The Little Prince is an artistic blend of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s classic story and an original, compelling story by Irena Brignull and Bob Persichetti. Not to mention, its themes of childhood and adulthood are what makes The Little Prince a fine piece of animation. As we begin to get older in age, we begin to lose our sense of childhood. When we completely focus on our lives on our work without our sense of wonderment and imagination, we lose a part of our souls.
So to combine both elements of Saint-Exupéry’s book and its original story, The Little Prince employs two separate kinds of animation. The stop-motion animation sequences, illustrating parts from the book, is outstanding. The stop-motion evokes Saint-Exupéry’s simple illustrations and brings them to life. Yet when we go back to the “real world,” its computer-generated animation elicits a cold and lifeless tone. A stark contrast that fuels the film’s message of not letting our lives go without a little imagination in it.
And what a way to get our imaginations back than through a classical performance by Jeff Bridges. His delicate and warm performance is a perfect catalyst to the softening of The Little Girl. Although the film is based on The Little Prince, it’s Jeff Bridges’s The Aviator that’s become the heart and soul of the entire film. It’s through him, that The Little Girl and The Mother rediscover the beauty of life with the help of the Aviator and his stories of the Little Prince.
Overall, The Little Prince is one of the most delightful and comforting animated films of 2015. There will be folks who are understandably mad that Saint-Exupéry’s book becomes a side story, but the presence of these stories helped inspire the characters — much like the readers of the book throughout its life. So, in a way, it celebrates the book, and The Little Prince is finally able to get its cinematic adaptation.
Movie Rating: 4.5/5 atoms
Video
The Little Prince hits Blu-ray with a 1080p MPEG-AVC with a 2.35:1 aspect ratio. Like any animated film, regardless of it being Pixar or On Animation Studios, the brightness and black levels are mostly consistent throughout. Luckily, that’s the case with this release. The film is dominated by a colorless and cold color scheme — a metaphor for the mundane world that The Mother and The Little Girl live in. However, once The Little Girl crosses the threshold to The Aviator’s rich and warm world, the colors come alive. There isn’t much texture in the CG-animation, but the full range of textures is on full display once we get to the stop animation, including all of the hand-made puppets, foreground, and background. Overall, this is a very satisfying video presentation.
Video Rating: 5/5 atoms
Audio
The Little Prince hits Blu-ray with a 7.1 Dolby TrueHD Master Audio track. The film doesn’t have a ton of dynamic moments, but the audio mix still has sound effects that smoothly transition from one channel to the other. Also, the atmospheric sound effects and score has fantastic stage presence where it complements the dialogue and never overpowers it. The score makes up for most of the activity in the rear channels, but the ambient effects nicely immerse the viewer into the film. The dialogue is consistently crystal clear throughout the entirety of the film. Overall, this is a fine audio presentation from Paramount.
Audio Rating: 4.5/5 atoms
Special Features
The Little Prince‘s Blu-ray disc has the following special features on Blu-ray disc:
- The Making of The Little Prince
- “Turn Around” – Music Video by Camille
Within this 25-minute featurette, The Making of The Little Prince covers a lot of topics, including the difficult challenges of adapting this beloved children’s book. The featurette also follows all of the painstaking work in the creation of this visually appealing film and the casting of the film. Unfortunately, other than the music video for the lovely “Turn Around” by Camille, there isn’t much else that this Blu-ray release offers in terms of special features.
Special Features Rating: 1.5/5 atoms
Overall, The Little Prince is a lovely animated film that was clearly made with a lot of tender, love, and care. From Hans Zimmer’s phenomenal score to Mark Osborne’s visually artistic eye, The Little Prince evokes a lot of emotions, both sentimental and emotional. The video and audio presentations are fantastic, but the special features are severely lacking in content.
Overall Rating: 4/5 atoms
The Little Prince hits Blu-ray on February 9th.
This Blu-ray was reviewed using a retail/advance copy/unit provided by Paramount Home Entertainment.
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