8 | / 10 |
Users | 4.7 | |
Reviewer | 4.5 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
A magical adventure story centering on Pi Patel, the precocious son of a zoo keeper. Dwellers in Pondicherry, India, the family decides to move to Canada, hitching a ride on a huge freighter. After a shipwreck, Pi finds himself adrift in the Pacific Ocean on a 26-foot lifeboat with a zebra, a hyena, an orangutan and a 450-pound Bengal tiger named Richard Parker, all fighting for survival. Based on the best-selling novel by Yann Martel.
Starring: Suraj Sharma, Irrfan Khan, Tabu, Rafe Spall, Gérard DepardieuAdventure | 100% |
Epic | 42% |
Coming of age | 13% |
Surreal | 10% |
Drama | Insignificant |
Video codec: HEVC / H.265
Video resolution: 4K (2160p)
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1, 1.85:1, 1.33:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.85:1
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1
Spanish: Dolby Digital 5.1
French: DTS 5.1
Danish: Dolby Digital 5.1
Dutch: DTS 5.1
Finnish: Dolby Digital 5.1
German: DTS 5.1
Italian: DTS 5.1
Norwegian: Dolby Digital 5.1
Swedish: Dolby Digital 5.1
English DD 5.1=descriptive audio
English SDH, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish
Blu-ray Disc
Two-disc set (2 BDs)
UV digital copy
4K Ultra HD
D-Box
Region A, B (C untested)
Movie | 4.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 5.0 | |
Extras | 3.0 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
The UHD release of Life of Pi was originally announced with a March 1 street date, along with
other titles from Fox, Sony and Warner intended as the format's debut. On March 1, however, Pi
was nowhere to be found, presumably due to production delays. Now that the disc is generally
available, though, it turns out to be worth the wait.
Ang Lee's multiple Oscar winner is a unique creation. The extras on the original Blu-ray
(included in this package) documented the long evolution through which a novel originally
deemed unfilmable was transformed into an epic fantasy that is also, at the same time, an
intimate drama. Pi's narrative deliberately blurs the line between illusion and reality, and it could
not have been achieved without photo-realistic CGI images so convincing that their digital
craftsmanship is invisible. The most famous creation of the Oscar-winning effects team is the
tiger known as "Richard Parker", who is second only to protagonist Pi Patel as the film's most
important character. Occasional shots of a real tiger appear in Pi, but they are indistinguishable
from the creature born and bred entirely in the digital domain.
Screenshots are sourced from a 1080p Blu-ray disc. Watch for 4K screenshots at a later date.
Note: The included screenshots are sourced from a 1080p Blu-ray disc. Watch for 4K
screenshots at a later date.
Life of Pi provides an interesting case study in the translation to UHD. Like the majority of the
early UHD releases, the film was completed on a DI at 2K, which means that any gain in
perceived resolution must be a result of up-conversion. But like Avatar and Prometheus,
Pi was
also filmed in native 3D, and the film's creative team repeatedly notes in the extras that 3D was
intended to be the preferred viewing format. (Wherever possible, they worked on the film in 3D,
even in editing.) The challenge for a UHD rendition of Pi is less a matter of increasing the
resolution than of using HDR encoding to create a perception of depth in a format that doesn't
support 3D (which is a widely noted omission in the UHD specs).
Fox's HEVC/H.265-encoded 2160p UHD presentation of Pi uses HDR encoding to "turn up" the
colors of Claudio Miranda's Oscar-winning cinematography in almost every scene. The increase
in saturation and brightness may not be as immediately obvious in the early scenes set
in Pondicherry, where the profusion of vivid hues prevents any one of them from standing out,
but once the film reaches its central drama of Pi and Richard Parker adrift in their lifeboat and raft,
the difference can't be missed. Against the array of blues in sea and sky, the frame's contrasting
colors pop with new intensity: the reddish interior of the lifeboat, Pi's dark skin and light-colored
attire, Richard Parker's striped and multi-shaded fur, the silver of the flying fish and numerous
other shades. Brightness and contrast are also improved, so that even relatively monochromatic
scenes, like the magical nighttime encounter with a school of jellyfish and a massive whale, seem
more immediate and tactile. The UHD's image may not fully approximate the 3D version's
"reach out and grab you" immediacy, but the additional vibrancy brings a sense of depth to the
experience that exceeds anything on the 2D Blu-ray (which, I hasten to add, is still an excellent
image).
Pi's encounter with the meerkat population of the "floating isle" provides a fine example of how
HDR encoding can increase the perception of superior resolution even when the source is less
than 4K. With the additional contrast and color saturation, the long shots featuring hordes of CGI
meerkats appear more detailed on the UHD, and the ability to make out individual creatures in
the crowd is enhanced. The same effect applies to the dense and mysterious tangle of vines and
undergrowth of which the isle is apparently constituted.
Unlike the fire effects in the UHD rendition of Mad Max: Fury Road, none of the CG artistry in
Life of Pi appears to suffer from 4K/HDR treatment. In fact, the only questionable difference that
I spotted was in the present-day scenes where the adult Pi is telling his story to the unnamed
writer played by Rafe Spall. Because those sequences are intended as the film's anchor in reality,
their palette is more realistic and they should look relatively similar on both the Blu-ray and the
UHD, but, at least to my eye, the Blu-ray has more natural-looking fleshtones. This may simply
be a matter of proper calibration, which, as of this writing, is still unavailable for UHD.
Overall, though, Life of Pi is my favorite of the UHDs I have viewed to date. The question of
accuracy remains unanswered (for those who care about such things), but the disc's HDR
encoding seems entirely in accord with the film's magical-realistic themes and visual style.
As with its other initial UHD releases, Fox has not included a Dolby Atmos track. The UHD's DTS-HD MA 7.1 track appears to be identical to the Blu-ray's, and it is as impressive as ever. See our previous review.
The 4K disc contains no extras. The accompanying Blu-ray disc is identical to the original release and contains the extras previously reviewed here. The additional extras from the 3D disc (reviewed here) are not included.
Like all of Blu-ray.com's UHD reviews so far, this one of Life of Pi remains provisional at this
early stage of the format, when standards and calibration remain unsettled. Even so, it is hard to
dispute that the combination of 4K and HDR has brought an enchanting new vividness to Ang
Lee's mystical tale. For anyone excited about the possibilities of the format, the disc is a must-buy. That the film is one of the best from the last decade
only adds to the disc's appeal.
2012
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Awards O-Ring Slipcover
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Movie Only Edition
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Extended Edition
2015
Includes "Silent Space" version
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