Prancer Returns (2001)

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General		Extras
Category	Family	Main Menu Audio Theatrical Trailer DVD-ROM Extras-Games (2);Colouring Pages;Screensaver;Windows Theme;Web Link
Rating
Year Of Production	2001
Running Time	86:56
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Joshua Butler
Studio Distributor	Universal Pictures Home Video	Starring	John Corbett Stacy Edwards Michael O'Keefe Jack Palance Robert Clark
Case	?
RPI	$29.95	Music	Randy Miller Kristin Wilkinson

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	Unknown	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	None	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Prancer Returns is a very straightforward formula-based American story. It has all the standard elements: the divorced mother with two kids, one that is having problems with the divorce and wants to go back and live with his father, and another that is the standard misfit who has yet to make any friends and is the occasional target for bullies. The mother and kids move back to the mother's original home town. There are two guys in the town that are very happy that she has moved back, and one is a less-than-likeable character who thinks she will fall head-over-heels for him. He is also in this case the local school principal. The other is great with kids...

    Now, as we know, in this standard story the younger brother is going to get involved in some sort of crisis that will ultimately be resolved, and we will ride off into the sunset for a very sickly sweet and overly happy ending. Because this is a Christmas version of the formula, the crisis in this case revolves around one of Santa's reindeer - Prancer, to be precise. Without delving too deeply into the mythological background that they build up to support the storyline, which actually gets an extra half star as the only original thing in this film, the young boy ends up trying to look after a young reindeer. He initially hides it in his bedroom and the middle of the film is a series of situational skits based around keeping a reindeer at home. Of course, he is soon found out and the poor little reindeer ends up on death row for biting the school principal (see how the complex threads of this story come together), but...hold the phone. This could be one of Santa's reindeer and Christmas just wouldn't be the same if Santa was one reindeer short on his appointed rounds on Christmas Eve.

    To make matters even a little more uncomfortable, this is actually a sequel. In the first film, which appears to have followed the same formula as this one, a little girl (with a troubled family) found an injured reindeer in the forest and nursed him back to health just in time for Christmas Eve when the reindeer, which is of course Prancer, flew off to join Santa on his Christmas flight. This story is reflected in this film by being the town legend and these events are ten years in the past.

Video

    Considering that this is a single layered disc, this is a very nice transfer with no real problems.

    The transfer is presented in an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 and is 16x9 enhanced.

    The image is sharp and the shadow detail good. There is no low level noise present.

    The colours are good with no noise or bleeding present. Some scenes appear to have been filmed through a very blue filter which does have an effect on skin tones. It would appear that they were trying to give the impression of extreme cold.

    There are no MPEG artefacts visible nor any film to video transfer artefacts. There is also a complete absence of any visible grain.

    There are no subtitles on this disc.

    This is a single layered disc, and thus there is no layer change.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    There is a single English Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack with the surround flag set on this disc.

    There are no problems with the dialogue quality nor with the audio sync.

    The theme song is the best part of this soundtrack and is not bad at all. The remainder of the soundtrack is fairly standard stuff and works well enough with the on-screen action.

    The surrounds help the music draw from the front to surround the listener but there is little else present.

    Other than the theme song which has a reasonable bass line there is not much activity from the subwoofer.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Menu

    A simple static menu with a picture of the little boy from the film, accompanied by a Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack.

Theatrical Trailer (1:06)

    This looks a lot more like a TV ad for the DVD/Video than a theatrical trailer. It is presented at an aspect ratio of 1.33:1 and is accompanied by a Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack with the surround bit set.

DVD ROM: Game: Escape to Antler Ridge

    A very simple little game where you try and avoid the bad guys by throwing snowballs at them. There are energy points etc. to collect. The game is shown as a top down view of you and your reindeer on an ice lake - both appear to be on ice skates. I couldn't seem to get the hang of this game but maybe I am getting old.

DVD ROM: Game: Prancer's Maze Game

    A small version of Pac-man with Prancer as you and animal control goons as the munchins. All the standard power-ups etc. are available - not a bad effort considering that this and the previous game are built in Macromedia Flash.

DVD ROM: Printable colouring-in pages.

    Five pages of scenes from the film in outline. Print them off and the kiddies can enjoy colouring them in.

DVD ROM: Screen Saver and Theme package.

    I'll admit to not having loaded these as I quite like my current settings but assume that they are pretty much the standard offerings for these functions.

DVD ROM: More Prancer fun.

    This link would have taken you to a website with more content. Unfortunately, the Prancer section of the web site appears to have disappeared. The remaining site appears to be a shop of some sort.

    The Region 4 version of this disc misses out on:

• Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack.
• Music Video If You Believe
• RSDL disc.

The Region 1 version of this disc misses out on:

• Nothing

    The review that I located for the Region 1 version stated that the 5.1 soundtrack was basically no different from the surround encoded version (which both discs have). The transfer on the Region 4 version does not seem to have suffered from being compressed onto a single layer leaving us with only the Music Video as the main difference. This gives us a technical win to R1, but in reality I would prefer the PAL transfer.

    The highlight of this film for me was to see Jack Palance in another role, albeit looking a little old. There is probably a market for this film in the correct age group, maybe about 9 or so, but as none of my brood are currently at that age I cannot confirm this.

    The video quality is very good

    The audio is all right for this type of film.

    The extras are aimed at the kids which is probably quite appropriate.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall