Smurfs: The Lost Village isn’t a very good movie but being aimed at younger audiences, and I suppose Smurfs purists, it’s fine a time-waster and at least does have a nice message to it.
Smurfs: The Lost Village
(2017)
Genre(s): Animation, Comedy, Adventure, Fantasy
Sony | PG – 90 min. – $45.99 | July 11, 2017
Date Published: 07/13/2017 | Author: The Movieman
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Note: Screen Captures came from the included Blu-ray disc.
THE MOVIE — 2.5/5 |
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Plot Synopsis: Best friends Smurfette (DEMI LOVATO), Brainy (DANNY PUDI), Clumsy (JACK MCBRAYER) and Hefty (JOE MANGIELLO) use a special map that guides them through the Forbidden Forest, an enchanted wonderland that’s filled with magical creatures. Their adventure leads them on a course to discover the biggest secret in Smurf history as they race against time and the evil wizard Gargamel (RAINN WILSON) to find a mysterious village. Quick Hit Review: The Smurfs franchise, the two part-live action versions, were hardly good – go so far to call them awful, so it’s not an uphill battle for Smurfs: The Lost Village to improve on the previously installments. Now it’s entirely animated, which it should’ve been from the start, and while it’s certainly not good, it is a mild improvement. Sadly, for comedy it’s not that funny though I did manage to elicit a chuckle once, otherwise I sat there, a man in his mid-30s, biding my time until the short 90-minute running time ran out. This go around we get voice talents that included the likes of Mandy Patinkin as Papa Smurf, singer/songwriter Demi Lovato as Smurfette and Rainn Wilson voicing Gargamel, and honestly, he wasn’t too bad but even in voice form couldn’t hold a candle to Hank Azaria who was the best parts of the two previous films. |
SPECIAL FEATURES – 2.5/5 |
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This release comes with a thin, matted slip cover. Inside is a redemption code for the Digital HD copy. Filmmaker Commentary – Director Kelly Asbury, Animation Supervisor Allan Hawkins and Head of Story Brandon Jeffords. This is a fine track, each providing a little background on the story, characters and animation. Deleted Scenes (7:35; HD) – There are four (unfinished) scenes that didn’t make the cut and are accompanied with text explaining the context and where they would’ve been placed. Kids at Heart: The Making of Smurfs: The Lost Village (9:12; HD) is a behind-the-scenes featurette and has various people at the studio offering some insights into the project and doing voice casting. The Lost Auditions (4:14; HD) is a jokey feature with the voice actors, like Jack McBrayer reading for Hefty Smurf and Joe Manganiello for Azrael, etc. Demi Lovato Meets Smurfette (1:01; HD) has the singer “meeting” the animated female smurf. Music Video (2:48; HD) for Meghan Trainor’s song, “I’m a Lady”. Making the Song “You Will Always Fine Me in Your Heart” (3:00; HD) looks at the heartfelt song and how it was composed. The Sound of the Smurfs (3:44; HD) is about the music in the movie composed by Christopher Lennertz. Also included:
Baker Smurf’s Mini Kitchen (4:07; HD) has this smurf (voiced by Gordon Ramsey) doing some mini baking.
Under See More Smurfs (5:48; HD):
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4K VIDEO – 5.0/5, BD VIDEO – 5.0/5
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| Smurfs: The Lost Village smurfs onto 4K presented in smurftastic 2160p ultra-high definition transfer and in its original theatrical 1.85 aspect ratio. No surprise, but as animated films go, it does look excellent in the format with brilliantly bright colors throughout and excellent and sharp detail. The 1080p Blu-ray meanwhile is no slouch and looks great as well. |
4K AUDIO – 5.0/5, BD VIDEO – 4.5/5
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As is the case for Sony, they’ve given the 4K and BD releases two different audio codecs. The 4K disc comes with a Dolby Atmos track and although I normally don’t find animated movies to sound that great, perhaps due to artificial sounds, this one was different with excellent depth and dialogue levels came through the center channel clearly and cleanly but shows off its robustness during the few action-centric scenes such as when the Smurfs, and Gargamel, are rafting down the river. The Blu-ray has been given a fine DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track and although it’s not as rich compared with the Atmos track, it still sounds pretty good, at least based on my testing since I am not going to watch this movie again. Based on that, any sound system will output fairly well even if its relegated to the 5 channels. |
OVERALL – 3.0/5 |
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Overall, Smurfs: The Lost Village isn’t a very good movie but being aimed at younger audiences, and I suppose Smurfs purists, it’s fine a time-waster and at least does have a nice message to it. This 4K Ultra HD/Blu-ray release offers up excellent video and audio transfers and a fine selection of bonus features. |
Check out some more 1080p screen caps by going to page 2. Please note, these do contain spoilers.