Polar Express, The 3D

Dreams become reality when a young boy—who no longer believes in the magic of Christmas—takes a golden ticket ride on The Polar Express. Based on the book and paintings by Chris Van Allsburg. (Suzanne Hodges)

Special features include You Look Familiar: The Many Faces Of Tom Hanks, which is a fascinating featurette that explains how Tom Hanks stars as the boy, the father, the conductor, the hobo, and Santa Claus (SD 4:09); A Genuine Ticket To Ride (SD 11:12); True Inspirations: An Author's Adventure, which is a featurette that profiles author Chris Van Allsburg (SD 5:29); Behind The Scenes Of "Believe"—a behind-the-scenes peek at creating "Believe" with Glen Ballard, the writer of the song, and singer Josh Groban (SD 4:24); Flurry Of Effects: five motion-capture sessions—"All Aboard," "Hot Chocolate," "Hobo On Top Of Train," "I Believe," and "Goodbye" (SD 8:48); additional footage, including listening to Josh Groban sing a live performance of "Believe" at The Greek Theatre (SD 4:33); Meet The Snow Angels—the moviemakers' Christmas memories featurette (SD 2:44); an additional song; the characters Smokey and Steamer—played by the late Michael Jeter performing "It Takes Two" (SD 7:04); the theatrical trailer (SD 1:02); the THQ game demo; and D-BOX Motion Code™.

Faithful to the look of Chris Van Allsburg's original picture book animation, the 2-D 1080p VC-1 2.41:1 picture reviewed as a Webzine Exclusive was superior to the anamorphically enhanced 2.38:1 DVD picture reviewed in Issue 115. This 2.40:1 1080p MVC 3-D Blu-ray release is far superior. Color saturation is superb. The picture exhibits pleasing, beautiful imagery with glowing lights and foggy grays that provide mood and intrigue to the storytelling. Viewers will be fascinated with the motion capture-animated imagery. Textures and attention to detail are astounding. The picture is clean and solid. Unlike the previous 3-D version viewed through the provided red/blue anaglyph glasses (four provided), this 3-D version provides a greatly enhanced experience and does not suffer from a faded color palette. While slightly darker in character, viewing in a darkened, preferably black room, is recommend for optimal picture quality. Resolution is nicely refined, with a soft, stylistic look that reveals finer details upon close examination. The color palette's rich and warm hues have limited pop. Still, the color scheme is pleasing to the eye and complements the overall stylization. The 3D itself inspires imagination, with nifty motion dimension during the Polar Express' journey to the North Pole. Depth and perspective perception is excellent and at times the imagery presses effectively forward from the screen. The night scene with the train amidst the herd of Caribou exhibits a natural presence, with excellent depth. There is no apparent double image or ghosting artifacts, for an impressively pristine cinematic experience. The outstanding 3-D imagery does a fine job in delivering this holiday classic, which should be near the top of a family's 3-D Blu-ray collection. (Gary Reber)

While generally quiescent in nature, the previous Dolby® TrueHD 5.1 soundtrack was a noticeable improvement over the DVD's Dolby Digital 5.1-channel soundtrack. The 3-D Blu-ray's soundtrack is encoded in the DTS-HD Master Audio™ lossless codec. The 5.1-channel surround sound is recorded and mixed very well, with good imaging around the room and pristine detail. Dialogue sounds so natural, and effects are so believable, closing your eyes it is easy to assume this is a live-action recording. The waiter dance scene in the hot chocolate scene is absolutely wonderful and a thrill to experience. The deep bass of the Polar Express train permeates the room, using each of the front three full-range channels and the LFE, to create a wall of force that you will hear and feel, especially if experienced on a D-BOX Motion Code system. The D-BOX experience is often intense and adds excitement. The surround channels, unfortunately, are not used as effectively as they could for off-screen and atmospheric effects and are pretty much limited to the music. That is all that stops this track from joining the ranks of the elite. (Danny Richelieu/Gary Reber)