Warner Bros. released Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince on Blu-ray last week and simultaneously re-dipped the first two movies in densely-packed Ulitimate Editions. Potter 6 has a lot of family-friendly fluff on it, but there's one particularly interesting piece. The Ultimate boxes thankfully feel like the definitive home video releases of the older films that won't require another dip into peoples' pockets. In the interest of efficiency, I'm going to cover the lot of them in one post.
The Ultimate Editions
Both of the Ultimate sets feature a hardcover collectable photo book (DVD case dimensions in size) and new extras in addition to all the previous DVD special edition supplemental features in a package that weighs the same as a young cat. On top of that, both the DVD and Blu-ray editions feature the Theatrical and Extended versions of each film. As nice as these are, the only one in the series I'm chomping at the bit for is Prisoner of Azkaban. Both boxes include a Digital Copy of the respective films' theatrical cut.
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
New featurettes cover: the original casting search, screen tests, the first days of shooting, Chris Columbus' plans that laid out the cinematic Potter universe, and a retrospective comprised of vintage interviews of the kids that have never before been seen.
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
New featurettes cover: established British film stars recounting how and why they came onboard the series, Evanna Lynch (Luna Lovegood)'s screen test with Radcliffe, a look at the various directors on the series' work, and a time-lapsing set of interviews that trace Radcliffe/Grint/Watson over the years.
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
The movie itself is much darker than the ones that precede it, but unfortunately, it suffers from being the catalytic lead-in to the final chapter(s) of the cinematic series. The most interesting part of the home video release for me was a nearly hour-long doc on JK Rowling and her process of putting the final book together. J.K. Rowling: A Year in the Life is probably the most time I've spent watching something substantive about her life and process, and it was quite worth it.
The Maximum Movie Mode on this title is all mini-featurettes that cover different individual sequences and set pieces for the most part. The additional scenes are just a bit of extra flesh that made the 153-minute feature closer to the dreaded 3 hour mark. There's also a collection of featurettes that are aimed at a rather younger audience that cover such controversial topics as cast members' answers to various common small talk questions and the behind-the-scenes jobs the actors (allegedly) are most interested in actually doing. The "sneak peek" at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter (at Universal Studios in Orlando) is a bit of a let-down, since it's mostly people talking about the exhibits and rides. Super-fans will probably love all of the little mini-featurettes, but they bored me. The doc and deleted stuff is where it's at with this title.
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and the Ultimate Editions of Sorcerer's Stone & Chamber of Secrets hit DVD & Blu-ray on 12.8. The Blu-ray of Half-Blood Prince is $16.99, while Sorcerer's Stone & Chamber of Secrets are $31.99 in their Ultimate iterations.