The Prestige Blu-ray

The Prestige

 (2006)

Drama | Sci-Fi | Thriller



Set in Victorian London at the turn-of-the century where magicians are idols, two young but very different magicians set out to carve their own paths to fame. Robert Angier (Hugh Jackman) is a consummate entertainer — flashy, sophisticated and a true showman — while Alfred Borden (Christian Bale) is a roughedged creative purist who lacks the panache to showcase his tricks. As friends and partners they provide the perfect combination but when one of their tricks goes terribly wrong, friends become enemies and an escalating battle of one-upmanship begins with ever increasing perils to those around them.

For more details about The Prestige on Blu-ray, see The Prestige Blu-ray Review

Starring: Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Scarlett Johansson, David Bowie
Director: Christopher Nolan

The Prestige Blu-ray, Video Quality

 


The Prestige represents one of Disney’s first forays into using the AVC compression codec and has one of the finest High Definition pictures I have yet seen in the home theater environment. After viewing this Blu-ray on several occasions, I have yet to find a single defect in the presentation. This transfer is absolutely flawless. Shadow detail is amazing in this very dark film and black levels are rock solid throughout. Color levels are outstanding with extremely lifelike fleshtones and the occasional splash of nicely saturated colors. As an example, there is a scene where Angier (Hugh Jackman) is taken by Tesla’s assistant to a foggy field that is suddenly illuminated by thousands of arc-lamps. This one scene presents several difficult hurdles for this transfer to overcome. Artifacts in the dark shadow details surrounding the fog and halos around the arc-lamps against their dark backdrop are just a few problems that are all too common in scenes of this kind. Of course, this AVC encoded transfer handles all of these issues flawlessly. This exceptional encoding of a very tricky scene allows the viewer to remain connected to the film rather than being distracted by picture anomalies. It is worth noting that the cinematographer for The Prestige, Wally Pfister, was nominated for an Academy Award this year for his work on this film. His fantastic work has been beautifully reproduced for this Blu-ray release and is the very definition of reference quality.

The Prestige Blu-ray, Audio Quality

 


PCM audio is, again, the flavor of choice on this release. While The Prestige is not a very flashy movie from a sound perspective, it has a several very exciting moments that make this surround presentation leap to life. The majority of the film, however, is mostly atmospheric with a wide open sound stage and extremely effective use of ambient and rear fill elements. Whenever a Tesla coil is fired up on screen, on the other hand, you’d better hold onto something or the sound effects might just rocket you right out of your chair. To say that these effects are loud, violent and jarring is an understatement. During several of these sequences, my subwoofer moved about 3 inches to the right of its original position. So, The Prestige comes with a word of warning: be careful not to crank the volume up too high during the heavy dialogue sequences, or you might find yourself partially deafened when the louder sequences come on quickly.

The Prestige Blu-ray, Forum Discussions

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