5.6 | / 10 |
Users | 3.5 | |
Reviewer | 2.0 | |
Overall | 2.2 |
What do you get when you mix a lawyer, a slacker and a British Guy with the great outdoors? The wettest, wildest, and most outrageous road trip since Lewis & Clark! As a last wish for a little old lady, Ben the lawyer, his best friend Zach, and a wacky Brit, Nigel, team up to find her missing granddaughter. But there's one little problem... She's somewhere deep in the wilderness getting in touch with nature. See what happens when three guys without a plan, without a chance and without a clue fall out of the pan and into the fire! Let the adventure begin!
Starring: Oliver James, Kristopher Turner, Rik Young, Amber McDonald, Madison RileyComedy | 100% |
Adventure | Insignificant |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080p
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1
English: Dolby TrueHD 5.1
English, English SDH, French, Portuguese, Spanish
25GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 1.0 | |
Video | 3.5 | |
Audio | 2.5 | |
Extras | 1.5 | |
Overall | 2.0 |
Rats have rights too!
As Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling begins, a high school student named Heather is seen
roaming the halls, asking anyone and everyone to sign her petition that supports the right of rats
not to be dissected. Given the choice between dissection and a screening of Without a Paddle:
Nature's Calling, the rat just might choose the former. This direct-to-video offering is a comedy
without the laughs, playing as more of a tedious chore than even lighthearted entertainment. The
movie is mostly inoffensive to the sensibilities but also completely forgettable. The inane
shenanigans are stale, the characters bland, the story forced, and the pacing unforgiving.
Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling is one of those movies that might have played better in
the imagination; one can imagine a perusal of the script might have garnered a few laughs here and
there, but the material just doesn't translate all that well to the screen. As noted earlier, there is
nothing inherently bad about the movie, considering it is merely a low-budget, direct-to-video
comedy -- it just never clicks or gets into a rhythm.
Perhaps the film should have been titled, 'With Two Paddles: Nature's Calling.'
Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling ventures onto Blu-ray with a generally nice looking 1080p transfer, framed inside a 1.78:1 window. The image is clear and clean, with a colorful, natural palette. Grain can be seen here and there, though it is never intrusive and barely noticeable over the mostly bright, pleasing outdoor imagery. Detail is solid, though not always exceptional. There are many varied locations to be seen outside of the film's primary natural setting, particularly early on, including several locales in and around a high school and a small Oregon town, and each shares their own unique features with a better-than-expected amount of detail. Background images even remain fairly clear; in the small town as seen in chapter four, for example, signs in windows in the background can clearly be read. Detail in the woods, too, is nice; moss on trees, leaves, and various plants all appear fairly realistic. Flesh tones are never problematic, but black backgrounds often appear as a dark shade of gray. All in all, though, Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling looks good on Blu-ray, and this video presentation is the highlight of the disc.
Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling floats onto Blu-ray with a Dolby TrueHD 5.1 lossless soundtrack that is as forgettable as the movie it accompanies. Front heavy and bland, the track is suitable for a goofy comedy, but not much more. The music emanates nicely across the front with a mostly warm, natural presence, with a bit of support from the subwoofer. Environmental ambience is handled by the front speakers; many of the scenes on the river feature a nice presence across the front, as the water seems to flow around, but the rear speakers are used sparingly, if at all, leaving the experience one-sided and not at all immersive. A few gunshots heard near the end of the movie, along with several crashes and thuds, sound good enough, but again, lacking that sense of real-time immersion thanks to a completely front-heavy presentation. Dialogue is presented with no problems. Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling sounds about as one might expect of a direct-to-video comedy.
Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling sinks on Blu-ray with minimal supplements. Up the Creek: The Making of 'Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling' (1080i, 10:30) is a very basic piece featuring cast and crew recounting the plot and sharing their thoughts on what makes the film work. The piece also looks at how the film connects with the first film in the Without a Paddle series and how this entry expands into its own film. Furious Nuts (1080i, 7:00) is a comical look at the "original" concepts for the squirrels seen in the film. Treehouse Tales (1080i, 3:18) more closely examines the tree house sets used in the film. Concluding the disc-based supplements is a gag reel (480p, 5:28) and four deleted scenes (480p, 1:16). Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling also includes a digital copy of the film which must be downloaded from a website provided on an enclosed flyer, though it states up front that it is neither Mac nor iPod compatible.
Hollywood has produced far, far worse than Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling, but this film might just make a short list of "most forgettable films," even if only considering it among its fellow direct-to-video brethren. The film is horribly paced, dragging mostly due to the unfunny situations, lame dialogue, forgettable characters, and stale direction. Paramount's Blu-ray release of this direct-to-video snoozer is sufficient, with an above average video presentation, an average soundtrack, and a below average helping of bonus materials. Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling is best suited as a space-filler on the DVR whenever it may be on television, but it doesn't make the cut as a recommended addition to a Blu-ray collection.
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