Customer Reviews

The Discoverers (Large Format)

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

I have pretty much all of the WMVHD disks (including the more obscure ones like Muffin Man and Step Into Liquid). The film transfer of this title isn't as crisp as the other IMAX titles, and in general, the cinematography is not as stunning. Still nice, but it just doesn't compare to the others. The story line is a little campy, but they do a good job of covering a lot of ground, from 1600's to the future, showing how explorers risk everything to break new ground.

I purchased the discoverers for myself and subsequently had it shown for the whole family. It is VERY high quality production and if you have full Dolby 5.1 you will be rewarded with rich and wonderful sound effects.

This DVD has 8 'topics' all professionally mastered. The whole family was stimulated by this educational tool. I wish it was a year long series that went deeper into each topic.

Only negative - Although it is listed as 72 minutes, that includes all the behind the scenes pieces. The real event lasts only about 40 minutes.

Have fun learning!

Not up to the normal standards of IMAX movies. The flow is a very disjointed and unconnected of random events. The audio is poor enough that even following what is there can be difficult. I normally love IMAX movies, but this one leaves a lto to be desired.

I didn't know there's such thing as a bad IMAX movie until I came across this.

As many have said, this was not the best IMAX movie ever made.

I wanted a copy for myself because I have a 10 second cameo in this movie (am I vain?). I worked on the Magellan Venus Radar Mapper project at JPL, and helped generate the images that went into the simulated flight over the surface of Venus. This was probably the only part of the whole movie worth seeing. My coworkers and I were invited to see this movie at its first public showing at the IMAX theater in LA. I was blown away by the simulated flight segment, even though I had seen it many times before in our labs. Even so, I found it difficult to spend money on this weak piece of work.

With my apologies to Greg MacGillivray.

IMAX being the large film format that it is, This CLASSIC film will make you wonder about the world around you, and beyond you. It is a classic film, and hopefully this will be available in BD format. All IMAX films distributed on BD format will be the closest thing in your home theater to the REAL IMAX experiance in the IMAX theater. For more info visit [...] Until then Future Thrill Seekers...
-Alex

I was suprised at the negative reviews... more like I was SHOCKED! I don't get it, why are people saying it was "disjointed?" It flowed together like visual, symbolic, intellectual poetry! It was simply beautiful. If you are not that erudite, it might not make sense to you. This was high art. the imagery of the cave paintings found by a curious child meshed like the painting of a great master with the dolphins learning and perceiving symbolic imagery on a television screen under water. The sheer genius of that alone had me on the verge of tears... A beautiful message of the soul is how I would describe this film in one sentence. The part about Isaac Newton shows his unique eclectic reason and insatiable logic and curiousity better than 1000 words ever could! They did not call him "the Lion" for nothing!

An amazing film. Absolutely loved it. The connections between the stories are supposed to be made in YOU. which, again is a reflection of the basic thesis of the film. A beautiful echo. Very poetic.

I purchased this DVD as a teaching aid. It is worthless from a pedagogical point of view. It is nothing more than a pastiche of disconnected topics. It displays none of the intelligence nor logic of Boorstein's book. It's not even very entertaining-- a colossal waste of time, money, and film.

When I first got into DVD, I was pleasantly surprised that it seemed to be an excellent documentary. This is probably the most impressive IMAX I have ever seen before. A complete and enthralling.. I have this DVD and I'd highly recommend it. This is a DVD that anyone can enjoy, it is really educational, you can actually stay home and watch this DVD with your whole family.

... a disjointed, disjuncted pastiche.

An even worse book of the same ilk is Connections by James Burke.