Babe (1995)

This review is sponsored by

BUY IT

General		Extras
Category	Family	DVD Teaser Trailer-Universal #1
Rating
Year Of Production	1995
Running Time	88:10 (Case: 92)
RSDL / Flipper	No/No	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Programme
Region Coding	2,4	Directed By	Chris Noonan
Studio Distributor	Sony Pictures Home Entertain	Starring	James Cromwell Magda Szubanski
Case	Brackley-Trans-No Lip
RPI	$36.95	Music	Nigel Westlake

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) German Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) Italian Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) French Dolby Digital 5.1 (384Kb/s) Spanish Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English for the Hearing Impaired Portuguese Danish Finnish Polish Dutch Swedish Norwegian Czech	Smoking	No
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    Funny, different, marvellous and enchanting are adjectives that spring to mind to describe this wonderful movie. Children will love it, and adults will love its slightly darker undertone.

    The special effects are simply stunning, but, most importantly, they never get in the way of a marvellous story. The human actors very sensibly don't get in the way of the story, either, and are perfectly happy to play supporting roles to a most remarkable pig, Babe, who wants to be a sheepdog.

Video

    This is a stunning transfer, and is of reference quality. It is basically faultless.

    The transfer is presented at an aspect ratio of 1.78:1. It is 16x9 enhanced.

    The transfer was razor sharp and crystal clear throughout. Shadow detail was generally superb, with only the odd scenes lacking slightly in detail.

    The colours were gorgeous. There are plenty of vivid and perfectly saturated greens, browns and reds to enjoy along with some excellent cinematography.

    There were no MPEG artefacts seen. Film-to-video artefacts consisted of minuscule amounts of aliasing that would go completely unnoticed unless you were looking specifically for it. Film artefacts were essentially non-existent except for one very short burst early on in the movie.

    Subtitles must be selected from the main menu, and the choices are dependent on which Region the DVD player is set to. Unlike Twister before it, the packaging for this disc is labelled correctly for Region 4, except for the running time which is incorrectly stated as 92 minutes when it is in fact 88 minutes.

Audio

    Dialogue was a little hard to understand early on in the movie, and had a very processed, ADR quality about it. This improved as the movie progressed.

    There were some minor audio sync issues with the human ADR dubbed dialogue, but nothing of major concern.

    The score by Nigel Westlake is frequently present, and integrates excellently into the overall feel of the movie.

    The surround channels were utilized effectively by this soundtrack, with lots of ambient noises placed in the surrounds along with plenty of music. Whilst not being spectacularly enveloping, this soundtrack was very effectively enveloping, helping to draw you into the movie.

    The .1 channel received a small amount of signal which was well-integrated into the overall soundtrack.

Menu

    There are two versions of this disc in Region 1. One has the standard Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack, and the other has a DTS 5.1 soundtrack. Both versions are Full Frame only (1.33:1), and neither have any additional features on the disc. Consequently, the Region 4 version is the version of choice.

    The video quality is virtually perfect, and being in the correct widescreen aspect ratio (and 16x9 enhanced), this disc is superior to the Region 1 version of this movie.

    The audio quality is very good, with some minor dialogue intelligibility issues detracting slightly from the movie early on.

    There are no extras.

    This disc is good enough to go into my Hall of Fame.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall