Avengers, The (Blu-ray 3D) (2012)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Action Adventure	Featurette-Short Film - Item 47 (11:20) Featurette-Visual Journey (6:02) Featurette-Gag Reel Deleted Scenes-Deleted & Alternate Scenes (14:59)
Rating
Year Of Production	2012
Running Time	143:00
RSDL / Flipper	Dual Layered	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	Joss Whedon
Studio Distributor	Marvel Paramount Home Entertainment	Starring	Robert Downey Jr. Chris Evans Mark Ruffalo Chris Hemsworth Scarlett Johansson Jeremy Renner
Case	Amaray Variant
RPI	$46.95	Music	Alan Silvestri

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	Auto Pan & Scan Encoded	English DTS HD Master Audio 7.1 (6912Kb/s) Italian DTS HD High Resolution Audio 7.1 (2304Kb/s) Hindi Dolby Digital 5.1 (320Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	1080p
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English Hindi Italian Romanian	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	Yes, setting up the sequel and an amusing post-credits

    So here it is – the first proper big screen incarnation of The Avengers. A culmination of several previous Marvel films starting with the commercial success of Iron Man in early 2008, which led to a planned series of films setting the background for this one: The Incredible Hulk in late 2008, Iron Man 2 in 2010, Thor in early 2011 and Captain America: The First Avenger in late 2011.

    That’s a lot of lead up to a film and places significant weight on the shoulders of the cast and crew, and in particular the writer and director of The Avengers. When Joss Whedon was brought on board in mid-2010 to helm the film and take up directing credits and tweak the script by Zak Penn, fans of the comic series breathed a collective sigh of relief – if anybody could pull this off, the creator of cult favourites Buffy: The Vampire Slayer and Firefly could.

    The question is, did he succeed?

    Before I continue with this review, I should point out that I grew up on Marvel and DC comics. Sure, my experience of The Avengers is that of the 1980s and early 1990s, and generally more around their crossovers with my childhood favourite Marvel Universe characters, The X-Men, but I do have a certain nostalgic fondness for the characters that may or may not have coloured my views of this film.

    There is an adage – “You can never go home.” The meaning being that, what we see through the rosy coloured remembrances of youth are not necessarily what they were then, nor are they anything you can recreate now in your adult self. With much of his small screen work, Joss Whedon seems to have been trying to deny that adage, and has taken that over into his work in comics with his run on The Astonishing X-Men. It is clear that Whedon did not take up this film just to cash a pay cheque. He has a definite love for the characters in the film and the Marvel Universe itself. I always wonder what would have been if he had been given the reigns for X-Men: The Last Stand - I suspect that film would have been a much better one.

    So it would seem, with The Avengers, Whedon has sought again to defy the adage and take fans of the comic back to their youth whilst at the same time creating the mythos that would enable newcomers to enjoy the film as well. And, at least in this reviewer’s experience, he succeeded.

    The plot of The Avengers is as far-fetched as the plots of the comic book generally were – Loki (Tom Hiddleston), the adopted brother of Thor (Chris Hemsworth), makes a pact with a race of aliens to invade Earth in return for their help in bringing him to rule in Asgard. The invasion begins at a S.H.I.E.L.D. compound where Clint Barton / Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner) is turned to the service of Loki and the entire compound destroyed. Seeing the destruction wrought at the compound, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) proceeds to initiate the mothballed Avengers Project to combat this new enemy and call into service Tony Stark / Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Natasha Romanoff / Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), Steve Rogers / Captain America (Chris Evans), and Dr. Bruce Banner / Hulk (Mark Ruffalo, replacing Edward Norton from the 2008 The Incredible Hulk film). Of course, once Thor realises that Loki is on Earth, he must also intervene, much to the displeasure of S.H.I.E.L.D. and other members of the team. As tensions mount, and personality clashes abound, things start turning for the worse with an alien invasion in New York imminent. Can the Avengers put aside their differences and assemble to save the Earth?

    Whedon is one of those rare directors in Hollywood today that seems to understand that for all the big screen spectacle that is afforded by the summer blockbuster, what makes a film are the believable characters in the film who we come to like and care about. The film can have all the special effects it wants, but it’s just a paper moon if we as an audience do not care what happens to the characters in the film. We simply cease to engage. With this in mind, much of the film involves developing the interplay between the characters and letting their personalities evolve in the course of the film. It certainly helps if you have seen all of the previous Marvel Universe films leading to this one, and in some respects Whedon assumes that you have in order for this film to succeed on every level. But rest assured, you will not be cast completely adrift if you have not.

    As a visual effects extravaganza, The Avengers is a complete success – and believe me, the bigger the screen you have, the better in that regard. As an epic superheroes movie, The Avengers is also a success. As a cinematic masterpiece, we are not really comparing apples and apples. What I will say, though, is that The Avengers is a far more light-hearted and fun film than, for example, Christopher Nolan’s vision of Batman. I find that Nolan’s Batman films seek to engage on an intensified emotional level in a way that Whedon’s vision of The Avengers does not have scope to – there are simply too many characters involved. And whilst I will say that my adult self has a greater love and respect for Nolan’s Batman films, I was, very briefly, taken home by The Avengers to a ten year old me reading comic books in the sun. I think that if Whedon knew that, he would feel that he achieved his goal.

Video

    There are numerous releases of this title in Australia. I have the Blu-Ray 3D, Blu-Ray and Digital Copy “Triple Play” release for review. The 3D Blu-Ray is the subject of this review. The standard 2D Blu-Ray is also reviewed.

    The Avengers was shot almost entirely in digital using the Arri Alexa film-style digital motion picture camera system at a maximum resolution of 2880 pixels x 2160 pixels. Some scenes were shot using Digital SLR cameras, and some film sequences were captured on high-speed 35mm using an Arriflex 435. The film was composed in an aspect ratio of 1.85:1 for theatrical broadcast. The cinematographer, Seamus McGarvey, has been quoted as saying that this was done to compensate for the radically different heights of the various cast members, particularly in their CGI incarnations when Ruffalo has to merge into The Hulk. He is also quoted as saying that this was to give a sense of vertical scale to the two major action set-pieces, both of which have altitude as a major component of their visceral feel.

    The Blu-Ray release has had the matte opened slightly to 1.78:1 to completely fill a standard 16:9 television screen. This assists in viewing the film in 3D, which tends to be more impressive when the entire screen is filled.

    The film was not originally shot in 3D, although Walt Disney Studios had announced that it wanted The Avengers to be in 3D in theatres, and this was kept in mind in the way in which the film was shot. The movie was converted in post-production to 3D for cinematic release, a task made much easier by the fact that it was shot in digital.

    The 3D Blu-Ray is encoded at a resolution 1080p in MPEG-4 AVC encode with a rough bit rate of 32Mbps.

    This is a very subtle 3D image with no “stand out” 3D moments. That said, it is also a very effective 3D image with good depth of field and no instances of 3D “flatness” such as were present in the Harry Potter 3D releases. Although my home 3D collection is very limited, this is one of the better 3D experiences I have had on Blu-Ray.

    The 3D image is a touch less detailed than the 2D image, seeming a little granier in the background. This is a consequence of the image needing to be “split” between left and right eye to generate the 3D image but with only a 1080 resolution panel to do that.

    Being shot on digital, there were no film to video artefacts and no film artefacts.

    Colour is bold and accurate, even with the decreased luminance from the 3D glasses. Obviously, my TV has a 3D setting that seeks to compensate for the glasses and to be honest, after the first 5 minutes or so I completely forgot I was wearing the glasses and simply sank into the 3D experience.

    Shadow detail is excellent with inky blacks and no noise in dark scenes, as you would expect given that there was no dependence on light exposure on film in shooting.

    Subtitles are available in numerous languages including English, Hindi, Italian and Romanian.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    Both the 3D and 2D Blu-Rays present the theatrical 7.1 DTS-HD Master Audio mix at 48kHz and an average bit rate of 5.0Mbps.

    As one would expect of a film such as this, the sound design is about creating a big screen blockbuster audio assault. And it succeeds, with aggressive use of surrounds and the subwoofer during the various battle sequences, and a constant use of the surrounds for ambience throughout the film. With a sufficient system, listening to this audio track really is like sitting in a theatre.

    Dialogue is clear and easy to understand throughout the film, even when coming form a channel other than the centre channel.

    I unfortunately do not have room for back surrounds so cannot comment directly on their use, but would suggest that given how aggressively the other speakers in the mix are used, the back surrounds are equally as well utilized.

    Audio is also available in Italian in 7.1 DTS-HD High Resolution Audio, Hindi in 5.1 Dolby Digital and there is an English Audio Descriptive track as well.

    All up, this is the demo disc of 2012 for audio.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Menus

    The start-up menu is presented in 1.78:1, 16x9 enhanced with a DTS-HD MA soundtrack and also in 3D.

Featurette - A Visual Journey (6:02) (1080p HD not 3D)

    A promotional featurette from the show.

Gag Reel (4:05) (1080p HD not 3D)

Short Film - Item 47 (1080p HD not 3D)

    Presented in 2.35:1, 1080p HD, 16x9 enhanced with a Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo soundtrack at 320kbps, this is a short film set shortly after the movie about a missing piece of technology.

Deleted/Extended Scenes (9 In Total) (14:59) (not 3D)

    The film was originally cast with a different intro and outro that puts a slightly different light on one of the characters. I think Whedon made the right choice in re-editing it as he did. Most of the other scenes were removed for timing purposes and add little to the film.

Digital Copy

    This is a full digital copy of the film in 2D with Dolby Digital 5.1 audio compatible with iTunes and other mobile platforms. As a person who travels a lot, I do appreciate it when studios release digital copies of their films with the Blu-Ray release. I downloaded this to my iPad and it works well for a mobile version. Through my AppleTV it was no comparison to the HD version on Blu-Ray, nor should one expect it to be. Though given that the iTunes store now downloads in 1080p, it would be nice for a HD digital copy to be included or downloadable as an option.

    The US version also includes:

- Audio Commentary by Director Joss Whedon

- Featurette - Disney's Second Screen

- Featurette - Assembling the Ultimate Team

- Music Video - Soundgarden “Live to Rise”

    If you value special features, the US release is clearly the winner.

     The Avengers is an example of Marvel Universe storytelling done right. It is shot full of Whedon’s trademark dry humour and some excellent action set pieces, but it is ultimately held together by the characters, played by an excellent ensemble cast. If you’re a fan, this is a must own, and if you have 3D this is also a must own.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall