Like Mike
20th Century Fox Home Entertainment
Cast: Jonathan Lipnicki, Lil’ Bow Wow, Eugene Levy, Robert Forster
Extras: Commentary Track, Deleted Scenes, Featurettes, Music Video
Rating:
We haven’t seen a lot of live action family movies on DVD lately and 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment’s new release ’Like Mike’ is certainly one of the most current films in the genre. Featuring wanna-be-cool kid-rapper Lil’ Bow Wow I didn’t have any hopes for the film as it was clearly designed as a vehicle to promote the kid’s profile than turning into a decent movie. Nonetheless, the film wasn’t all that bad and does have its moments.
Telling the story of 14-year old orphan Calvin who finds a pair of magical sneakers that turn him into a basketball sensation. Immediately his professional basketball player career takes off and he’s signed by the L.A. Knights. But one thing is missing in Calvin’s life, despite the success and notoriety – a real family.
20th Century Fox Home Entertainment is presenting ’Like Mike’ in a 1.85:1 anamorphic widescreen transfer and a fullframe transfer on this DVD in a presentation that is meticulously clean and detailed. Being a brand-new film, the print is free of any speckles or defects. Colors are vibrant and lush, rendering faithful skin tones and nicely saturated hues. Blacks are deep and solid, and the DVDs compression is free of distracting artifacts.
The DVD contains a 5.1 channel Dolby Digital audio track that is well produced with good directionality and a wide dynamic range. The track is supplemented by Dolby Surround tracks in French and Spanish.
20th Century Fox Home Entertainment has added a number of great features t othe release, suc has commentary track by director John Schultz, and his stars Lil’ Bow Wow and Jonathan Lipnicki. As you can guess the track is very much on the light side without many technical references. A series of deleted scenes, a ’Making of’ featurette and a featurette on Lil’ Bow Wow are also included, as well as the ’Basketball’ Music Video.
’Like Mike’ is a nice movie for the whole family on a rainy Sunday afternoon. It is clearly targeted at younger audiences but manages to hold also adults’ attention and sympathies.
