Evan Almighty

Newly elected Junior Congressman, Evan Baxter (Carell) prays that he will be able to "change the world," a request that is heard by God (Freeman) himself. Perhaps someone should have told the preening ex-newscaster turned politician to be careful what you pray for, it just might come true. When God shows up in Evan's picture-perfect life, he makes a perplexing request for him to build an Ark. At first, he tries to resist God's request, but when animals begin flocking to his suburban home two by two and mysterious deliveries of wood begin to arrive, Evan Almighty heeds the call and rallies his family for support. (Stacey Pendry)

Special features shared with the standard disc include 14 minutes of deleted scenes; three minutes of outtakes; the following featurettes: Ark-itects Of Noah's Ark (seven minutes), Becoming Noah (six minutes), Steve Carell Unscripted (three minutes), Animals On Set Two By Two (13 minutes), The Almighty Green Set (six minutes), It's Easy Being Green (four minutes), Acts Of Random Kindness (two minutes), A Flood Of Visual Effects (seven minutes), Casting Call: Serengeti (three minutes), and The Almighty Forest (six minutes); and an Animal Roundup Game. In addition, the HD DVD includes 24 clips of scenes with live animals in Animal Wrangler, a Web-enabled feature to download additional content, and trailers from the film, and a U Control option, which enables you to purchase promotional items from the film.

The anamorphically enhanced 2.33:1 DVD generally looks good, with solid black levels and good shadow delineation, and natural-looking fleshtones. Colors are deeply saturated and the color balance tends to be rather dark. Contrast can look slightly overblown at times, but generally looks natural. Details are captured well, and the picture generally looks quite good. Pixilation is not a problem and edge enhancement is not overly obtrusive. The VC-1-encoded HD DVD looks spectacular, with impressive resolution, well-saturated colors, and good shadow linearity. The depth to the image is also impressive, making the picture look very natural. (Danny Richelieu)

The Dolby® Digital 5.1-channel soundtrack is mixed well, with a deep and broad front stage and a good use of the surround channels. The LFE channel is incorporated well when needed, and deep bass is also delivered through the full-range channels. Dialogue can sound natural, but occasionally it can sound muffled and boxy. Also, when ADR is used it is often obviously noticeable. Clipping distortion can also be heard at times as well. The HD DVD's Dolby Digital Plus encoding sounds very much the same as the DVD, although fidelity is improved slightly. (Danny Richelieu)