Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		2.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.0
Overall		2.5

Fascination Coral Reef 3D Blu-ray Movie Review

I suggest picking up another disc for your daily dose of fascination...

Reviewed by Kenneth Brown January 28, 2013

In 2011, Universal dipped its toe into 3D nature documentary waters with a trio of poorly received June releases: Ocean Wonderland 3D, Dolphins and Whales 3D and Sharks 3D. Underwhelming and overpriced, with rickety video transfers and hit or miss 3D presentations, the wayward docs can still be spotted in the wild, huddled together on the shelves of Best Buys everywhere. Fast forward to 2013. Universal is pulling a repeat performance with three more generic and wholly uninspiring undersea 3D bores; not in June but in January, when fewer titles are flooding the market and ravenous shoppers are more desperate than usual. Which brings us to Amazing Ocean 3D, Fascination Coral Reef 3D, and the cumbersomely titled Fascination Coral Reef 3D: Mysterious Worlds Underwater, budget documentaries sans those pesky budget prices. And it gets worse. Rather than bundle all three together at a reasonable cost, the studio is releasing each one individually, problematic 3D video presentations and all, at a premium price. So beware: rough waters ahead...

For more than 400 million years, an incredible variety of coral species have been growing in our oceans, which covers over 70% of our Earth. The biodiversity of corals offers the perfect habitat for much of the flora and fauna that lives underwater today. The structures of coral reefs, which are formed by reef-building cnidarians, are large enough to exert a significant influence on their physical and ecological environment. They represent the largest structures created by living organisms on Earth. Today, coral reefs cover an area of over 600,000 to a million square kilometers, and in some areas can rise up to 2,200 meters above the sea floor.

Fascination Coral Reef 3D couldn't be further removed from Amazing Ocean 3D. While the latter was anxious to dart past science and biology as if the two were predators, Coral Reef settles in for the long haul, delivering factoid after factoid dutifully and mechanically, ultimately to its detriment. Amazing Ocean, for all its faults, at least attempts to tap a primal vein of awe and wonder, and does so with a fair amount of heart and passion. Coral Reef, by contrast, is as dry and academic as its routine photography, shuffling along the ocean floor at a leisurely, almost apathetic crawl with narration sure to sedate anyone with less than six hours of sleep under their belt. The reef and its inhabitants are dissected and analyzed with almost cold indifference, and often without any flourish or payoff. (After a detailed explanation of the manner in which a puffer fish puffs, we watch intently as a puffer fish... doesn't puff.) The information is welcome, and in many ways makes this a slightly better undersea documentary than Amazing Ocean, but I couldn't shake the feeling that I wasn't feeling anything at all.

All of which begs the question: must we have one or the other? Disneynature's visually arresting Oceans approaches the deep sea with a playful tone, to the point of habitually anthropomorphizing the underwater creatures it studies, however brief each study may be. And yet the science is intact. Gripping and engaging, in fact. The imagery is astonishing, to the point of consistently giving me chills. And the emotional response is palpable. There is a balance, and too many others have struck it to simply give Coral Reef a free pass, especially when its elevator music and bland photography would have been right at home in 1993. If Amazing Ocean 3D is geared toward the kiddies, Fascination Coral Reef 3D is geared toward armchair marine biologists more interested in learning about skeletal structure and general anatomy than in experiencing the beauty and grandeur of the reef itself. I came away with bits and pieces of information, but few resonated. Come to think of it, I'm having a hard time even remembering the trivia-worthy tidbits that surprised me at the time. Perhaps Fascination Coral Reef 3D: Mysterious Worlds Underwater will offer the best of both worlds. Onward and hopefully upward.

Fascination Coral Reef 3D Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Fascination Coral Reef 3D sinks further with a disheartening 1080p/MVC-encoded transfer and subsequent 3D presentation. Compared to Amazing Ocean, Coral Reef exhibits more obvious and persistent aliasing (going frame by frame reveals multiple instances in almost every scene), not to mention more serious banding, more disruptive macroblocking, more ringing, more noise, more pixelation, more bleeding, more missteps, more mishaps... essentially more of everything you don't want to see swimming alongside the creatures of the reef. It isn't a complete misfire, I'll admit. Colors are stronger (blues in particular), contrast is more vibrant and black levels deeper, but any improvement is offset by more crush, softness, compression blips and pulldown-like oddities. The 3D isn't any better. While some foreground elements pop now and again, so too do the technical issues. 3D aliasing et al. Depth and dimensionality are also lacking, and the image is just as prone to ghosting on displays that exhibit crosstalk, if not more so. Several scenes (far too many, truth be told) even look as if they've been ripped from an upconverted DVD. Hardly what I expect from a 1080p high definition presentation in 2013, especially one released by a major studio.

Fascination Coral Reef 3D Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Fascination Coral Reef 3D and Fascination Coral Reef 3D: Mysterious Worlds Underwater feature near-identical DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround tracks, but that's actually a good thing. Granted, the documentaries' sound design is by no means first rate. That said, the addition of LFE output (underutilized though it may be) and rear speaker activity makes the resulting sonic experiences fuller and more satisfying. Music is by far the most refined element in the soundfield, as well as the one thing that takes advantage of the entire soundstage. Light directional effects are present, the flow and warble of the ocean is passably immersive, and there aren't any glaring issues; certainly none that are as distracting as those that plague the discs' video presentations. Narration is clear, intelligible and nicely prioritized too, despite the fact that the score is a touch domineering at times. Still, each Fascination Coral Reef lossless track is easily the highlight of its respective release, and the one redeeming aspect of each AV presentation.

Fascination Coral Reef 3D Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Like Amazing Ocean 3D, Fascination Coral Reef 3D doesn't offer any special features.

Fascination Coral Reef 3D Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Amazing Ocean 3D features more rewarding photography but is better suited to young children, Fascination Coral Reef 3D is more interesting but awfully dry and uneventful, and Fascination Coral Reef 3D: Mysterious Worlds Underwater strikes a better balance but struggles with dull visuals and much too routine ocean sights and sounds. All three, though, flounder with mediocre video transfers and disappointing 3D presentations, and arrive barebones, without any special features whatsoever. And all three are overpriced, when a budget-priced, three-film bundle would have been far more appealing (although nearly as underwhelming). I'd recommend skipping all three, unless a 3D sale lands the trio in the bargain bin.