The penguins steal the show. In the sprightlyMadagascar, a mid-life crisis inspires Marty ... more
the Zebra (voiced by Chris Rock) to escape from his lifelong home, a New York zoo. His equally pampered friends--Alex the Lion (Ben Stiller), Gloria the Hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith), and Melman the Giraffe (David Schwimmer)--then escape to bring him back. Unfortunately, their attempt at damage control persuades zoo officials that the animals are unhappy, so all four get shipped to an animal preserve in Kenya...only a squad of maniacal penguins change the destination to Antarctica. The quartet end up on an island where, in addition to meeting some hedonistic lemurs, they learn about the food chain--and that Alex is a different link on the chain from the other three.Madagascardoesn't achieve the snappy perfection of a Pixar movie, but it tops most other computer-animated efforts; the collision of friendship and predator instincts makes for an unusually gripping conflict. The vocal performances of the central characters is serviceable, but Sacha Baron Cohen (Ali G) provides topnotch lunacy as the lemur king, and the penguins--voiced mostly by the animators themselves--are the best thing in the movie.--Bret Fetzer, Amazon.com
Postage & Packaging:£1.21 Availability:Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
The sequel to the animated movieMadagascargives more of everything audiences loved in the ... more
first movie: More of the penguins; more of Julian, king of the lemurs; more musical bits of classic rock; and many, many more lions, zebras, hippos, and giraffes. In the first film, a quartet of coddled zoo animals found themselves shipwrecked on the island of Madagascar in a misguided effort to return them to the wild. InMadagascar: Escape 2 Africa, a failed attempt to fly back to New York maroons Alex the lion (voiced by Ben Stiller), Marty the zebra (Chris Rock), Gloria the hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith), and Melman the giraffe (David Schwimmer) in an animal preserve on the African continent, accompanied by the four deranged penguins and the lunatic lemur king (deliriously voiced by Sacha Baron Cohen,Borat). By wild coincidence, this is where Alex was born--and where his father is still the alpha lion, and where his malevolent uncle seeks to take over (let's call this an homage toThe Lion King). The other beasts have their own story arcs, but really it's all an excuse for daffy comic bits. Though the result is disposable, it's also entirely entertaining. The action sequences pop with dizzying spectacle; though some jokes are mainstream fodder, more often they're surprisingly quirky and engagingly oddball. This is the best kind of cotton candy filmmaking--it dissolves into nothing, but it's oh-so-sweet to the taste.--Bret Fetzer
Postage & Packaging:£1.21 Availability:Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
Advantages: Good film with excellent special effects Disadvantages: none
good and evil, but with cutting edge special effects and action scenes galore this is a great film to watch.
The blu-ray version i watched was a 2 disc set with the second disc full of extras. There was a section on the history of transformers, and interviews with executive producers Steven Spielberg and Brian Goldner, writers Alex Kurtzman and Robert Orci, and director Michael Bay. There were also features on the animation used and the way they worked out where to do scenes. You also get a look at the military equipment seen and used in the film.
This additional information is something you do not want to skip over, because it gives you a much deeper understanding of how much planning and work went into the final production. If you are into cutting edge special effects and head banging action then beg, borrow, rent, or if that fails buy ...
Advantages: Rhino, Blu-ray and DVD with Rhino toy, good family watch Disadvantages: Similar to other animated films
***Introduction***
Bolt is the latest movie made by Disney and so I decided to recently purchase this movie and see what all the fuss was about. This version was only a couple of quid more than the normal DVD and I purchased mine from TheHut (which I have reviewed very recently) and this includes the Blu-ray disc with special features, the film on DVD as well which is worth over £10 and a Rhino soft toy! (the excellent and very funny hamster in the movie) So I obviously decided to buy the Blu-ray!
***Plot***
Bolt and his owner Penny are the stars of a massive TV show with Bolt being the main character. To make everything appear more realistic Bolt must not know that this is just a show and not real and so he believes everything around him is real. When Penny is captured by the evil green eyed man he escapes over night to try ...
mariofan123 06.08.2009
· Read full review
Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful Review of Bolt (Blu-ray)
Advantages: Brilliant Blu-ray player! Disadvantages: Slow in downloading updates, Horrible menu system!
this console mainly to play games because we have the Xbox for that which all-in-all i find a better GAMING console! However we use it as a blu-ray player, when we brought it, it was a relitively cheap, good quality blu-ray player comparitive to the others on the market at the same time and I have to say it is brilliant as a blu-ray player, plays all DVDs we have tried in truly stunning high quality HD! The menus however are not to my liking at all. So all-in-all I'd say if you were going to buy one of these buy it as a blu-ray player with the capabilities of playing games not as a games machine with the capability of playing blu-rays! ...
PARAMOUNT HOME ENTERTAINMENT; TECHNICOLOR DISTRIBUTION SERVICES
Languages
Main Language
English
Subtitle Language
Dutch, Norwegian, Finnish, French, Danish, English, Swedish
Hearing Impaired Language
English
Technical information
Special Features
Commentary with Directors Tom McGrath and Eric Darnell, Mad Trivia Pop-Up, Penguins in a Christmas Caper, Mad Mishaps, Meet the Wild Cast, Behind the Crates, The Tech of Madagascar, Penguin Chat, Enchanted Island, DreamWorks Animation Video Jukebox, 'I Like to Move It, Move It' Music Video, Learn to Draw
Aspect Ratio
16:9 Anamorphic Wide Screen
Sound
Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround, Dolby TrueHD 5.1 Surround Sound
Professional reviews
Review
A delightfully wacked new digitally animated comedy... Untamed fun (Entertainment Weekly, 09/02/2009)
MADAGASCAR offers plenty of amusement (Sight And Sound, 09/02/2009)
The animation is visually stunning, and the animals' stylized rendering and friendly look is in keeping with the energetic mood of the movie (USA Today, 09/02/2009)
DVD Description
The friendship between a New York City lion and zebra is tested when fate brings them out to the unforgiving wilderness in this computer-animated feature. Chris Rock provides the voice of Marty the Zebra, whose longing to explore beyond his cushy Central Park Zoo boundaries is the impetus that ultimately strands him and his pals on the shores of savage Madagascar. Marty loves the new, edible scenery, but his best friend Alex (voiced by Ben Stiller) the Lion begins to starve since his diet of thick steaks has been cut off, and the rump of his friend starts to look mighty tasty. Their other friends, a hypochondriac giraffe (David Schwimmer) and a sassy hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith), try their best to think of a solution as the call of the wild slowly turns the starving Alex into Marty's worst nightmare. Meanwhile the hilariously self aggrandising King of the Ocelots (Sacha Cohen) has a plan to use Marty to repel their own carnivore problem. This kid-oriented comedy stays adult-friendly every step of the way thanks to a clever script that mixes New Yorker humour and even some existentialism in with the pratfalls and spit-takes. Jolts of comedic brilliance are supplied by some Arctic-bound escaped con penguins, and a couple of literary apes. It's not a musical, but classic songs from the likes of Louis Armstrong and Sammy Davis Jr. keep the montages flowing loose and sassy.
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