Home (2D Party Edition) [Blu-Ray] 
Director: Tim Johnson
Cast: Jim Parsons, Rihanna, Steve Martin (VOICES)
Release Date: Own it today on 3D & 2D Blu-Ray Combo Pack, DVD & Digital HD
A Review By: Kevin Lovell
Film Rating: 8/10
Disc Rating: 9/10
Synopsis:
Celebrate family, friendship and fun in the surprise smash comedy hit of the year from the creators of How To Train Your Dragon and Shrek! In DreamWorks Animation’s HOME, Oh, a lovable misfit from another planet meets a girl named Tip. The two unlikely friends embark on the greatest journey of all time…the journey HOME.
The Boov are beings from another planet, a cowardly species continually leaving the planet in which they currently occupy and fleeing for another once their mortal enemies the Gorg track them down and come for them, which they always seem to do. Unfortunately for the human race, the Boov have just made Earth their newest home and after arriving they abduct all of the humans and ship them away to the equivalent of human happy-themed prison camps and take their homes and cities for themselves. Meanwhile a goofy yet lovable Boov named Oh (Parsons) on the run after making yet another terrible mistake and causing more problems for his fellow Boov, runs into a lone human named Tip (Rihanna) and her cat Pig who randomly escaped the abductions and are now searching for her missing Mom. Both unsure what else to do, in the most drastic of circumstances Oh and Tip reluctantly team up and try to help each other deal with their problems together, and who knows, they just may end up becoming friends in the process.
Regular DreamWorks Animation Director Tim Johnson (Antz, Over the Hedge) directed ‘Home’ and he does a more than capable job at the helm guiding this enjoyable and beautifully animated film. ‘Home’ also features voice talent from a number of well known individuals including Jim Parsons, Rihanna, Steve Martin, Jennifer Lopez and more, most of whom deliver pretty solid and spot-on performances in each of their respective voice roles which helps tremendously in successfully pulling you into the story and causing you to truly care for these characters.
‘Home’ is an enjoyable out of this world adventure that the whole family should easily be able to enjoy together. It successfully bridges the gap between adults and kids and manages to find that perfect middle ground that allows adults to really get involved with the story on their own level, while surely keeping the kids simultaneously enthralled and never allowing the content to get overly offensive or too adult oriented. The animation is phenomenal and worth watching for alone, delivering a bright and richly detailed animated world that should impress even the animation enthusiasts. Overall, ‘Home’ definitely comes recommended and is well worth a rental at the very least. It’s a perfect family film; fun, funny, and surprisingly heartwarming, not to mention it additionally provides a healthy helping of goofy otherworldly action.
VIDEO:
The Blu-Ray release of ‘Home’ features a full 1080p High Definition presentation utilizing the film’s original 1.85:1 Aspect Ratio. The video presentation looks downright phenomenal. The movie’s beautiful animation is on brilliant display here and it’s hard to imagine it possibly looking any better. Every drawn line, color and other miniscule detail is spot on, delivering a sharp, detailed and highly impressive presentation throughout, looking perfect during even the numerous fast moving and heavily populated sequences with quite the plethora of activity occurring on screen. Overall, this is an outstanding high definition video presentation that I can’t imagine could possibility disappoint in the slightest.
AUDIO:
The Blu-Ray release features a lossless 7.1 channel DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack. This lossless multichannel soundtrack sounds quite fantastic and delivers a consistently clean, discrete and aggressive audio presentation throughout. It regularly utilizes all seven available channels to their fullest potential in order to surround the viewer with films music in addition to numerous objects, ships and other random auditory effects whizzing past quite regularly, while never resulting in any dialogue which may be occurring simultaneously to become distorted or inaudible in any way. Overall, this 7.1 channel DTS-HD MA soundtrack is quite impressive and contributes a great deal more fun to this already highly enjoyable animated feature.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
The Standard Party Edition Blu-Ray release of ‘Home’ includes an impressive collection of fun bonus goodies that are sure to entertain. Included on the release are a number of Deleted Scenes (approximately 25 minutes worth in total) including introductions by director Tim Johnson, plus 3 Animated Shorts relating to the film (approximately 9 minutes altogether), the three included shorts being: ‘‘This is Being Boov’, ‘Almost Home’ and ‘Testing Lab’. Also included is ‘Be an Artist!’ which features Animator Andy Erekson with some drawing tutorials displaying how a number of the characters were created. We are additionally treated to numerous short and sweet little extras including everything from music videos, goofy little additions and some Featurette’s exploring, explaining and featuring the characters within the film as well as exploring some behind the scenes aspects of the film. These include: ‘Best Party Ever!’, ‘Oh’s Shake Your Boov Thing’, ‘“Feel the Light” by Jennifer Lopez – Music Video & Lyric Video’, ‘Oh’s Boovy Jukebox’ ‘Oh’s Party Planning Tips’, ‘Oh’s Costume Party’ and meet the stars both behind and in front of the screen in ‘Stars of Home’. Lastly we are treated to a ‘Gallery’ and the ‘Theatrical Trailer’.
*Please note that the above images are taken from the Blu-Ray and resized. They additionally will suffer quality loss as a result of .jpg compression. Larger versions of each image can be viewed by clicking on the image. All images and content included on this Blu-Ray release are the property of their respective owners.
Film Rating: 8/10
Disc Rating: 9/10
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