Igor – Blu-ray Disc Review

March 13, 2009 – 4:36 PM - Posted by: Danielle Byington

Tags: Eddie Izzard, Jay Leno, Jennifer Coolidge, John Cleese, John Cusack, Matt McKenna, MGM, Molly Shannon, Myleene Klass, Sean Hayes, Steve Buscemi

has an average rating of 6.1 on IMDb
1080p in AVC MPEG-4 on a 50gb disc
DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio
are HD but tad bit too short
–
– 2008
– 86 minutes
– MGM
–
This uses 26.1GB for the movie out of 27.7GB total.

Overall Verdict – Worth A Look

Buy it for $25.99 @ Amazon.com

— Review written by: Danielle Byington —

Trailer:

The Movie Itself is Directed by Anthony Leondis, who also contributed to the screenplay, with the writing credits of Chris McKenna, Dimitri Toscas (additional screenplay), and John Hoffman (additional screenplay). The story revolves around the world of Malaria, where overcast stormy clouds one day came, and never went away. Because they can no longer economically survive with their typical ways, the world of Malaria has become a dark one, offering fame and fortune to the most supreme evil scientists for their horrid inventions that the rest of the world pays millions to keep the use of such creations from wrecking havoc on their land. As every evil scientist must have an “Igor”, and there are several evil scientists in Malaria, there is an abundance of the “Igor” type, destined for the work with the hunch-backs they are born with, and trained in special “Igor” schools.

This brings us to the introduction of our main character, Igor (John Cusack). However, this leading “Igor” just is not like the others; Igor has the most sincere aspirations to be an evil scientist himself. Though, unfortunately for him, it is absolutely preposterous for that dream to come true in the world of Malaria. That is until the evil scientist Igor serves slays himself in carelessness of a trial run of his own invention, leaving Igor in a laboratory full of opportunity.

Igor has previously developed a few creations; notably, Scamper (Steve Buscemi), an immortal rabbit with suicidal tendencies, and Brain (Sean Hayes), a talking brain in a jar on wheels with a severe lack of common sense. With these creations under his belt, and at his side assisting him, Igor is opting to created another life form, Eva (Molly Shannon), to be the most dreadful and horrific creation Malaria has ever seen, all to bring him fame and respect as an Igor at the Evil Science Fair. The problem with this plan, however, is that Eva is way to kind, and not only is her behavior putting a damper on the big Evil Science Fair win, but another plotting evil scientist, Dr. Schadenfreude (Eddie Izzard), is using his girlfriend, Jaclyn (Jennifer Coolidge), to secretly round-up the creations of other scientists for his gain of fame and fortunate.

Overall, the film should appeal to many audiences, with its multiple levels of humor. However, that of course also creates an issue, when people have this instinct of “it’s animated, so that means my 5 year old can watch it”. Though it does wear a “PG” rating, elements such as the suicidal rabbit it seems have upset some parents. However, for the more seasoned adolescent groups, teenagers and up, the film should come across as quite humorous, with a dialogue really playing on sarcasm. The story itself is interesting, but seems a tad weak at some points. Adding it all in, funny jokes plus an okay story, the movie itself earns a “3.5 Star Rating“.

Video Quality on this release is in full 1080p using the AVC MPEG-4 codec on a BD-50 (50 gigabyte dual-layered Blu-ray Disc) in the 1.85:1 aspect ratio. Immediately upon watching this release, audiences will be impressed by an abundance of 3-D depth that the visual style of the animated film presents. This “pop” that is visually experienced often exists through out the film, from still scenes with highly detailed backgrounds, to some interesting 360 degree animated scenes. In regard of the characters themselves, the animation style is somewhat simplistic, though the detail that is present, especially in their surroundings, is very clear. The color palette filling this animated film relies more on a murkiness, with potentially vivid hues baring a dingy look, all making for a fitting essence in a world populated by evil scientists. There is a solid black level present which of course heightens the aspects mentioned above. Overall, the video quality on this release earns a “4.5 Star Rating“.

Audio Quality on this release is presented in DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio. As it goes with most animated features these days, the audio quality is rather impressive. All of the foley is well fitting, and conveys realism, using all of the channels in the soundscape through out the film’s duration. There is a great amount of bass presence, especially when used as a sound effect, such as when Eva crashes through a wall, or even her own gigantic footsteps. The soundtrack offers some fun “oldies” tunes, presented with clarity from the front channels, though also not skimping on the usage of the rear channels; the brightness of these songs helps pull the audience away from a totally dark and dreary setting, acting as a reminder of the lighter comedic elements of the film. Overall, a detailed audio track with brightness and clarity, earning a “4.5 Star Rating“.

Bonus Materials on this release are presented in High Definition video using AVC MPEG-4 and Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo @224kbps.

• “Audio Commentary By Director Tony Leondis, Writer Chris McKenna, And Producer Max Howard“
• “Alternate Opening Scene” (3:18 – HD) is nice to see included and is definitely worth watching if you enjoyed the film but is sadly the only real “featurette” of sorts found on this release, aside from the features mentioned above and below. I do have to say the video quality here has some issues and the voice over narration doesn’t seem to be by John Cuscak. It almost seems this is actually the voice of actor Albert Brooks. I guess he was originally considered for the lead role or something.
• “Concept Art Galleries: Characters, Set and Production Design, Storyboards, and Posters“. If you’re a fan of this film’s computer animated visuals then you’ll probably enjoy looking at some of the still photographs from the early production, storyboard sketches. The posters on the other hand, most no one will really care to look through.

In closing, the bonus materials we get here are very slim in quantity and really quality as well. MGM is known for not doing very good bonus materials on past Blu-ray Disc releases. So, I can’t really say this comes as too much of a surprise.

Blu-ray Disc packaging:

Screenshots:

NOTE: The full-sized 1920×1080 files are in a .PNG file format and uncompressed. Bare with the slow loading times, keep in mind these files are at least 1MB (1 megabyte) in size each.

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