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Balto [Blu-ray]
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Additional Blu-ray options | Edition | Discs | Price | New from | Used from |
Blu-ray
July 4, 2017 "Please retry" | — | — |
—
| $9.99 | — |
Watch Instantly with | Rent | Buy |
Balto | — | — |
Purchase options and add-ons
Genre | Kids & Family, Animation, Action & Adventure |
Format | NTSC, Subtitled |
Contributor | Juliette Brewer, Steve Hickner, Jim Cummings, Roger S.H. Schulman, Steven Spielberg, Bridget Fonda, David Steven Cohen, Bob Hoskins, Simon Wells, Cliff Ruby, Kevin Bacon, Phil Collins, Miriam Margolyes, Lola Bates-Campbell, Elana Lesser See more |
Initial release date | 2017-07-04 |
Language | English |
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From the manufacturer
About Us
Universal Pictures is an American film studio, owned by Comcast through its wholly owned subsidiary NBCUniversal, and is one of Hollywood's "Big Six" film studios. Its production studios are at 100 Universal City Plaza Drive in Universal City, California. Distribution and other corporate offices are in New York City. Universal Studios is a member of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). Universal was founded in 1912 by the German Carl Laemmle (pronounced "LEM-lee"), Mark Dintenfass, Charles O. Baumann, Adam Kessel, Pat Powers, William Swanson, David Horsley, Robert H. Cochrane, and Jules Brulatour.
Six of Universal Studios' films; Jaws (1975), E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982), Jurassic Park (1993), Despicable Me 2 (2013), Furious 7 (2015) and Jurassic World (2015) achieved box office records, with the first three (which were directed by Steven Spielberg) all becoming the highest-grossing film at the time of its initial release.
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Product Description
Experience the journey of one of the most courageous canines of all time with Balto, inspired by an incredible true story. Part husky/part wolf, Balto doesn't know where he belongs. He's an outcast in Alaska, except to his true friends—Boris, the Russian snow goose; polar bear cubs Muk and Luk; and the beautiful husky, Jenna. Even though he's different, all of Balto's friends recognize what he still can't see himself: his noble spirit. One day, a serious epidemic spreads fast among the children of Nome. When a fierce blizzard closes off all routes of transport, there's no way to obtain lifesaving medicine…unless a team of sled dogs can race six-hundred miles through the blinding Arctic storm and bring back anti-toxin. When the dogs get lost in the frozen wilderness, only Balto can rescue the team and save the children.
Product details
- Aspect Ratio : 1.85:1
- Is Discontinued By Manufacturer : No
- MPAA rating : G (General Audience)
- Product Dimensions : 0.7 x 7.5 x 5.4 inches; 2.4 ounces
- Director : Simon Wells
- Media Format : NTSC, Subtitled
- Run time : 1 hour and 18 minutes
- Release date : July 4, 2017
- Actors : Kevin Bacon, Bridget Fonda, Phil Collins, Bob Hoskins, Miriam Margolyes
- Subtitles: : Norwegian, German, Swedish, Finnish, Danish
- Producers : Steve Hickner, Steven Spielberg
- Language : English (DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1)
- Studio : Universal Pictures Home Entertainment
- ASIN : B0716F3K1G
- Writers : Cliff Ruby, Elana Lesser, David Steven Cohen, Roger S.H. Schulman
- Country of Origin : USA
- Number of discs : 1
- Best Sellers Rank: #5,358 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
- #245 in Kids & Family Blu-ray Discs
- #788 in Action & Adventure Blu-ray Discs
- Customer Reviews:
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Top reviews
Top reviews from the United States
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Balto is one of my favorites from childhood despite the fact it was overshadowed in its year of release, and never really got the recognition it deserved. Its very loosely based on the true story of Alaskan husky, Balto and his role in carrying diphtheria medicine to Nome in 1925. The film itself takes many liberties with the real story, including the fact they say Balto is half-wolf, when he never was. This was not meant to be a historical documentary, it was meant to be good family fun, and it succeeds in that department.
Now for those blu-ray fans....what did Universal give us?
Video is somewhat grainy, but this is not a bad thing in itself because it means that Universal did not do what Disney sometimes does and tries to remove every speck of dust they can find, removing some of the texture and quality of the painted cells in the process. The film isn't that old, so the grain isn't as apparent as what happened when Land Before Time came out on blu-ray. This is also the first time in the United States we have the opportunity to see Balto in widescreen 1.85! When I watched it, I saw things I didn't remember largely because they were not chopped off the sides on all the previous DVD releases we had to put up with. Video bitrate hovers around a healthy 30mbps.
Audio is amazing on this blu-ray as its presented in HD-5.1 Master Audio. I've never heard Balto sound better, if you have a decent system to show it off. Watching the white wolf scene, I noticed James Horner's score being more crystalline and with more sparkle than it ever had, even more than on the CD soundtrack, which was already mastered well!
Unfortunately, no extras are there. That's a shame because there is a Making Of featurette out there. For those that want to browse google, the 30 minute Making Of documentary that was released over in Europe on one of their DVD releases. There are also other documentaries to be found about the real Balto online if you're so inclined to learn more about the four-legged hero of Nome (and Togo too!).
Overall, I was shocked Universal released this on blu-ray at all, given it was already making its rounds on streaming services. I won't complain about the lack of extras, just happy to finally have the film in its proper aspect ratio and in HD!
The story: loosely based on a true event, Balto (voiced by Kevin Bacon, Mystic River ) is a dog-wolf crossbreed who must prove his worth and place in a small Alaskan community by rescuing a sled team relaying a crate of valuable medicine to the stricken town across the dangerous sub-Arctic wilderness.
Aficionados of strong mainstream animation will be getting an eyeful. In comparison to Amblimation's previous two films, "Balto" ranks number one: it's infinitely finer and more detailed than We're Back! A Dinosaur's Story , and while An American Tail - Fievel Goes West was arguably more expressive with a jump-out-at-you illustration quality, it was less coordinated and a bit too over-the-place by contrast. I've always appreciated the art style that director Simon Wells brings to the table, and this one ought to be considered his magnum opus for how well he pulls everything off here: the animal animation manages to be both graceful and funny depending on the character, the rotoscoping used for human characters is as smooth as Don Bluth could ever have managed, and the limited computer-generated objects and environment pieces are tastefully rendered and harmonious to the film's predominant 2D art style...95% of the time. It's a pretty gorgeous picture.
The voice acting's good and solid. Bob Hoskins ( Who Framed Roger Rabbit ) as Boris the goose, Bridget Fonda ( Jackie Brown ) as Jenna the lady husky, and voice-acting stalwart Jim Cummings ( The Lion King ) as the narcissistic antagonist are great as immediate co-stars, and Phil Collins is pretty funny in one of only two voice acting roles he's taken, this time as a pair of hydrophobic polar bear cubs. Kevin Bacon does a pretty good job as Balto, but since the movie makes such a huge deal out of his being a half-breed - a possible allusion to mixed race Native Americanism - he might have been more authentically played by a young Indian actor like Jay Tavare or Paul Litefoot. Moving beyond the casting, the only fault I can find with the movie is in its writing: most notably, the inclusion of Muk and Luk - Phil Collins' characters - is redundant, since Bob Hoskins was already supplying comic relief within his mentor role. I also was kind of a annoyed with a dumb E.T. reference late in the movie and a really forced sequence wherein Jim Cummings' character keeps Balto from joining the sled team by stepping on his paw and making him bare his teeth at the team leader - what, were the humans so unobservant that they didn't see this was a provoked response?
Gunnar Kaasen, the real-life musher who drove Balto and his team during the historical relay, is also a voiced and animated character but he's not explored at all or even named in the movie - perhaps the one thing the film was missing, to give it a greater sense of legitimacy. However, as it currently stands, "Balto" is very good, with a strong story that needed telling and probably otherwise would've been snatched up by Disney in the future, but it's not perfect. Luckily, its imperfections are overlookable and don't keep the film from retaining its well-deserved status as a cult classic and credible alternative to other big studio output of the time.
Top reviews from other countries
Ceci étant dit, je voudrais juste préciser ce que l'annonce Amazon a oublié de mentionné à propos du DVD. Celui-ci comporte bien une VOSTFR pour ceux qui se poseraient la question, ainsi que des bonus : la bande-annonce de Balto, la bande-annonce de E.T. pour sa ressortie salle en 2002 (les 20 ans du film), ainsi qu'un documentaire de 26 minutes, sorte de making-of de ce dessin animé, très intéressant car il nous montre à voir le véritable Balto et son histoire, jusqu'à sa mort en 1933 dans un zoo. Par ailleurs, le DVD se lit bien, le son et l'image sont de bonne qualité. Bref, faut pas hésiter à l'acheter et à le montrer à vos enfants.
Merci pour ma fille et je recommande