When koala Buster Moon (Matthew McConaughey) was just 6 years old, he discovered his love of theater. As much as he’s tried over the years, he’s never managed to produce a hit show. Now he’s in danger of losing his theater, and spends his days dodging stage crews looking for their paychecks and calls from the bank looking for his mortgage payment. Buster’s best friend Eddie (John C. Reilly) the sheep comes from a wealthy family, but even his parents are no longer interested in investing in Buster’s shows. Buster soon comes up with his latest big idea—to produce a singing competition show where regular folks will compete to win a prize of $1000 the amount of money he was just barely able to scrounge up). He has his senile old lizard assistant Miss Crawly (Garth Jennings) create and distribute some fliers, but when she accidentally lists the prize as $100K, the turnout for the auditions is overwhelming.
Over the course of the auditions, we are quickly introduced to rest of the main characters. Pig Rosita (Reese Witherspoon) is a housewife whose marriage has lost much of its spark—she spends all day taking care of her 25 piglets while husband Norman (Nick Offerman) is at work, and both are too exhausted to do anything by the end of the day. Porcupine Ash (Scarlett Johansson) is in a punk band with her boyfriend, but he is a bit controlling and wont let her write any of their songs. Ape Johnny (Taron Egerton) is being pressured to join his father’s bank-robbing gang, but he doesn’t want any part in the family business, and just wants to sing. Elephant Meena (Tori Kelly) has an amazing singing voice and is constantly encouraged by her family, but she has crippling stage fright. And mouse Mike (Seth MacFarlane) sings like Sinatra and is an excellent jazz saxophonist, but he is also overly-confident and cocky. While the other contestants are all supportive of one another, he’s just in it for the money, and knows he’s got what it takes to win.
Buster isn’t in this business to make money—he just really loves the theater and really cares about these contestants. Buster seems to have a knack for knowing the underlying talents and hidden desires of his performers. He pairs up reserved housewife Rosita with the “piggy power”-filled Gunter (Nick Kroll), who is a constant dancing bundle of excitement. He also senses Ash’s desire to break out on her own, and Meena’s desire to show the world the talent hidden under her shy exterior. Buster doesn’t know how to tell the contestants the truth about the prize money, so he sets that aside and goes ahead with helping the performers learn their routines—while also trying to just keep the stage lights on.
Sing is a delightful, inspiring tale about learning to be happy with yourself, following your dreams and becoming the person you’ve always wanted to be. Much like Zootopia, the film is set in a sunny, vibrant, animal-filled city. The characters are very well defined and developed, and represent a nice cross-section of society. Each of these animals has flaws to overcome and desires to to achieve, and you find yourself really rooting for all of them. Well, maybe not Mike—though I did warm to him by the end of the film. The story provides many fun moments, as well as some deeply emotional scenes. Over the course of the film, pretty much every character experiences a transformation—while some characters learn to stick up for themselves, others learn to be more humble, but all learn to live their life in a way that makes them happy.
The musical performances are excellent, primarily consisting of covers of recognizable songs. I thoroughly enjoyed the opening audition montage—there’s so many fun characters that just appear on the screen for a few seconds. The wonky-eyed Miss Crawley is the source of much physical humor and sight gags (in both senses of the word), and Gunter is just a bundle of joy whenever he appears on screen.
I didn’t notice much difference between the picture quality of the 4K and Blu-ray releases. Both look phenomenal, with vibrant colors, and extensive detail—you can make out every hair on the animals, and there is always a lot going on in the backgrounds of each scene. I did notice a few scenes that seemed to be geared towards 3D—such as the POV of a character walking high above the stage, as well as some gimmicky action happening at the camera—so those with 3D playback abilities may want to opt for the 3D Blu-ray release of this film.
The Dolby Atmos soundtrack also sounds excellent, making use of the overhead channels to add a bit of echo to the theater and add some realism to the sound of helicopters flying overhead. The stereo and surround channels are also well utilized to add direction to the action on screen. The dialogue is also very clear, and the musical performances sound fantastic—the bass really gets a workout whenever Ash is performing.
The discs contain a nice collection of bonus material. The 3 mini-movies appear on both the 4K disc as well as the Blu-ray. However, everything else is solely contained on the Blu-ray. This includes a behind-the-scenes for the mini-movies, 20 minutes of behind-the-scenes interviews with the cast and crew, five music videos, a dance tutorial, some fake TV ads and a Gunter montage.
The 4K UHD release comes packed in standard keepcase with a slipcover, and contains an insert with a code to redeem for a UHD UltraViolet or iTunes digital copy of the film as well as a code to redeem for an additional bonus digital film.
What’s Included:
Film: (1:47:53)
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4K Ultra HD:
- 2160p / Widescreen 1.85:1
- HDR
- Audio: English Dolby Atmos, Spanish 7.1 Dolby Digital, French 5.1 Dolby Digital
- Subtitles: English SDH, French, Spanish
- 1080p / Widescreen 1.85:1
- Audio: English Dolby Atmos, Spanish 7.1 Dolby Digital, French 5.1 Dolby Digital, English DVS
- Subtitles: English SDH, Spanish, French
- Digital UHD copy redeemable via UltraViolet (Universal, Flixster or Vudu) OR iTunes
- Additional bonus digital movie (expires 9/17/2017), redeemable at www.upherewards.com. The list of available titles at launch includes Beethoven’s Treasure Tail, The Darkness, Hail, Caesar!, Intolerable Cruelty, Notting Hill, and Somewhere in Time. This list is subject to change.
Blu-ray:
Digital UHD (for redemption deadline, see NBCUcodes.com):
Extras:
Only the mini-movies also appear on the 4K disc, the rest of the bonus material, including the making of the mini-movies, only appear on Blu-ray disc.
- Mini-Movies:
- Gunter Babysits (3:48)
Gunter agrees to babysit Rosita’s 25 piglets, but when he fills them up with candy, he quickly realizes the task isn’t going to be as easy as he originally thought. - Love at First Sight (4:19)
Johnny helps Miss Crawly create an online dating profile to meet the handsome crodile of her dreams, but the guys responding to her ad seem to all be losers. - Eddie’s Life Coach (4:17)
Eddie’s mother threatens to kick him out of the house unless he stops laying around playing video games all day. So he orders the Earphones of Enlightenment from an infomercial, and starts following the advice of his new in-ear life coach. - The Making of the Mini-Movies (5:56)
The directors of the three mini-movies talk about what inspired their stories and cross-country collaborations. Includes behind-the-scenes footage, storyboards, early sketches, and interviews with Illumination founder/CEO Chris Meledandri, co-directors Scott Mosier & Guy-Laurent Homsy (“Eddie’s Life Coach”), Eric Favela & Adrien Borzakian (“Gunter Babysits”), and Matt Nealon & Benjamin Le Ster (“Love at First Sight”).
- Gunter Babysits (3:48)
- The Making of Sing (4:40)
The filmmakers talk about the inspiration for the film, moving from directing live action to animation, the character and set design, and casting the film. Includes behind-the-scenes footage, production sketches, recording booth footage, and interviews with Illumination founder/CEO Chris Meledandri, writer/director Garth Jennings and producer Janet Healy. - Finding the Rhythm: Editing Sing (2:44)
Editor Gregory Perler talks about the process of editing an animated film. - Character Profiles (12:25)
The actors talk about the characters they voice. Play All or select from:- Matthew McConaughey as Buster Moon (2:06)
- Reese Witherspoon as Rosita (2:28)
- Tori Kelly as Meena (1:39)
- Taron Egerton as Johnny (2:17)
- Nick Kroll as Gunter (1:46)
- Garth Jennings as Miss Crawly (2:27)
- “Don’t You Worry ‘Bout a Thing” Music Video (3:11)
Live action music video by Tori Kelly, who voices Meena in the film. - Making a Music Video with Tori Kelly (2:52)
Singer Tori Kelly, director Alan Bibby and choreographer Denna Thomsen take viewers behind-the-scenes at the music video shoot for this remake of the Stevie Wonder classic “Don’t You Worry ‘Bout a Thing”. - “Faith” Music Video (2:46)
Live action Tori Kelly/Stevie Wonder music video. - “Faith” Lyric Video (2:49)
Song lyrics appear on the screen while the song plays over clips from the film. - “Set It All Free” Lyric Video (3:40)
Song lyrics appear on the screen while the song plays over clips from the film. - Sing & Dance! – “Faith (6:31)
Chroerographer Aakomon Jones and friends Amy Allen & Codie L. Wiggins teach viewers some dance moves inspired by the film. - The Sing Network
Some fake TV ads inspired by the characters/locations/events of the film.- Gunter’s Dance Studio (1:22)
- The Moon Theater (0:43)
- Rosita’s Babysitting Gizmo (1:03)
- Miss Crawly’s Matchmaking Service (0:55)
- In the News (9:09)
Play All or select from- Buster Moon (1:44)
- Gunter (:55)
- Rosita (:59)
- Johnny (1:19)
- Meena (1:20)
- Ash (1:15)
- Mike (1:45)
Montage of fun Gunter moments from the film.
Final Thoughts:
Sing is a delightful film with some really fun characters. It’ll not only have you dancing and laughing, but it will also tug at your heart strings. At the core of the film is an inspiring “learn to be yourself” message, and at least one of these character’s stories/journeys is sure to strike home with every viewer. The animation looks fantastic on this 4K release and the Dolby Atmos soundtrack is well utilized to add dimension to the aural experience. The release also contains a solid selection of bonus material. This release is an easy recommendation for anyone looking for a fun, toe-tapping family film with heart.
