Introduction
4K Ultra HD Blu-rays are here and, while there are not a lot of them right now, more and more are hitting the store shelves every day.
Here T3.com rounds up the best Ultra HD content your money can currently buy in a disc-based media format, with the list regularly updated with the greatest new releases, special editions and box sets.
Enjoy!
- Want to watch the best films that Netflix has to offer? Then head over here
- In the mood for great TV on Netflix rather than a film? We've got you covered
- Don't have Netflix but do have Amazon Prime? Then check out our curated selection of its best TV here
- We've also got a curated list of Amazon Prime's best films you can watch right now too
- Looking for great movie experiences to fill up your diary? Here's a movie for each month of 2016 that we think has promise
Deadpool
Everybody's favourite wise-cracking anti-hero makes a tasty big screen debut in the movie adaptation of Deadpool, with plenty of extreme violence, mouthy put downs and R-rated humour to fill even T3 Tower's 18-rated boots.
The only downside here is that the film opens with everything very much turned up to 11, with an awesomly bombastic opening salvo from which it never manages to really recover, with the film's obvious lack of budget slowing everything, including the action, down.
It is funny, violent and entertaining from start to finish, but if it could have maintained that Jazz-style synthesis of disparate styles, genres and fourth-wall breaking asides that it does so in the opening, then this wouldn't be just considered a good movie, but one of the best and most subversive superhero films ever.
This HDR-compatible 4K edition bags you a Ultra HD, Blu-ray and digital HD version of the film in one package.
Price: £19.99 | Buy Deadpool 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now
Mad Max: Fury Road
Legendary director George Miller returned, aged 69, and absolutely killed it with this excellent, brutal action flick in 2015 and now, finally, you can enjoy its dusty apocalyptic glory in Ultra HD fidelity.
Indeed, Mad Max: Fury Road is so refreshing because it keeps things simple. A bunch of people drive in one direction for about an hour and then, hitting an impassible barrier, turn round and drive back to where they started off.
Sounds boring, right? Wrong! The action throughout is superbly paced and the tension is built masterfully, with a real pressure cooker generated that leaves you at times literally with bated breath.
Also, Charlize Theron just owns this movie, with a superb turn as Imperator Furiosa. As you would expect, however, Mad Max himself - as played by English tough man Tom Hardy - gets plenty of screen time too and come this film's conclusion, you are definitely left wanting more from both his character and the franchise.
This HDR-compatible 4K edition bags you a Ultra HD, Blu-ray and digital HD version of the film in one package.
Price: £24.99 | Buy Mad Max: Fury Road 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now
Pineapple Express
Pineapple Express is a crime action comedy starring a pair of stoners, played by funny men Seth Rogen and James Franco, who accidently witness a terrible murder and end up on the run from hitmen and a corrupt police officer.
At its core this flick is a traditional buddy comedy, that builds on the funny but loose and erratic legacy of Dude, Where's My Car! and Superbad, with a slow-burn pace and off-beat sense of humour.
Oh, and if you are wondering about the film's name, it is titled after a real cannabis strain called Pineapple Express. Of course it is!
This 4K edition bags you a Ultra HD, Blu-ray and digital HD version of the film in one package.
Price: £19.99 | Buy Pineapple Express 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now
Chappie
Remember the 1980s "comedy" Short Circuit? Yeh, don't rewatch it, ever - time has not been kind to that schlock-fest and it is best left in your childish, rose-tinted memories.
Instead you should watch Chappie if you want some Johnny Five-style action, with the titular Chappie both a robot and featuring an annoyingly similar voice.
The plot is basically exactly the same as well, with a military tech programme producing the world's first robotic police force only for its original inventor to go one step further and, because he's got ideals and isn't an evil government official, reprogrammes one of the robots with a prototype artificial intelligence that mimics the human mind and how it learns.
Drama and conflict ensue!
This 4K edition bags you a Ultra HD, Blu-ray and digital HD version of the film in one package.
Price: £19.99 | Buy Chappie 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now
Ghostbusters
If the most disliked trailer of all time on YouTube for the new Ghostbusters film got you super down, which it really, really did for us here at T3 Towers, then you can blow away those demons with this 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray edition of the original.
Peter Venkman and company are in their finest form here in the original spectre-stuffed film, with the 4K fidelity allowing you to get an even more detailed view of Slimer munching on garbage and Mr Stay Puft laying waste to downtown New York.
Don't cross the streams!
This 4K edition bags you a Ultra HD, Blu-ray and digital HD version of the film in one package.
Price: £19.99 | Buy Ghostbusters 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now
Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice
The ultimate grudge match comes together in a 4K 'Ultimate Edition' Blu-ray here in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice.
The film is OK as superhero flicks go, which considering the paucity of quality in the genre, should be taken as a thumbs up, with underated leading man Ben Affleck blowing away those Daredevil cobwebs with a more balanced, all-round performance as the Bat than Christian Bale's dour gruff-fest.
Gal Godot and Henry Cavill also deliver decent turns as Wonder Woman and Superman, as too Jeremy Irons who plays Alfred, with only a dialling-it-in Jesse Eisenberg as big bad Lex Luthor kind of spoiling the party.
It delivers on the spectacle however, which is a large dose of what you want from films like this. The inevitable follow-up needs better, tighter editing though.
This 4K, HDR edition bags you a Ultra HD, Blu-ray and digital HD version of the film in one package.
Price: £22.99 | Pre-order Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now
Kingsman: The Secret Service
Take a James Bond film and then smash it together with a Guy Ritchie flick as well as John Wick and you've got Kingsman: The Secret Service, a slightly subversive parody of the spy film genre that, while not a classic, does entertain consistently.
It's stuffed full of top talent too, with Samuel L. Jackson, Colin Firth and Michael Caine turning up for sizeable roles, and newcomer Taron Egerton performing admirably in the lead role of a youth who is selected to enter the Kingsman, a secret organisation of top spys and agents that help foil evil doers.
An entertaining romp that already has a sequel in the works and, we're guessing, will get at least a third film too.
This 4K edition bags you a Ultra HD, Blu-ray and digital HD version of the film in one package.
Price: £19.99 | Buy Kingsman: The Secret Service 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now
The Lego Movie
Lego madness abound in this for kids but not just for kids action comedy, with everyman protagonist Emmet Brickowski (see what they did there?) - as voiced by the leading man of the moment, Chris Pratt - proceeding on a wild and crazy adventure throughout the Lego universe.
On said adventure, Master Builder Emmet will team up with Elizabeth Banks' Wyldstyle, Will Arnett's Batman and Alison Brie's Princess Unikitty to defeat the nefarious Lord Business, as played by a Mugatu-light Will Ferrell.
The Lego Movie is, to use a cliché, good fun for all the family and can now be enjoyed in super high definition.
This 4K, HDR edition bags you a Ultra HD, Blu-ray and digital HD version of the film in one package.
Price: £24.99 | Buy The Lego Movie 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now
The Revenant
So Leo finally got his Oscar, only after being subjected though on-screen to a dizzying array of punishment in The Revenant, including being mauled by a grizzly bear, thrown off a cliff, shot at - repeatedly - by arrows and muskets, being buried alive, almost drowned in a river and forced to sleep in the gutted innards of a horse's stomach to avoid freezing to death.
Sheesh, the Academy doesn't ask for much does it?
Anyway, you can watch Leo's give-me-an-Oscar-you-b*st*rds stare in unparalleled fidelity here, with director Alejandro G. Iñárritu's visually intense shooting style really benefiting also from the 4K, HDR treatment delivered.
No bears were harmed in the making of this film, however a virtual CG bear was, like, totally f*ck*d up.
This 4K, HDR edition bags you a Ultra HD, Blu-ray and digital HD version of the film in one package.
Price: £19.99 | Buy The Revenant 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now
Life of Pi
And, bringing up the rear, is Life of Pi, a visually spectacular fable about a little Indian boy called Piscine Molitor Patel after he survives a devastating ship wreck in the Pacific Ocean. The twist, he survives with a Bengal tiger that he names Richard Parker, with the pair of them ending up in small lifeboat.
Visually spectacular, with some absolute top draw CG - especially considering this Ang Lee-directed film is now four years old - and traditional cinematography combining to produce a fascinating and philosophical look at the relationship between life and narrative.
The scale of the movie, which ranges from packed, sprawling cityscapes to calamatous ship wrecks and the desololate, ever shifting ocean, is rather epic and in 4K, Ultra HD definition, really pops.
This 4K edition bags you a Ultra HD, Blu-ray and digital HD version of the film in one package.
Price: £19.99 | Buy Life of Pi 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray now