SING 3D

SING takes place in a city of humanoid animals in which Buster Moon (McConaughey), an eternally optimistic koala, puts on the world’s greatest singing competition to save his crumbling theatre. Among the contestants are Rosita (Witherspoon), an overworked and unappreciated mother of 25 piglets desperate to unleash her inner diva, Ash (Johansson), a punk rock porcupine with a beautiful voice behind her prickly exterior, and Johnny (Egerton), a young gangster gorilla looking to break free of his family’s felonies. The event becomes grander than he anticipates, even as its finalists find that their lives will never be the same. (Gary Reber)

Special features include the mini-movies Gunter Babysits (HD 03:47), Love At First Sight (HD 04:18), and Eddie’s Life Coach (HD 04:16); the “Don’t You Worry ‘Bout A Thing” music video starring Tori Kelly (HD 03:11); Making A Music Video With Tori Kelly (HD 02:52); the “Faith” music video (HD 02:46); the “Faith” lyric video (HD 02:49); the “Set It All Free” lyric video (HD 03:40); the featurettes The Making Of SING (HD 04:40), Finding The Rhythm: Editing SING (HD 02:44), SING & Dance! (HD 06:31), and The Making Of The Mini-Movies (HD 05:56); The Best Of Gunter; Character Profiles—Matthew McConaughey as Buster Moon, Reese Witherspoon as Rosita, Tori Kelly as Meena, Taron Egerton as Johnny, Nick Kroll as Gunter, and Garth Jennings as Miss Crawly (HD 12:45); The SING Network–Gunter’s Dance Studio; The Moon Theater; Rosita’s Babysitting Gizmo; Miss Crawly’s Matchmaking Service (HD 04:01); In The News (HD 09:09); upfront previews and an UltraViolet digital copy.

The 1.84:1 1080p 3D picture exhibits some scenes that really showcase depth and spatial dimensionality. While animated, the imagery never exaggerates the 3D effect of wild projection out of the screen, but exhibits a natural inward depth perspective. Spacial proportions enhance the sense of character dimension, as there are so many animal characters of different heights, widths, and volumes. But everything is well scaled and realistic. And, as noted, depth is nicely rendered. The color palette is vivid, with nicely saturated hues that often pop. Colors are wildly varied and punchy. Contrast is excellent, with solid blacks. Resolution also is excellent, with character detail quite revealing of textures; Likewise, general object textures are nicely defined, as in cityscapes, interiors, and the theatre. Overall, this is an enjoyable 3D visual experience with fun animal characters that light up the screen. (Gary Reber)

The Dolby Atmos/Dolby TrueHD 7.1-channel soundtrack is musically dynamic, with great singing/instrumental performance depicted by the fun animal animations. Deep bass is strong but always natural sounding, with plenty of toe-tapping .1 LFE energy. Not only is the singing great, but the instrumental accompaniment is fantastic. Dialogue is consistently intelligible with a good sense of spatial integration. While the immersive height surrounds are not frequently used, when they do kick in there is a more fuller sense of soundfield expansion and immersion. The music and sound effects are effective in extending to the four ear-level surrounds, for a holosonic® presence. Speeding cars, the theatre collapse, and helicopters are the louder and most aggressive surround segments. And the big finale musical numbers are very exciting and rousing and effectively serve as showstoppers. This is a fun and musical satisfying soundtrack with effective soundfield dimensionality and superb fidelity. (Gary Reber)