Diamond Edition / Blu-ray + DVD

Aladdin Blu-ray Review

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Reviewed by Kenneth Brown, October 3, 2015

No mere diamond in the rough,is a dazzling gem gleaming with adventure, humor, heart, song and spectacle. From the opening number to the climactic showdown between a Genie-less Aladdin and a snapping, slithering Jafar, Walt Disney's 31st animated feature is one of its best, and certainly one of the hallmarks of the Disney Renaissance era. The animation is slick, the characters and voice performances spot on, the music delightfully entertaining, and the comedy full of laughs, even twenty-three years after its release. (Children needn't catch all of the late Robin Williams' pop culture references; they'll have a blast with his face-swapping antics and dizzying personalities regardless.) More crucially,defies its age, grabbing hold of the imagination with a story that plays to the young and the young at heart. It's a Disney classic in every sense, and will continue to win over new generations of kids for decades to come.In his review of the 2013 UK Blu-ray release of, reviewer Jeff Kauffman wrote "Whatever mojo may have been lost in the decades between the 1940s and the 1990s was obviously back in full swing by the timecame along in 1992. The film was once again a gigantic hit for Disney, becoming the highest grossing movie of the year, and ultimately garnering several Oscar nominations as well as two statuettes for its score and its biggest hit song "A Whole New World". The film is a raucous entertainment, slyly subversive and self-referential due to voice actor Robin Williams' often manic contributions, but it also is a near perfect adventure and romance, one that appeals just about equally to males and females, the sort of broad demographic allure that Disney would sometimes struggle with in later animated offerings that seemed to be geared either mostly toward boysgirls.Whilemay have been the critical darling of this particular era of Disney animated fare,is quite appropriately more like the scrappy little brother who may have hyperactivity problems, not to mention attention deficit disorder, but who is undeniably lovable despiteor perhaps even because ofthose "problems". Once the perhaps risky decision to cast Robin Williams as the Genie (as well as the Narrator) was made, the handwriting was on the wall for the film's ultimate tenor, for Williams' anarchistic approach to free association as he did his voice work created both opportunities and issues for the animators. As the commentary included on this Blu-ray makes clear, Williams was given free rein at many moments throughout his days in the recording studio, and the result is ungainly, undisciplinedand just flat out hilarious. There has probably never been another Disney film with this air of the unexpected, and it infuses all ofwith a very contemporary breath of fresh air, something that had been missing for years (some might argue decades) from Disney animated fare and which evennever really had, either, despite its many pleasures.cribs elements from many different versions of the age old stories, including a dash ofand the many versions of. Aladdin is a street kid who pals around with his pet monkey Abu, a simian who aids Aladdin in his small scale crime spree of stealing food. Meanwhile, Princess Jasmine, who has spent her entire life tucked behind the imposing palace walls, wants to see what the real world is like, and escapes the protective glare of her father, the Sultan, venturing out into the tumultuous marketplace only to instantly get in trouble. Aladdin rescues her, of course, and true love would seem to be preordained, except that Jasmine is required to marry a Prince, and the Sultan has already picked out a suitable husband for her, with a marriage planned for a mere 72 hours in the future. Playing out against this star-crossed love scenario are the machinations of Jafar, the Sultan's Grand Vizier who is trying to get his hands on a magic lamp with contains a Genie. Jafar has his own animal sidekick, an imperious little parrot named Iago. Through a little bit of magic, Jafar discovers that only Aladdin has the goods to be able to enter the Cave of Wonders where the lamp is stored, and a plot is hatched.Considering how many writers contributed to this troubled project (lyricist Howard Ashman died just as the film was getting off the ground, just one of many stumbling blocks that were encountered) and how many differed story elements are woven together in the film (as briefly outlined above),remains one of the most effortlessly entertaining and surprisingly cohesive entries in the Disney animated canon. Bolstered by incredible voice work, not just from Williams but the likes of Jonathan Freeman (Jafar) and even Gilbert Gottfried (Iago), the film is easily one of the funniest entries in Disney's long and storied history. The film is also graced with a wonderfully integrated song score (Tim Rice picked up the pieces from the deceased Ashman and contributed some incredibly effective pieces, including the Oscar winning "A Whole New World"). Composer Alan Menken continued the winning ways he had already established with, contributing a wonderfully melodic and evocative score that easily bridged pop, theater and Middle Eastern styles.also is one of Disney's most impressive feats of animation from this era, with skillful (if relatively minimal) use of the then nascent CGI technology nicely melded with a traditional 2D hand drawn approach. Character designs are gorgeous, and the backgrounds are simply lustrous, with one of the most distinctive palettes from this era of Disney film."