Bry's DVD Review
All About Pan and Scan
Anamorphic Widescreen?
Bryan's DVD Review FAQ

Bryan's Other Sites
Twentysix.net
Riceboypage.com

DVD / Movie Sites
The Digital Bits
IMDB

Try Netflix for Free!

The Emperor's New Groove (2000)
Studio: Buena Vista
MPAA Rating: G
Run Time: 78 minutes
Movie:
Video:
Audio:
Features:
Audio Format:
DTS 5.1, Dolby Digital 5.1
Video Format:
1.66:1 Anamorphic Widescreen

The Movie: The Emperor's New Groove was released by Disney in 2000, and stars the voices of David Spade and John Goodman (among others). It's the story of a young, snobby, arrogant, selfish emperor (voiced by Spade) who through an evil plot is transformed into a Llama. Alas, he becomes friends with Pacha (Goodman) who helps him return to his human form and teaches him some lessons about caring for other people besides yourself. This movie has a fantastic musical score, and all the Disney kitsch you can shake a stick at. I thought Pacha's children were especially cute... but then again, that's what they want you to think. I'd say it's not Disney's best work (and far from their worst... Dinosaur, anyone?), but your kids will love it.

The DVD: When it comes to tip-top video quality, it's pretty hard to beat Disney DVD -- like many of their other DVD's, this transfer is taken direct from the original, digital source, meaning it's perfectly crisp, clear, with bright, bold color with no film grain (there's no film!), dust, scratches, or other imperfections.

The audio is THX certified, and although the musical score sounds amazingly full and detailed, I did notice that in some of the voices (particularly the David Spade narration voice overs) didn't seem to have quite the full range of sound as the score and sound effects did.

Special features are plenty, including a behind the scenes documentary, a deleted scene, Sting's "My Funny Friend and Me" music video (which really was more like a little behind the scenes piece than a music video), and Rascal Flatt's "Walk the Llama Llama" music video (which really was more like a Disney Channel kid's singalong). There's also a little interactive game, audio commentary, and some DVD-ROM content. There are also (all non-anamorphic) commercials -- I mean trailers -- for Monsters, Inc., The Hunchback of Notre Dame II, 102 Dalmatians, and Atlantis: The Lost Empire which they will show you at the beginning if you don't hit "menu" to start the movie.

Date reviewed: 2002-02-26

468C

Reader Comments: none


Add a Comment: