DVDizzy Forum

Hey everyone

I've become addicted to Disney DVDs however, I think I've also become quite spoiled by the Platinum Editions as well, in terms of quality. That being said I'd LOVE to have the whole library of Disney Animated Films in my collection, but I also want the utmost quality with them as well.

I was recently browsing Amazon, and Mulan: Special Edition as well as Tarzan: Special Editions were listed. I know they're not in the platinum line, but are these two measured up there? I read the Ultimate Disney reviews and they said they're both pretty good.

I'm also tempted to get Alice's DVD, but I thought I'd enlist the help of my fellow UDers on the concept!

Yeah those 2-disc sets are actually pretty good! Like Mulan and Alice in Wonderland which I love both of those. Pocahontas 10th Anniversary is also really good! Basically every 2-disc set that isnt a Platinum is close to Platinum Status minus the Platinum Editon Name.

I think the best Platinum's in terms of quantity and quality are:

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
Beauty and the Beast
Aladdin

The Lion King, Bambi, Cinderella, Lady and the Tramp and The Little Mermaid are pretty good too, but I dont think there as good as those three up there in terms of Quantity and Quality. Though some of these rank as my all time Favorites Disney movies. *coughaladdinbeautyandthebeastthelionkingthelittlemermaidcoughcough*

wow what and exaggerated cough!

I dont have Peter Pan yet, But I will get it soon! Since its my second favorite Disney Animated Classic.

The 2003 Sleeping Beauty 2-disc set is really good also!

There are also 2 disc sets of Tarzan, The Emperors New Groove, and Atlantis the Lost Empire but they are OOP and harder to find. I have the standard 1 disc Special Editions of those movies. But Im sure the 2-disc sets are amazing if your looking for quantity and quality.

Oh what am I babbling about? lol Look on the Ultimate Disney Home Page underneath the Classics You'll find all the info you need on this link.

http://www.ultimatedisney.com/ultimateclassics.htm

Happy Collecting!

By the way. I think Snow White and Beauty and the Beast will be released within the next 2 years. If it follows that whole Disney Vault Schedual. But Im not really sure.

The 2-Disc "Alice" is likely the best we'll get for quite some time, and as such there is really no reason not to pick this one up. It doesn't carry over all the laserdisc features sadly, but it will likely be a while before Disney decides to revisit "Alice".

If you like "Pocahontas" (as I do), the 2-Disc there is a must-own, if only for the extended cut of the movie. The supplemental features are also great, and provide a really interesting look on how the movie could have turned out.

The "Mulan" is okay, but I don't care much for the movie, so I can't talk there.

Really, any of the 2-Discs are quite good, and there have been weaker Platinum releases ("Cinderella", "The Lion King", "Peter Pan"...) than "The Emperor's New Groove", and "Tarzan" 2-Discs, which rival the Platinums in quality IMO. Heck, even "Atlantis: The Lost Empire" has an excellent 2-Disc set, which you may only really like if you enjoy the movie at all, but is interesting nonetheless.

"Sleeping Beauty" is also a very good DVD, but seeing as it's been added to the Platinum line, you may want to hold off on it for now, likewise for the 3-Disc "Fantasia Anthology".

The Atlantis CE is still in print, though it still carries its ridiculously-high-but-worth-it price tag of about $39.99

Other non-Platinums that are definitely Platinum-quality:

The Fantasia Anthology
Sleeping Beauty: Special Edition
Pocahontas: 10th Anniversary Edition

I haven't viewed any of the other two-disc SE's in awhile, but Tarzan's two-disc could do with an update. It's got great featurettes and lengthy sections of stills and text materials, but since it came so early in the Disney DVD releases, is rather segmented and lacking compared to later releases. On the plus side, it's easy to navigate and is nicely split into sections like History/Development, Music, Characters, Animation, Story, Release, etc. Much easier to navigate as opposed to the sections like North America, South America, Antarctica, etc. of The Lion King.

The best Platinum for me will always be the Aladdin release, because it's got the most immersive extras after Snow White, but the movie is much more tolerable!

I would really like to say that Beauty and the Beast is another top-notch Platinum, but having three versions of the film on one disc gives the film compression issues, and all in all, while I was impressed by the bonus materials (50-minute doc, several standalone featurettes, etc.), I always felt they could have put more effort into it.

The weakest Platinums are The Lion King, The Little Mermaid, and Peter Pan. Never mind that I don't care at all for TLK, but the bonus materials are a mess, and I'm sure fans would prefer a cohesive and in-depth longform documentary over scattered and segmented glossy featurettes. The Little Mermaid's documentary is most disappointing, at least for me, as it seemed to simply repeat everything everyone already knew about the movie. And Peter Pan...oy, Peter Pan. It was such a wasted opportunity and the biggest insult to the DVD consumer's intelligence can be found in the 77 minutes of wasted disc space on the second disc aka the "Read Along" version of the film. There's so much that was NOT included and NOT made for Peter Pan's Platinum that it seems not deserving of the once-prestigious banner title.

As for the Platinums for Bambi, Cinderella, and Lady and the Tramp, they all have their share of good and bad, but on the whole, are nice middle-level Platinums that don't contain enough to complain about, and there's a nice amount of bonus material that covers the films nicely.

Escapay

All the 2-discers, as has been said before. Glad that I have always opted for the two-discers in the past.

It has been mentioned before but Sleeping Beauty: SE is definitely Platinum Edition worthy, in fact is better than some of the Platinum releases. I know that Alice in Wonderland: ME had a lot of material missing from the Laserdisc release but it is still on par IMO with a Platinum Edition.

The 2-disc CE of Dinosaur, as well, probably is in the top 2 or 3 based on sheer quantity of bonus material... lol, teh thing even had a disclaimer one it saying it was a "maximum capacity disc", or something to that effect, and that some players may have trouble playing it (though no player these days should, unless it's some years old).

Atlantis: The Lost Empire, is for me, the ultimate Disney DVD. It really is a stunning set.

Sleeping Beauty doesn't go into the making of in much detail (apart from the wonderful virtual art galleries which are fantastic) but it is a great "time capsule" of all things Disney around the film's 1st release.

Also, check out the commentary track - it also has a music only soundtrack, which is often showcased throughout the commentary track.

Pocahontas is better than most 2 disc editions, and includes 2 versions of the movie, plus lots of behind the scenes stuff (and again some excellent gallaries).

Lilo and Stitch (only available overseas) takes the documentary route, having few visual items on the all-new second disc, but the documentary is not only long, its also filmed video diary style by the film's two creators, so its very revealing.

I would recomment "Pocahontas: 10th Anniversary Edition" as well as "Alice in Wonderland: Masterpiece Edition" since both films received very high quality releases and both are still readily available for purchase as well. I recently purchased "Sleeping Beauty: Special Edition" from eBay and was very happy with my purchase (even though I have to shell out a little extra money). Those are my recommendations

Animated:

-Alice in Wonderland: Masterpiece Edition
-Sleeping Beauty: Special Edition
-Pocahontas: 10th Anniversary Edition
-Atlantis: The Lost Empire - Collector's Edition
-The Emperor's New Groove: Collector's Edition
-Dinosaur: Collector's Edition
-The Fantasia Anthology
-Tarzan: Collector's Edition
-Mulan: Special Edition

Live Action:

-Swiss Family Robinson: Vault Disney Collection
-Pollyanna: Vault Disney Collection
-Old Yeller: Vault Disney Collection
-The Parent Trap: Vault Disney Collection
-20,000 Leagues Under the Sea: Special Edition
-The Apple Dumpling Gang: Special Edition

There are probably more, so I'll update, but this is what I have so far.

As we see, quite a number of non-PE titles that are very worthy. I'd say there are also some PE titles that are not particularly "worthy" in terms of quality and extras. All in all I guess it's fair to say that "Platinum Editions" are hardly more "special" than the other "Special Editions" - except that they're expected to be bestsellers. As far as I know they're not even marketed as "Platinum" outside North America.

This is how I rank Disney's animated 2-disc sets supplement-wise (for the sake of the thread topic, non-Platinums will be in red):

10 out of 10
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs: Platinum Edition
Aladdin: Platinum Edition
The Fantasia Anthology
Atlantis: The Lost Empire - Collector's Edition
Beauty and the Beast: Platinum Edition

9 out of 10
Tarzan: Collector's Edition
The Emperor's New Groove: Collector's Edition
Sleeping Beauty: Special Edition
The Little Mermaid: Platinum Edition
Pocahontas: 10th Anniversary Edition
Cinderella: Platinum Edition
Bambi: Platinum Edition

8 out of 10
The Lion King: Platinum Edition
Alice in Wonderland: Masterpiece Edition
Mulan: Special Edition
Lady and the Tramp: Platinum Edition
Peter Pan: Platinum Edition
Brother Bear: Special Edition

Let's see how The Aristocats and The Jungle Book fare later this year. Based on what I've read, Lilo & Stitch's SE is 10 out of 10 worthy, and if Hunchback of Notre Dame had all its laserdisc features ported over for a SE, it'd be a 9 out of 10 (its contents are structured almost exactly like Pocahontas').

Defintly, Pocahontas. Great set!

Disneykid wrote:9 out of 10
Cinderella: Platinum Edition
Bambi: Platinum Edition

Oh, c'mon! "Bambi's" 2-Disc set was much better than Cindy's. We practically get an audio commentary for "Bambi," and do you see one in the Cindy set? We get a 53-minute documentary of the making-of "Bambi" and for Cindy we only receive a 38-minute doc. I really do not agree with you on this, and "Bambi" should definetly rank higher than some of the others you posted for "9 out of 10".

Despite Cinderella lacking a commentary track and having more fluff features, I think the substance of the disc outweighs the substance of Bambi. We get two so-so deleted scenes for Bambi when much meatier story excisions exist. Cinderella got various song demos, two of which accompanied by storyboards, as well as a featurette on unused story sequences. Bambi's gallery was significantly smaller than Cinderella's. The latter features various trailers while the former only includes the original one. If you want to bring runtimes into this, Bambi's supplements (not counting the DisneyPedia or Bambi II sneak peek) run about 90 minutes. If you want to include Walt's Story Meetings, that makes it 160 minutes. Cinderella's supplements (ignoring the ESPN crap, House of Royalty, or music videos) run about 165 minutes. Bambi's video commentary is what really elevates it. Take it away, and you have a disc about the same as Lady and the Tramp's, probably even inferior. Heck, the Tricks of Our Trade excerpt already showed up on Snow White's DVD. I really don't understand all of the Cinderella DVD supplement bashing that's been going on here. The only thing that set lacked was a commentary track. If you ignore all the fluff and look all of the substance, what else is Cinderella really missing?

Disneykid wrote:I really don't understand all of the Cinderella DVD supplement bashing that's been going on here. The only thing that set lacked was a commentary track. If you ignore all the fluff and look all of the substance, what else is Cinderella really missing?

Oh no, I'm most defenitly not bashing the PE, not at all. It's just that the set feels more of the first sets that BV released, like "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," "The Fantasia Anthology," among others. To me, "Bambi's" set just feels like it has more content and provides more information than Cindy's set. But they are both fine additions to any DVD collector.

bennyb98 wrote:It has been mentioned before but Sleeping Beauty: SE is definitely Platinum Edition worthy, in fact is better than some of the Platinum releases. I know that Alice in Wonderland: ME had a lot of material missing from the Laserdisc release but it is still on par IMO with a Platinum Edition.

i agree, Sleeping Beauty: 2-Disc Special Edition is the closest disney dvd to being a platinum edition(in my opinion) and if it was a platinum edition and i didn't know it, then i would've believed it from just looking at the amazing quality video and sound!

TheSequelofDisney wrote:Oh no, I'm most defenitly not bashing the PE, not at all. It's just that the set feels more of the first sets that BV released, like "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," "The Fantasia Anthology," among others. To me, "Bambi's" set just feels like it has more content and provides more information than Cindy's set. But they are both fine additions to any DVD collector.

Oh, sorry I misunderstood. There ARE people around here who find the Cinderella DVD weak, though I suspect they'll be hush hush now that Peter Pan's clearly the winner in that regard. I do understand where you're coming from, though. Cinderella's DVD is what we expect from Disney (and that's probably because most of the supplements came from a laserdisc 10 years prior). Bambi is admittedly more innovative because NO ONE saw the Walt's Story Meetings feature coming. I still have yet to see another feature like that on any DVD, though I've heard that WB is doing something similar with its HD-DVDs.

Why was the Vaul Disney line dropped?

UncleEd wrote:Why was the Vaul Disney line dropped?

Little to no promotion, poor sales, and Disney's fickle nature when it came to banner titles. 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and The Love Bug were also Vault Disney titles, but Disney decided to drop the name and simply billed them as Special Edition (the discs themselves still have the Vault Disney styles and animations in their menus). Later on, they pared down* the releases for The Apple Dumpling Gang, Escape to Witch Mountain, and Return from Witch Mountain from their original double-disc Vault Disney sets and sold them as single-disc Special Editions (these too had the Vault Disney style menus, but only for the bonus features section).

*they simply shortened the "Conversations with..." featurette, and limited the Production Archives to a smaller quantity of text materials and still galleries, as well as removing the trailers/tv spots, audio archives, and any featurettes that were made for that section.

Escapay