In the Heart of the Sea 4K Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		4.0
Audio		5.0
Extras		3.0
Overall		3.0

In the Heart of the Sea 4K Blu-ray Movie Review

The White(r) Whale

Reviewed by Michael Reuben July 4, 2016

The third disc in Warner's second wave of UHD releases is Ron Howard's In the Heart of the Sea (or "ItHotS"), a box office failure that isn't nearly as bad as Point Break but pales in comparison to Creed (those being the other two UHD titles in the group). Warner's 4K/HDR treatment of ItHotS doesn't tinker with the color scheme, as happened with Point Break on UHD, but it does offer a noticeable uptick in contrast and clarity.

Screenshots are sourced from a 1080p Blu-ray disc. Watch for 4K screenshots at a later date.

For a review of the film, please see the In the Heart of the Sea Blu-ray review. I have retained the same score for the film here, although I found that subsequent viewings only make its flaws more apparent.

In the Heart of the Sea 4K Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Note: The included screenshots are sourced from a 1080p Blu-ray disc. Watch for 4K screenshots at a later date.

As with Creed, which was also finished on a 2K digital intermediate, the UHD presentation of In the Heart of the Sea offers no meaningful improvement in resolution or detail. However, HDR encoding has subtly enhanced contrast and brightness so that numerous scenes gain in definition and immediacy. In the conversations between Melville and the older Nickerson, which are set in a darkened room at night illuminated by flickering lamps, the two men are more visible, as are objects in their environment; for example, when Nickerson illustrates the course of the Essex on his wooden table carved with charts, the markings stand out more distinctly. Scenes on the Essex at night or in darkened spaces (e.g., when the young Nickerson is forced to descend into a whale carcass to scoop out the remaining liquid fat) remain dark but with sharper focus and improved shadow detail. In the meeting with Captain Pelaez in Ecuador, where Chase and Pollard first hear of the white whale, the faces of the men sitting in a darkened bar are more visible. Colors are slightly (but only slightly) more intense, especially the pale greens and blues that dominate the palette in the Essex portions of the film. The differences between the Blu-ray and UHD presentations of ItHotS are more pronounced than those in Creed, but still subtle enough that they might easily be overlooked without a direct comparison.

In the Heart of the Sea 4K Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The UHD release of ItHotS features the same Dolby Atmos track previously reviewed.

In the Heart of the Sea 4K Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

The UHD disc contains no extras. The accompanying standard Blu-ray is identical to the initial release and contains the same extras listed here.

In the Heart of the Sea 4K Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

It's curious that Warner's initial wave of UHDs contains so many films released to both theaters and Blu-ray in 3D, because the 3D presentations routinely offer more visual stimulation, even with a film like ItHotS, which doesn't exploit the additional dimension as aggressively as, e.g., Point Break. The studio keeps forcing viewers to choose between the obvious "pop" of 3D and the subtler enhancements offered by UHD, and the trend continues with Warner's upcoming third wave of 4K titles, which includes Man of Steel and Batman v Superman, both of which offer a 3D alternative. The studio should broaden its UHD offerings with more 2D-only titles, and it needs some titles sourced from 4K masters, if it wants to demonstrate the benefits of the format. As for ItHotS, while the UHD improves on the Blu-ray presentation, the difference isn't sufficient to justify a double-dip.