Lovable Sulley (John Goodman) and his wisecracking sidekick Mike Wazowski (Billy Crystal) are the top scare team at Monsters, Inc., the scream-processing factory in Monstropolis. When a little girl named Boo wanders into their world, it's the monsters who are scared silly, and it's up to Sulley and Mike to keep her out of sight and get her back home.

CRITIQUE

Since Monsters, Inc.’s release in 2001, I’ve probably seen it at least seven times, which is roughly once a year. In fact, it’s one of my favorite Pixar films. The humor is universal and anyone can relate; I laugh each time I see it. Plus, I love all the characters, principal and supporting. The success of Mike and Sulley’s friendship is very important and it keeps the movie grounded in reality; they’re co-workers and also best friends, and like every friendship there are hardships to overcome.

The driving force of the story becomes Sulley bonding with little girl Boo, who enters the monster world wreaking unimaginable havoc there because humans are considered “toxic”. The script is extremely well executed in terms of story elements and progression, but most of all in creating honest character moments, aided by a fantastic voice talent from the likes of Billy Crystal, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi and James Coburn. It’s no secret, but Monsters, Inc. has talent written all over it, from directing to production, and story department to animation, the movie feels and looks amazing.

Simply put, I love Monsters, Inc.

THE VIDEO

Monsters Inc. is presented in 1.85:1/1080p on a 50GB disc and encoded with AVC. The image quality is absolutely superb; perfect in all areas, offering great detail and the ultimate in high definition. Colors are vibrant and pop off the screen. Hands down, a perfect 10.

THE AUDIO

Monsters Inc. is presented in a very good 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack. Surrounds are active frequently, music and dialogue are crisp and clear, equally well reproduced across the front and rear speakers. French and Spanish 5.1 Dolby Digital dub tracks are also featured. Optional subtitles include English SDH, French and Spanish.

THE EXTRAS

Audio Commentary by Pete Docter, Lee Unkrich, Andrew Stanton and John Lasseter: A great track filled with many anecdotes and interesting discussions.

Monsters Inc. Filmmakers’ Roundtable (HD, AVC, 21:35) is an engaging discussion of recollections and the history of the project featuring director Pete Doctor, co-director Lee Unkrich, producer Darla K. Anderson and story supervisor Bob Peterson sitting at a table inside the real Hidden Café (which makes a cameo in the film). Viewers will enjoy hearing about some interesting stories.

Monsters, Inc. Ride and Go Seek: Building Monstropolis in Japan (HD, AVC, 7:58) gives the viewer a pretty cool tour of the theme park attraction at Tokyo Disneyland and features interviews with the artists and engineers who created the ride.

For the Birds (HD, AVC, 3:28) is the lovable Pixar short that always gets a laugh out of me. Features an optional commentary by director Ralph Eggleston.

Mike’s New Car (HD, 1:33.1, AVC, 3:47) is a funny short that first appeared on the DVD. Also features an optional audio commentary by the filmmakers’ sons, which was fun to listen to.

Sneak Peeks: These play before the menu, but you can skip them by clicking “menu” on your remote. Trailers include a Toy Story 3 teaser, Up, Dumbo Special Edition, Ponyo, Santa Buddies, Disney Parks, and On Blu-ray Disc.

This disc is also BD-Live enabled.

Disc 2:

Roz’s 100 Door Challenge: A brand-new game designed for the Blu-ray release. Take Roz’s employee placement exam to see where you would best fit within Monsters, Inc. It’s rather fun to play, so check it out.

Next there are two choices, ‘Humans Only’ and ‘Monsters Only’, that feature the bonus material. A Set Up menu also offers Audio options and Subtitles in various languages, including English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, and more.

Humans Only

Pixar Fun Factory Tour (SD, 3:46) is a really fun tour of the studio hosted by John Lasseter. There’s a lot going on here, it’s definitely worth a watch.

Story breaks down into four segments:

Story is King (SD, 2:03) finds story supervisor Bob Peterson pitching ideas from picture cards to the story department.

Monsters Are Real (SD, 1:31) is a collection of interviews with the voice actors and creative crew talking about monsters.

Original Treatment (HD, 13:43) is the film’s original pitch presented with narration and fully-colored drawings. This is pretty cool!

Story Pitch: Back to Work (SD, 4:39) is Bob Peterson pitching a scene to the production team.

Banished Concepts features four “deleted scenes” all presented in high definition animated drawings with some colorization and full dialogue/sound effects/music.

Intro to Banished Concepts (SD, 0:32) is exactly that, featuring Lee Unkrich in the cutting room explaining that even though these scenes weren’t used, some aspects of them (including some dialogue) showed up in different places in the final film.

Assistant Sulley (HD, 2:14) shows how Sulley was originally an assistant on the scare floor dreaming of becoming a scarer.

End of Day (HD, 2:35) finds Sulley working the scare floor and later stepping through an open door after the scarers goes home at the end of the day. The scene ends just as he steps through!

Bad Scare (HD, 3:00) features Sulley in an encounter with a human child.

Scream Refinery (HD, 1:07) shows Sulley as a lowly worker in the bowels of the Monsters, Inc. factory.

Original Sulley Intro (HD, 0:59) is a fully rendered scene out of the movie but a slightly revised intro of James P. Sullivan.

Storyboard to Film Comparison showcases the Boo bedtime scene in two different stages of completion:

Storyreel (HD, 5:42) is in the form of early drawings with crude colors and complete dialogue, music and sound effects.

Final Color (HD, 5:42) is the completed scene taken from the movie with final color and completed animation.

Split-Screen Comparison (HD, 5:42) is exactly that, with both scenes playing at the same time.

Art Gallery breaks down into four categories: Characters, Color Script, Concept Art and Posters. You can view these by using your remote, either individually or as one using the “play all” option. Images are presented in high definition scans.

Designing Monstropolis (SD, 2:49) explains the detail and believability that went into creating the monster world through interviews and also some cool drawings.

Set Dressing Intro (SD, 3:22) is a piece about creating environments with set dressing supervisor Sophie Vincelette who explains how sets are designed and staged.

Location Flyarounds (SD, 7:25) are just that, and cool to look at! Some of these are tracking shots, others a variation of 360-degree views of locations. Locations include Boo’s bedroom, a Monstropolis street, Mike and Sulley’s apartment, and the Monsters, Inc. facility (including lobby, locker room, scare floor, the huge door vault, and the audition room).

Monster File showcases two videos:

Cast of Characters (SD, 5:54) is a mix of interviews with the performers and creative talent who discuss the characters, showing clips of the movie and some footage of the performers in the recording booth.

What Makes a Great Monster? (SD, 1:27) discusses the character designs.

Animation breaks down into several smaller featurettes:

Animation Process (SD, 3:14) is a very cool look at the process that starts with a storyreel, then layout and animation, and final shading and lighting. Make sure to watch this one.

Early Tests (SD, 8:05) feature Mike and Sulley in various stages of testing, accompanied by an audio commentary explaining the process of these early tests.

Opening Title Animation (SD, 2:09) shows the design of the title sequence.

Hard Parts (SD, 5:01) goes into the artistic challenges of creating the film (such as getting Sulley’s fur to look realistic) with plenty of interviews and clips.

Shots Department (SD, 2:15) explains how simulation was added as a step in the Pixar production process.

Production Demonstration (SD/HD, 1:50) is a multi-angle featurette showing a scene that allows the viewer to toggle between four different stages of completion. An intro by Lee Unkrich precedes the demo.

Music & Sound finds two videos:

Monster Song (SD, 3:17) goes behind the scenes of Billy Crystal and John Goodman singing Randy Newman’s “If I Didn’t Have You”.

Sound Design (SD, 4:16) finds sound designer Gary Rydstrom revealing some of the secrets behind the sound design of the film.

Release breaks down into many smaller snippets that include trailers and TV spots:

The Premiere (SD, 0:58) is a brief montage of the movie premiere in Hollywood, Trailer #1 (SD, 1:51) is the theatrical trailer, Trailer #2 (SD, 1:21) shows Mike and Sulley playing charades, TV Clip: Men in Teal (SD, 0:33) tries to sell it as an action movie with an appropriate action score, TV Spot: Your Eye (SD, 0:33) proclaims “You. Won’t. Believe. Your. Eye.” with the words flying at the screen, TV Spot: Green Skin (SD, 0:33) focuses on Mike’s features, TV Spot: Your Eye #1 Review (SD, 0:18) announces it the Number 1 film, International Inserts (SD, 1:08) is a brief but cool piece about the animators translating English words on screen (like the opening titles and newspapers) for the international release and also finding voice actors for different languages who sounded like the principal performers, Multi-Language Clip Reel (HD, 3:47) reveals the movie was heard in 30 languages around the world; this clip features German, Japanese, Euro-Portuguese, Norwegian, Dutch, French, Swedish, Polish, Italian, Brazilian Portuguese, Icelandic, Danish, and Hebrew, Toys (SD, 1:31) is an overview of the toys created from the film, and Outtakes and Company Play (5:27) is a funny gag reel (created for an animated film!) and later shows select scenes from “Put That Thing Where It Came From, Or So Help Me”, a Monsters, Inc. company play “starring, written, directed and produced by Mike Wazowski.”

Wrap-Up (0:46) concludes the Pixar tour.

Monsters Only

New Monster Adventures includes three brief video segments:

Monster TV Treats (SD, 1:13) is a collection of amusing TV vignettes featuring the characters, Ponkickies 21 is a randomized version of “Rock, Paper, Scissors” from Japan; an interactive game of sorts using your remote, and “If I Didn’t Have You” music video (HD, 1:12) is a montage of favorite moments from the movie cut to the song.

Behind the Screams features a brief video called On the Job with Mike & Sulley (SD, 2:33), a TV Special Report interview piece where both characters describe their jobs.

Orientation wraps things up with three videos: Welcome to Monsters, Inc. (SD, 0:56) is the infomercial that was seen in the movie, Your First Day (SD, 3:37) is a “new employee” video tour of the facility and explains its mission and background, and History of The Monster World (HD, 1:36) features drawings and narration by animation legend Bud Luckey talking about man and monster.

Disc 3:

The original DVD featuring the movie and bonus materials.

Disc 4:

This disc is dedicated to a Digital Copy of the movie.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Monsters, Inc. is a great family film that's fun and suitable for all ages. This Blu-ray set should be in everyone's collection.