The stereoscopic 3-D animated family film Fly Me to the Moon lands on home video shelves today, along with the second film in the vfx-laden Chronicles of Narnia series. The former is available in both 3-D and 2-D versions, and the latter can be had in a three-disc DVD and Blu-ray set loaded with bonus features.
In Fly Me to the Moon, three tween-aged flies decide they want to become part of the space program and hatch a plan to stow away on the 1969 Apollo II mission. Against the wishes of their mothers and with encouragement from a grandfather who missed his shot at becoming the first fly in space, the intrepid insects manage to get into the rocket and embark on an exhilarating and harrowing space adventure. The voice cast features Kelly Rippa, Christopher Lloyd, Nicollette Sheridan and Adrianne Barbeau, as well as real-life Apollo astronaut Buzz Aldrin in a special cameo role.
Written by Domonic Paris of Illuminata Picutres and directed by Ben Stassen of nWave Pictures, the $25 million movie was released theatrically in August by Summit Ent. and grossed just over $30 million worldwide. Both the 3-D and 2-D versions retail for $25.99. Stassen and Paris are now working on an animated sea turtle adventure titled Around the World in 50 Years’3D.
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian returns viewers to a magical realm brought to the screen with the aid of visual effects shops Weta Digital, The Moving Picture Company, Framestore CFC, Rising Sun Pictures, ScanlineVFX and CIS London. Based on the classic book by C.S. Lewis, the sequel has the young Pevensie siblings return to Narnia a year later, only to find that 1,300 years have passed and the enchanted kingdom has fallen into ruin. With the help of a certain animated lion, they must battle an evil king and return the land’s rightful ruler, Prince Caspian, to the throne. The film is directed by Andrew Adamson, who helmed the first journey to Narnia as well as the blockbuster DreamWorks Animation feature Shrek.
Bonus features include audio commentary by Adamson, a blooper reel, deleted scenes and the featurettes Inside Narnia: The Adventure Returns, Sets of Narnia: A Classic Comes to Life, Big Movie Comes to a Small Town, Previsualizing Narnia, Talking Animals and Walking Trees: the Magical World of Narnia, Secrets of the Duel, Becoming Trumpkin and Warwick Davis: The Man behind Nikabrik. The three-disc collector’s edition lists for $39.99 on DVD and $40.99 on Blu-ray. A single-disc edition is also available for the suggested retail price of $29.99 on DVD and $35.99 on Blu-ray. The third film in the series, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, is slated to hit theaters in the summer of 2010.
