Soul 4K (2020/Disney/PIXAR 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray w/Blu-ray)

4K Ultra HD Picture: A Picture: B+ Sound: A Extras: B Film: B+

Pixar has a pretty solid resume and is always trying to push the limits of digital animation technology to new and exciting heights. While they have plenty of in studio franchises now including Toy Story, Cars, Monsters Inc. and others, it is often times their solo original films that stand out the most.

The latest animated film, Soul (2020) is an intellectual and spiritual journey that embodies unique forms of animation in an attempt to explain what happens to us after we die. Can our souls be transferred to other living beings, like a cat perhaps? These ideas fused with a score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross that is equal parts jazz and electronic, and you have a surreal and quite interesting combination. In 2020, a terrible year full of limited and mostly terrible movie releases thanks to the terrible global pandemic, this film was certainly refreshing to watch and stood out to me.

Soul centers around a passionate musician and teacher Joe Gardner (voice of Jamie Foxx, who is also the first black leading character in an animated film). Joe gets the chance to perform at the music venue of his dreams, but takes a spill along the way and ends up deceased. As his soul enters The Great Before - an afterlife where souls interact with one another, he meets a soul named 22 (voice of Tina Fey,) who doesn't understand the appeal of humanity. As Joel attempts to explain to her what makes human life so great, he ends up discovering things about himself, and others in his previous and after life.

The film also features the voice talents of Rachel House, Richard Ayoade, David Diggs, Alice Braga, Angela Bassett, Questlove, Graham Norton and John Ratzenberger with direction by Pete Docter, who is a seasoned Pixar director.

Soul is presented on 4K UHD disc with an HEVC / H.265 codec in native 2160p 4K and a widescreen aspect ratio of 2.39:1 that's paired with audio mixes in lossless Dolby Atmos (Dolby TrueHD 7.1 mixdown), English Dolby Digital Plus, and traditional 5.1 and 2.0 tracks. That's a LOT of audio options for one disc! The image is sharper and more detailed with HDR10 and triumphs over the transfer seen in streaming on Disney+. Also included on the disc is a Blu-ray disc of all of the supplemental material and a separate Blu-ray with a 1080p transfer of the film that is subpar to the 4K, but looks fine for the aging HD format.

Special Features include:

Deleted Scenes

Not Your Average Joe Featurette

Astral Taffy Featurette

Pretty Deep for a Cartoon Featurette

Into the Zone: The Music and Sound of Soul Featurette

"Soul," Improvised Featurette

and Jazz Greats Featurette.

Soul is a great Pixar movie and is every bit as good as other classics that the studio has put out over the years. It will appeal to just about anybody with a soul of their own!

- James Lockhart

https://www.facebook.com/jamesharlandlockhartv/