Katy Perry: The Prismatic World Tour Live Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.5
Extras		1.0
Overall		4.0

Katy Perry: The Prismatic World Tour Live Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman November 4, 2015

Katy Perry may be the daughter of devout Pentecostal pastors, but she raised more than a few eyebrows with her provocative hit “I Kissed a Girl”. More conservative leaning pundits singled Perry out at the time as just the latest evidence of the moral decline of the United States, or at least the United States music industry, but when looking a bit more objectively at Perry’s still nascent career, especially when compared to the more outré shenanigans of some of Perry’s quasi-contemporaries like Miley Cyrus, Perry comes off as something closer to a role model. That certainly seems to be the case for the hordes of young girls who are on display in the audience of The Prismatic World Tour Live, many of whom are dressed like their idol and who chant every last word of her songs along with the star. Perry knows how to stage an arena show, and The Prismatic World Tour is an eyeful from start to finish, utilizing ideas of prisms and maybe, maybe not analogues like pyramids to develop a number of sequences that find Perry adopting any number of alter egos, including something at least close to Cleopatra and (just for good measure) the family cat.

The iconography of the modern pop-rock star is at times at least as important as any actual musical content, and Perry obviously has her stagecraft down pat. A number of outré elements start The Prismatic World Tour out with a bang, as a number of quasi-indigenous looking folks with lit spears start gymnastically cavorting across the stage, in a moment that looks a bit like Cirque du Soleil or La Fura del Baus. Katy appears inside an unfolding pyramid, in what might be a high tech reimagining of Venus on the half shell. Even Venus might have been a little envious of Perry's stylish dress, which, like the natives' spears, lights up.

The concert moves through seven ostensible “movements” with various descriptive titles, though some cynics may aver that these sequences are simply built around costume changes for the star. One of these segments is devoted to Katy's favorite pet, the cat, and includes a completely odd if endearing video featuring a bunch of "unusual" felines. There’s typically high energy on display throughout the concert, no matter what Perry is clad in, though some of the most effective musical moments come during the “Acoustic” set, where Perry gets to actually sing without the distractions of manic dance moves or overwrought stage mechanics. In fact, her heartfelt rendition of “By the Grace of God” is one of the highlights of the concert, though once again cynics may wonder if those tears welling up in her eyes are simply more performance art.

Perry zooms through a number of her top hits, though she seems vocally a bit wobbly at times, especially on some entrances where she hovers around keys rather than alighting directly on them. Some of this may be due to the fact that the show is so physical, rarely if ever giving the star the chance to simply take a moment to breathe and catch her bearings. Perry interacts well with her audience, many if not most of whom appear to be rapturous young girls dreaming of the time when they may be up on stage in their own brightly lit dress.

The concert (including the “segments”) includes:

Prismatic

• Roar
• Part of Me
• Wide Awake
• This Moment / Love Me

Egyptian

• Dark Horse
• E.T.
• Legendary Lovers
• I Kissed a Girl

Catoure

• Hot N Cold
• International Smile

Acoustic

• By the Grace of God
• The One That Got Away / Thinking of You
• Unconditionally

Throwback

• Walking on Air
• It Takes Two
• This is How We Do / Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)

Hyperneon

• Teenage Dream
• California Gurls
• Birthday

Encore

• Firework

Katy Perry: The Prismatic World Tour Live Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Katy Perry The Prismatic World Tour is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Capitol Records (how cool is it to see that iconic logo at the disc boot up), Universal Music Group and Eagle Vision, an imprint of Eagle Rock Entertainment, with an AVC encoded 1080i transfer in 1.78:1. Video director Russell Thomas utilizes a number of appropriately "prismatic" effects, with lights giving off lens flares and the like, but commendably a lot of this concert is really brightly lit, something that helps detail to pop extremely well throughout the presentation. The image is generally very sharp and well detailed, with the fine textures of the costumes precisely rendered. While the humongous stage features a battery of pinpoint lighting arrays, there are no issues with moiré or other similar anomalies, even when those arrays take up virtually the entire frame (see screenshot 4). Close-ups of Katy reveal excellent fine detail, offering looks at those aforementioned eyes welling up with tears, or more mundane items like flyaway hairs on some her outfits. Shadow detail can be a little lackluster at times, especially when action wanders toward the edge of the main stage, a place where the lighting arrays aren't quite so prevalent.

Katy Perry: The Prismatic World Tour Live Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Katy Perry The Prismatic World Tour features two sound options, a workmanlike LPCM 2.0 mix and pretty bombastic DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround iteration. Those with the ability to should probably opt for the surround version, as it provides significantly more amplitude as well as much more forceful low end. A lot of Perry's music traffics in a dance sensibility, and ubiquitous kick drums and low end synths populate a lot of the tunes and add significant punch to the low end. In fact Katy's voice can be just slightly buried at times in the 5.1 mix due to the force of the low end, but nothing is ever overly problematic. Fidelity is top notch, offering excellent clarity and precision and no problems whatsoever.

Katy Perry: The Prismatic World Tour Live Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Bonus (1080i; 10:02) offers some fun behind the scenes footage.

Katy Perry: The Prismatic World Tour Live Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Katy has a few slightly wobbly moments vocally during The Prismatic World Tour, but this is an incredibly high energy concert, one that benefits from typically (and traditionally) hyperbolic arena rock stagecraft and some pretty ferocious dance moves. The large band plays and sings convincingly, but it's Perry, front and center for the entire length of the concert (with the possible exception of the patently weird cat video), who commands attention. She may have shocked folks back in her girl kissing days, but she seems poised to be the kind of star audiences will want to kiss, if only virtually, for years to come. Highly recommended.