Inkheart (2008)

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General		Extras
Category	Fantasy	Main Menu Audio Featurette Theatrical Trailer
Rating
Year Of Production	2008
Running Time	101:40
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (84:09)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Ads Then Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Iain Softley
Studio Distributor	Roadshow Home Entertainment	Starring	Brendan Fraser Sienna Guillory Eliza Bennett Richard Strange Paul Bettany Helen Mirren Rafi Gavron
Case	?
RPI	$39.95	Music	Javier Navarrete

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) English Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	2.35:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	2.35:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    I have lately had the opportunity to review quite a few adaptations of fantasy adventure novels such as City of Ember, Eragon, The Golden Compass, The Spiderwick Chronicles, Bridge to Terabithia and others. I enjoy these stories for their inventiveness and the other worlds that are constructed in them. Accordingly, I was keen to take a look at this film, Inkheart.

    Inkheart is the name of the film and is also the name of a book within the film. The story involves Mo Folchart (Brendan Fraser) who is a ‘silvertongue’. A ‘silvertongue’ is a person who has the power to bring characters in books to life in the real world merely by reading the book aloud. The downside of this amazing power is that the character drawn out of the book no longer exists in the world of the book and must be replaced by someone from the real world. Before Mo realised the true extent of his power, he read from the book Inkheart which resulted in a character from the book, Dustfinger (Paul Bettany), a fire juggler & his ferret, Gwin being brought to the real world and Mo’s wife, Resa (Sienna Guillory) being sent to the world of the book. This occurred nine years before the movie kicks off.

    Now, nine years later, Mo is travelling the world searching for copies of the book so that he can attempt to read his wife out of the book. Dustfinger is following Mo trying to get Mo to send him back. Also involved is an evil character from the book, Capricorn (Andy Serkis) and his henchmen who were also read into the real world by Mo. They don’t want Mo to find copies of the book because they are very happy to be in the modern world as they are finding their criminal activities very profitable indeed. Capricorn has been on a campaign to find and destroy all known copies of the book. All of this comes to a head as the film proceeds.

    Mo is accompanied by his young daughter, Meggie (Eliza Hope Bennett) and sometimes by his aunt, Elinor (Helen Mirren) who is a great collector of antiquarian books but does not know of Mo’s power. Other members of a star studded cast include Jim Broadbent as Inkheart’s writer, Fenoglio and Jennifer Connelly as Dustfinger’s wife.

    This is an enjoyable action adventure fantasy film which was shot in Italy & England and benefits from the European look this produces. The book itself is originally German and was written by Cornelia Funke. The story is very much the star here providing an interesting concept to base the story around. My only criticism of the film would be that at times the storyline as presented in the film can become a little confused, relying a little too much on people having read the book. Perhaps a little more exposition and a slightly longer running time would have rectified this. Regardless, this is an entertaining action adventure which will appeal to younger teen audiences and adults who enjoy fantasy adventure (like me). It is probably not suitable for the younger infants school audience due to being a little dark and scary at times.

    None of the technical elements of the film’s production stand out in either a very good or very bad way. They are certainly competent and this has the feel of a quite well put together film.

    Recommended.

Video

    The feature is presented in a 2.35:1 aspect ratio, 16x9 enhanced which is the original aspect ratio.

    The picture was sharp and clear throughout about as good as SD gets. Shadow detail is very good.

    The colour was very good with no major issues to report. This is not an overly colourful film however those present are well rendered and vibrant.

    There were no obvious artefacts.

    There are subtitles in English for the hearing impaired which were clear and easy to read.

    There is a noticeable layer change at 84:09.

Video Ratings Summary

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

Audio

    The audio quality is very good.

    This DVD contains two audio options, an English Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack encoded at 448 Kb/s and an English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo soundtrack encoded at 192 Kb/s. The surround track is surprisingly effective really drawing you into the film.

    Dialogue was mostly easy to understand and clear, however, some scenes were a little difficult to catch, making the subtitles useful.

    The score is by Javier Navarette previously Oscar nominated for Pan's Labyrinth. It works well for the film and sounds good on this transfer using all five speakers.

    The surround speakers were also used extensively for storms, action scenes and the voices of the talking books. Very immersive atmosphere.

    The subwoofer was used for adding bass to the storms and other action effects.

Audio Ratings Summary

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

Menu

    The menu is functional, featuring music and a nice acorn cursor.

Eliza Reads to Us (3:48)

    The young actress who plays Meggie reads a scene from the novel which was not included in the film. Worth listening to.

Theatrical Trailer (2:01)

    Quality Trailer.

    The Region 1 DVD release of this film includes the same featurette plus a full screen version. So, nothing exciting basically. Draw. The film is available on Blu-ray locally and in Region A.

    The video quality is very good.

    The audio quality is very good.

    Not much here.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall