BLU-RAY REVIEW

License To Wed

Featured In Issue 126, December 2007

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SoundNR
WSR Score3
Basic Information on new release titles is posted as soon as titles are announced. Once reviewed, additional data is added to the database.
(Studio/Distributor):
Warner Home Video
(Catalog Number):
116072
(MPAA Rating):
PG-13
(Rating Reason):
For sexual humor and language
(Retail Price):
$34.99
(Disc Type):
Single Side, Dual Layer (BD-50)
(Widescreen Edition):
Yes
(Full Screen Edition):
No
(Running Time In Minutes):
91
(Color Type):
Color
(Chaptered/Scene Access):
Yes
(Closed Captioned):
Yes
(Regional Coding):
1
(Theatrical Year):
2007
(Theatrical Release):
Yes
(Direct-To-Video Release):
No
(Disc Release Date):
10/30/07
(THX® Digitally Mastered):
No
(Director):
Ken Kwapis
(Screenplay/Written By):
(Story):
(Music):
(Director Of Photography):
(Production Designer):
(Visual Effects):
(Costume Designer):
(Editor):
(Supervising Sound Editors):
(Re-Recording Mixers):
(Executive Producers):
(Co-Producers):
(Producers):
(Academy Awards):
(Principal Photography):
(Theatrical Aspect Ratio):
(Measured Disc Aspect Ratio):
(Disc Soundtrack):
Dolby Digital 5.1, PCM 24/48 5.1
(Theatrical Sound):
(Theatrical Re-Issue Soundtrack):
(DTS Bit Rate):
(Dolby Digital Bit Rate):
(Additional Languages):
(French Language):
(Spanish Language):
(Chinese Language):
(Subtitles):
(Cantonese Language):
(Mandarin Language):
(Japanese Language):
(Italian Language):
(German Language):
(Portuguese Language):

Ben Murphy (Krasinski) and Sadie Jones (Moore) are newly engaged and looking forward to a beautiful wedding and married life afterward. Sadie wishes to marry in her family church, but therein lies a problem, and the problem has a name...Reverend Frank (Williams). The good Reverend runs Sadie's church and insists that all who come before him in holy matrimony must first complete his "fool-proof" marriage prep course before he grants them a License To Wed. (Stacey Pendry)

Special features include 12 minutes of deleted scenes, either with commentary from the director or without; and the clip Ask Choir Boy, where an annoying, pre-pubescent boy answers 16 questions about relationships.

The anamorphically enhanced 2.34:1 DVD is marred by heavy compression artifacts that really damage the image, which is most likely brought on by the fact that a widescreen and fullscreen version of the movie is on both sides. Flesh also looks plugged up, with little fine detail shown, and it can also look overly pink in brighter scenes. Black levels are slightly washed out, and whites can bloom. Color fringing and bleeding can also be problematic. Strangely, some scenes can look quite good, with good resolution and dimensionality, but these scenes are few and far between. Edge enhancement can be recognized as well. The VC-1-encoded HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc both often look too blown out, looking flat and dimensionless. Other times, however, contrast is well balanced, and the image can look fairly dimensional. Still, the image is terrible, inconsistent with both high-definition releases. (Danny Richelieu)

Typical of movies of this genre, the Dolby® Digital 5.1-channel soundtrack can be limited to the front three screen channels for much of the presentation, with little surround envelopment. Dialogue can sound too laid back and thin, and occasionally sounds very forward and too obviously ADR-produced. The Blu-ray Disc's uncompressed linear PCM soundtrack delivers improved fidelity over the DVD's Dolby encoding, which can make bring more life to the soundtrack, but it also accentuates its defects, including a shuffling noise that can now be heard shrouding the dialogue at times. The HD DVD's lossless Dolby TrueHD encoding provides a very similar improvement in fidelity, and accentuation of its problems, and differences between the two formats are difficult to hear, if there are any. (Danny Richelieu)