Winnie the Pooh: Springtime with Roo Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.5
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.5
Overall		3.0

Winnie the Pooh: Springtime with Roo Blu-ray Movie Review

Someone at DisneyToon Studios should have done some spring cleaning in the mid-2000s...

Animated Easter movies are few and far between. How then did screenwriter Tom Rogers and directors Saul Andrew Blinkoff and Elliot M. Bour choose to tackle a springtime Easter romp with Winnie the Pooh and the denizens of the Hundred Acre Wood? By adapting Charles Dickens' "A Christmas Carol", of course. If you just found yourself shaking your head and whispering, "what now?" Welcome to Springtime with Roo. Released in 2004, when Disney was still barreling, full steam ahead, into the far reaches of the direct-to-video sequel market, Roo slips early and never quite recovers, proving itself to be yet another middling animated adventure as uninspired as it is unnecessary. The story plods along, the songs fall flat, and the fun lags. Adding to the strangeness of the film is little Roo, who -- surprise! -- isn't the main character at all. That honor falls to Rabbit, who's one "surplus population" shy of full-blown Scrooge disease. Will children mind? Not at all. The younger they are, the more they'll smile and laugh as Rabbit wrestles with grumpiness. But Springtime with Roo will be forgotten soon after it's over, doomed to be shelved until next year, when moms and dads once again go hunting for an Easter movie for the kids.

Winnie the Pooh: Springtime with Roo Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Springtime with Roo is a bit more vibrant on the whole than other Winnie the Pooh films, which traditionally cling more tightly to the watercolor palette of the series' original illustrations. Even so, none of it is out of sorts. Disney's 1080p/AVC-encoded video presentation is pristine, proficient, faithful to its source and quite lovely, especially for a direct-to-video DisneyToon Studios animated sequel (some of which haven't held up so well on Blu-ray). Colors are striking and perfectly saturated, contrast is pleasing and black levels are fully satisfying. Detail is spot on as well. The animators' line art remains crisp and clean throughout, without anything in the way of ringing or over-sharpening, and the artists' hand-painted backgrounds fare beautifully. Artifacting, banding and other irritations are nowhere to be found either, and only the slightest hint of slight, I'd argue negligible aliasing interferes with the otherwise impeccable presentation.

Winnie the Pooh: Springtime with Roo Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Disney's DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround track doesn't disappoint, although it also doesn't have a whole lot to work with. Springtime with Roo is a light, airy holiday film without much in the way of spectacular sights or sounds. Voices are clear, intelligible and neatly grounded in the mix at all times, and every rustle, shuffle, shlop shlop of a mop and shrsh shrsh of a brush is carefully prioritized in the soundscape. LFE output and rear speaker activity is restrained but effective, setting a playful, sprightly tone to a rather front-heavy experience. There's still a few standout sequences to be had, though -- most involving the always rambunctious Tigger -- and this is the movie and sound design, as they was intended. It isn't exactly remarkable, but it gets the job done, and without a hitch.

Winnie the Pooh: Springtime with Roo Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

The only extra included with Springtime with Roo is a "Get Up and Dance" mini-featurette (HD, 2 minutes).

Winnie the Pooh: Springtime with Roo Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Disney's excellent AV presentation helps solidify an otherwise average release of a lesser -- perhaps even the least -- Winnie the Pooh film. At only 65-minutes, it's a short trip through the Hundred Acre Wood that can't even be bothered to come up with a decent, original Easter story, leaning on Dickens' "Christmas Carol" instead. Young children will enjoy it, though, making it harmless holiday entertainment more unremarkable than it is disappointing.