Blu-ray Review: The Golden Compass

The Golden Compass

Blu-ray Review
New Line Home Entertainment
Released: April 29, 2008
MSRP: $39.98

The Golden Compass has been released on the Blu-ray format from New Line Home Entertainment. The film follows a line films such as Harry Potter, The Chronicles of Narnia and others. It may not be the best of the bunch, but visually this is one absolutely jaw-dropping film on Blu-ray.

The Golden Compass works off of the first of Phillip Pullman’s His Dark Materials trilogy. The story follows the adventure of an orphan named Lyra Belacqua, played by Dakota Blue Richards. Lyra is in school while her uncle, Lord Asriel, played by Daniel Craig, heads to the North Pole to look into a magic Dust which has appeared from outer space.

The magic Dust holds the key to allowing them to travel between dimensions.

While this is all going on, Lyra becomes the apprentice of sorts to Mrs. Coulter, played by Nicole Kidman. Mrs. Coulter finds herself being connected to the Gobblers, who are doing their best to kidney children.

If this sounds completely whacked and out there, it really is. This is a fantasy film like no other, which erupts with a huge confrontation between a band of rebels known as the Gyptians and the Magesterium’s, which are a religious body.

You get to see the likes of flying witches, armored polar bear warriors, and more.

The film was under a lot of controversy from the start due to its religious connection. Personally, I thought the controversy was unwarranted as the film itself was rather enjoyable for the fantasy buffs out there.

Nicole Kidman plays a great role in the film, as does Daniel Craig, albeit it is a bit too short for my liking.

The Golden Compass is a fun film to watch, but stacking it up against the likes of Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter is simply not fair, as it is not even in their league.

The video quality of this Blu-ray release is absolutely tremendous. The film is presented in 1080p/VC-1 in 2.35:1 aspect ratio.

The video quality has absolutely no grain or video noise anywhere to be found. The colors are absolutely tremendous as the picture is bright and has a pop of pop to it. The only complaint with the video is that the texture detail could have been a bit more apparent. But to be quite honest, that is being very nit picky. This is not a reference quality Blu-ray for he reason that some of the black levels could have been improved as well, but it is certainly no slouch.

The audio is presented in a DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 track which will impress any home theater fan.

Some of the sound effects in this film will fill up your surround sound as good as any other flick out there. The sound effects from the polar bears, battle scenes, etc. are tremendous. The music score is very impressive as well as encompasses you in the action nicely. The dialogue is the only complaint with the audio, as it is overshadowed by the musical score and soundtrack. The dialogue definitely needed to be a little more loud and clear.

The Golden Compass ships with a 2-disc Blu-ray set, arranged nicely with some great menus and special features.

The first feature is audio commentary by the writer and director, Chris Weitz. Weitz does a great job as to showing his intentions for the film, where he wanted to go with the story, etc.

There is also a 20-minute interview on the author Philip Pullman. The author talks a great deal about the origins of the story behind his novel and The Golden Compass film. My complaint here is that they did not get much into the religious controversies.

A 16-minute feature is done with Chris Weitz talking about how the movie came about and how they went from the novel to the film. It is amazing to see how much effort went into it.

Two features are dedicated to some of the more important aspects of the film. The first is 15-minutes on the casting of Lyra Belacqua, while another 20-minutes is spent on the visual effects of the animals, how they came up with stuff, etc.

They also focus for 15-minutes on the design and making of the props in the film, which I found interesting.

The shooting of the film is focused on in three different features which hone in on the costumes, shooting on location, as well as the scene where you see bears fighting each other.

To round out the special features you get a nice feature on the musical score, as well as the trailer and release of the film, and image galleries.

The special features are plentiful and add a lot of background information into the film. They are also all presented in HD.

The Golden Compass is a respectable release on the Blu-ray format, with a solid video and audio presentation. Unfortunately the film does not stand up to the other fantasy juggernauts out there such as Lord of the Rings and others. Will kids love this film, most likely. This is certainly not the next Harry Potter though. Worth a rental for the younger audience.

Film: 7.0 A decent flick but nothing compared to the likes of other major fantasy franchises.

Video: 8.0 A very nice video transfer with vibrant colors, detail, etc.

Audio: 8.5 A nice audio mix, but the dialogue needed to be more prevalent.

Special Features: 8.5 Plenty of special features here to learn more about the background of the film.

Final Score: 7.9

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Interested in picking up this release? Head over to Amazon at the link here – The Golden Compass [Blu-ray]

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