PONYO (2008, Blu-ray released March 2, 2010 – MSRP $39.99)
Stunning. Absolutely stunning. Yeah, I’m a a bit of an unabashed Miyazaki fan but the Blu-ray disc of his latest film, Ponyo has completely blown me away! I didn’t think 2-D, hand-drawn animation could look this good in my home!!
If you follow The Blu-ray Blog at all, I’m sure you’ve gathered that I’ve been waiting ages to get my hands on this disc. I’ve been following Ponyo (Gake no Ue no Ponyo, literally “Ponyo on the Cliff“) since before it was released in Japanese theatres in July of 2008 (writing about it for FPS Magazine too!) I’ve posted articles on the Japanese Blu-ray release, the North American disc and even a now-dated rundown of Studio Ghibli on Blu-ray. To say I’m excited to finally have Ponyo in my Blu-ray disc player is a bit of an understatement. And I’ve got to tell you, for the most part, I’m not let down by this release. Let me start with the good stuff.
The film itself is pure genius. As is everything creator Hayao Miyazaki touches. It’s very possible that I can’t be impartial here, as I’m such a fan of his work but Ponyo is wonderful, understated family entertainment that’s damn near perfect in every way. It’s essentially the familiar story of Hans Christian Andersen‘s The Little Mermaid, given that special Ghibli touch that turns a simple fairy tale into anime magic. It’s crafted to appeal to very small children but loaded with adult themes (the environment is always concern in Miyazaki’s work) and touches that hearken back to the director’s previous works. Much like My Neighbour Totoro and Kiki’s Delivery Service before it, Ponyo leaves you with an enchanted, magical feeling, like you’ve just seen the world through the fresh eyes of a child – a flavour of film making that, in my experience, only Miyazaki seems fully capable of harnessing.
Like I said off the top, Ponyo is absolutely stunning on Blu-ray. I would go so far as to say perfect. Yeah. Ponyo looks perfect! I’ve never seen anything look this slick in HD. I can’t find a fault! The audio, on the other had, is an issue for me. While the DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 English dub does sound spectacular, nearly matching the quality of the video encode, what irks me is the fact that the original language track (Japanese) is relegated to a mere, lossy Dolby Digital 5.1 track! Luckily, it’s pretty decent DD but it doesn’t really hold a candle to the lossless DTS-HD. Sigh… One of these days, Disney, you’re going to see the light and understand that the people who buy these films on Blu-ray are the people who care about film and the quality of the presentation of the original material!
The discs special features are actually a lot better than I was anticipating. And they’re all in HD! I was expecting typical Disney-style kids-fluff here. And there is some of that, to be sure (the clumsy, interactive The World of Ghibli – Enter the Lands, which I’ll be happy to never endlessly click-through again!) but what surprised me is the amount of content that actually features Miyazaki discussing his work! The World of Ghibli – Behind the Studio is a series of short pieces that, when viewed in succession, run almost 45-minutes and feature a ton of behind-the-scenes footage of Studio Ghibli and Miyazaki himself, intercut with a lot of film and interview footage, some of which has been culled from the 12-hour long Ponyo Was Produced Like This – Hayao Miyazaki’s Thinking Process Blu-ray (a Japanese release without English dubbing or subtitles.) There is also a Ponyo-related 1080i, English subtitled sequence from The Scenery In Ghibli : Japan in Miyazaki’s Work / European Journey To Meet Miyazaki’s Work Blu-ray, which is an incredible addition to this US/Canadian disc.
If you’re a Miyazaki fan, as I am, and love to look at his artwork, even when it’s not moving, you’ll really enjoy the excellent picture-in-picture track on the Ponyo disc as it allows you to view all of the master’s hand-drawn storyboards as the film plays in the background! Amazing! Almost as good as a commentary track in this case. The Ponyo Blu-ray disc is rounded out with an introduction to the film by its American producers Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy, previews of other Ghibli discs (sadly, all only available on DVD), trailers and BD-Live.
For a look at all the special features on the Japanese edition of the Ponyo Blu-ray read our previous article here: Studio Ghibli/Disney Ponyo Japanese Blu-ray Bonus Features, Release Date Confirmed
[flv:PONYO_DVD.flv 640 354]
