not the transfer. Like I predicted a few months ago in this thread, the Golden gate bridge sequence is truly HT demo-worthy. I will admit, the films few flaws (mostly the dialog and some of the plot contrivances) make the second viewing rather tedious.

T.B.

We saw this at the theater. Day 1 buy for me. Suuuuuuuusan

have this pre ordered from amazon.com.

party where did you find this to rent?

My kids had to have the poster in our theater. Had the poster up since April. The kids see the poster and are always asking me when we are going to see it in our theater. The wait is almost over.

I can't afford Sept. 29th & Oct. 06th '09.
Can anybody give me a loan?!?!

Wiz of OZ
Snow Wht (steellbook)
Dk Crystal (if its purple enough; screen grabs at this point have me worried)
Contact (can't wait for the opening shot!!!)
Now this & I just spent a hundred & one bucks today at BB (ST: TOS S2, Creepshow, New World, & the "steelbook" [only])!

Maybe this will come in a two pack w/The Incredibles for 30 bucks US! ;-)

This film was great in the theater for nice story,deep bass effect,great PQ when I watched at Imax,can't wait to get one.

Target will have this for $24.99 with a dvd copy.
http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/sh...tember_29/3499

Is it worth a few bucks more to you to get the dvd? I will do this version. For me it makes sense to have the dvd for the kids tv and the car.

If I miss that one things will get ugly, my daughter has also made it very clear

...The end of 2009 is going to be expensive on the Blu side!

While this may not be as good of a movie as Kung Fu Panda, from seeing the trailers on Blu-ray and seeing it in the theater, it will definitely be reference video and audio material as far as animations are concerned.. This will look and sound stupendous on Blu no doubt about it!

Not until home 3-D is available.

Oh, boy... here we go. Why is it that every time there is something new on the horizon, all the "old" technology suddenly "sucks"? It happened between LD and DVD. It happened between DVD and HD. When HD first reared it's head, so many were of the position that "SD-DVD sucks", and "I can't watch standard-def material" (many of the same people that were oooing and ahhhing at the PQ SD could deliver before HD came along). It happened between audio formats (lossy vs lossless). Now, "if it ain't 3-D, it sucks"...

I agree. I was thinking this year was a little soft on killer kids movies. Last year we had KFP, Walle and Bolt at the top end. KFP is a fun movie and a fantastic bd for pq and aq. Up is coming in November and that will be good but it did not blow my socks off at the theater- but still a must have in my family. Probably have to get Ice Age 3 but not real excited by it. M vs A is our most anticipated kids movie this year.

And then let's see... yippee!!!... we get to buy all new receivers or pre-amps (the internal HDMI switching circuitry has to be HDMI 1.4 certified and 3-D pass-through enabled), 3-D capable Blu-ray players, 3-D capable TV's and projectors, and get the joy of rewiring everything with HDMI 1.4 certified cables to synch it all together.

All for a few gimmick-riddled movies and a fad that may be as fleeting as when 3-D came out for the first time in theaters in the 50's. Why? Because the movies were all about the 3-D "gotcha" effects rather than a good story.

And let's not forget the movie itself won't have that good of a 1080p video encode because they have to cram in the regular 2-D version plus a secondary 1080p/24 metadata video file that must run simultaneously to create the 3-D effect. That's effectively half the video bit budget gone for this all to work. If you don't have a 3-D system you may have to sacrifice overall A/V quality for the sake of 3-D. You don't think the studios are going to give you two different Blu-ray discs with two different optimized video and audio encodes, do you?

Oh, the joy!

I repeat, not until home 3-D is available.

Dan, I don't disagree with anything you said, except that today's 3D movies (at least the CG animated ones) usually have enough going for them to get greenlit as 2D features and the relative ease of rendering a second camera eye is why it is being done. The relative ease of doing so also insures that as long as there are CG animated features the 3D trend will stick around. The real question is whether its worth investing in an all new setup just to be able to view ~4 new movies a year.

There are a ton of must haves for me by the end of the year. I am up to 14 that are musts and the list is growing...

I'm really looking forward to this one. We really liked the movie, and it should have some great audio.

The real question is whether its worth investing in an all new setup just to be able to view ~4 new movies a year.

There are fifty or so 3-D films from the 1950s age of 3-D, and a fair amount of features between then and the RealD recent films, and many shorts that did not have theatrical release. A lot of the content is mediocre or worse, but just consider what we all have to choose from in the Blu-ray catalogue when stacked up against what could be in the catalogue.

The 3-D festivals that Sabucat organized in Hollywood in the mid-nineties was working with lots of prints that were the only ones known to survive. A home 3-D solution would help to save these films in 3-D while there is still time to do so.

Say YES to full blown 3D in the home with 7.1 lossless surround sound.

I'm disappointed this ones coming with just a 2D edition and yet the extra is in 3D. I think i know why they are doing this though. I believe a deal has been struck with Panasonic and thus they are holding back 3D titles like this until proper 3D players and displays hit the market. I believe Fox, Disney and Dreamworks titles are being held back from being released on standard Blu Ray with the paper glasses due to a deal being struck for proper 3D coming next year.

It might be a gimmick but it's an entertaining gimmick so count me in. I also believe 3D is here to stay this time.

One thing i'd like to see is the introduction of BD-75 and BD-100 discs for 3D use. Panasonic claim you need 1.5 times the space of a normal 2D edition for 3D. Thus 99% of all 3D movies will fit on a BD-50. I also read that they can extrapolate a 2D edition from the 3D edition so more space shouldn't be needed just to make a 2D edition.

I don't see the image quality being an issue. Most films around two hours can easily fit in about 30 gigabytes of space with lossless audio and an audio commentary and they can look fabulous. 1.5 times the space is 45 gigabytes. Not a problem. They can add extra's onto a second disc.

I'm all for 3D. bring it on. Proper 3D for the home which will look as great as the current home cinema 3D. Yessssss.

I understand that, and I am a 3D fan from the 80s revival and was even fortunate enough to work on one of the first of the latest batch of 3D animated films from the current revival. I'd love to have a great home 3D setup but not if I have to take out a second mortgage to do it. Ultimately I'd probably find some way to make it happen if it were remotely affordable, but I suspect those who are indifferent won't become converts if the barrier to entry is high and people like the poster I replied to will never go for it.

While everything still looks pretty great, this one has the same edge enhancement as Kung Fu Panda, applied to the entire frame throughout the movie. There's even ringing on the letterbox frame.

Went home at lunch today to play with my new sub. Since I just picked up this bd today I thought I would test it a little bit before the big viewing this weekend. Just me and a co-worker. Two grown men sitting in a dark room to check out my sub and see how this looked and sounded. We had to tear ourselves away to get back to work. The picture and audio quality are so entrancing. The picture looks good. Even better than I remember at the theater and the audio is so clear and dynamic. The scene where the spaceship lands really made me happy with my new sub. Will be a fun time for the official viewing party this weekend.