Blu-ray

It may be 75 years since it first played on the big screen, but this lavish musical based on L. Frank Baum's children's book remains charming and utterly unmissable. And now Warner Bros. has only gone and given it a brand new 8K restoration and a 3D ret-con. So, let’s head off along the yellow brick road and see how this new release holds up…

Picture: Unlike the rather cheap stereoscopic ret-cons that some modern blockbusters have been subjected to, the 3D conversion of The Wizard of Oz was clearly a major undertaking and the results are rather special.

Every shot in the MVC 1.37:1 1080p encode has a convincing sense of depth and volume that goes far beyond the pop-up book style we expected. Mercifully, there's also minimal impact on the brightness or saturation of the image, which would have been problematic with such a relentlessly colourful film.

In this package, a second BD50 platter houses the traditional 2D version of The Wizard of Oz, derived from the same new 8K scan as the 3D version. In truth, it's all but impossible to spot any differences between this and the highly-regarded previous release at a 1080p resolution.
Picture rating: 5/5

Audio: The remixed 5.1 soundtrack may be encoded as DTS-HD MA rather than Dolby TrueHD this time around, but otherwise there's no discernible difference in audio between this re-release and the original Blu-ray. Dialogue is cleanly rendered, music is wonderfully lush and there's a reasonable amount of LFE and surround usage in the remixed track given the age of the source materials.

A Dolby Digital presentation of the original mono soundtrack can also be found among the Special Features on the set's 2D and 3D film platters.
Audio rating: 4/5

Extras: As well as offering 2D and 3D presentations of the film, this triple-disc set is packed with an extensive array of bonus goodies.

The really great news is that every single extra from the original 2009 release is present – albeit reshuffled slightly in order to accommodate an exhaustive and fascinating new 69-minute The Making of The Wizard of Oz documentary, narrated by Martin Sheen. The only other new extra is the inclusion of the trailer for the 3D re-release on both movie discs.
Extras rating: 4.5/5

We say: A spectacular new 3D conversion accompanied by oodles of extras. What's not to love?

The Wizard of Oz 3D, Warner Bros., All-region BD, £28 Approx
HCC VERDICT: 4.5/5