Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling (DVD)

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As I was watching it, I couldn't help thinking how much it reminded me of typical old television comedy shows. Specifically, "Gilligan's Island" came to mind, except that no one in the cast of the new movie is nearly as appealing as any of the people Gilligan hung out with. It's not that "Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling" is entirely stupid or insulting; it's not another "Dude, Where's My Car?" or "Freddy Got Fingered." It's just remarkably empty, silly, and pointless, and oh so very boring.

Video:
Paramount engineers provide an anamorphic transfer for this 1.85:1 ratio movie. The film's colors show up very brightly, very vividly, maybe brighter and more vivid than real life yet acceptable for a farcical comedy. Facial tones are reasonably natural, grain is minimal, and there are no obvious signs of edge enhancement or other artifacts. However, the picture is soft on detail, its object definition only so-so, occasionally looking downright blurry, with lines sometimes fuzzy and jagged and the overall look of the screen somewhat glossy and glassy.

Audio:
The disc's Dolby Digital 5.1 audio does very little, nor does it have to. There isn't much to reproduce beyond a plain-Jane musical soundtrack and some midrange dialogue. It sounds limited in its frequency range and dynamic impact, and the surround activity is practically nonexistent. It's not at all a bad soundtrack; it simply does exactly what it's called upon to do, which isn't much.

Extras:
The disc includes three featurettes, none of them anything to get too jazzed up about. The first one is a ten-minute making-of affair called "Up The Creek: The Making of Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling," that lasts a little over ten minutes and provides nothing more than any other making-of featurette would give us. The second item is "Furious Nuts," about seven minutes with the CGI squirrels; and the third item is "Treehouse Tales," about three minutes on the tree house sets. Things wind down with a five-minute gag reel and four deleted scenes, the latter totaling just a bit over one minute.

Finally, the disc contains sixteen scene selections; trailers at start-up and in the main menu; English as the only available spoken language; English, French, and Spanish subtitles; access to a digital copy download for Windows (not compatible with iPod, iPhone, Apple TV, Sony PSP, or Microsoft Zune); and an attractive slipcover for the keep case.

Parting Shots:
"Without a Paddle: Nature's Calling" looks like a movie produced for thirteen-year-olds. Needless to say, I mean no disrespect to thirteen-year-olds; all of us were or will be thirteen. It's just that the studio marketing department appear to be aiming their film toward people quite a lot older than thirteen, people in their twenties and above, perhaps, and I should think that by that age they would be more discriminating and demand more from their movies. This one doesn't provide anything more than a person could find almost any day of the week on the Disney Channel.