DVD Talk review of 'The Jungle Book - 40th Anniversary Platinum Edition'
 

I read Brian Orndorf's DVD review of The Jungle Book - 40th Anniversary Platinum Edition at http://www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/read.php?ID=29679 while eating some pretty decent Chick-Fil-A and...

Great review Brian... your review had me absolutely chomping at the bit for the upcoming release, but regarding the following line:

'"Jungle Book" is a buried gem of the Disney Empire, absent the regality of the early years and the flash of the 89-95 victory lap.'

I hardly think we can qualify Jungle Book as a buried gem... Adjusted for inflation, its domestic box office take is $484 million (nestled between Thunderball and Sleeping Beauty as the #27 highest grosser of all time), plus it does retain the lofty title of being the last animated production Walt had a hand in overseeing. And its got two of the greatest (and most replayed) Disney tunes ever in Bare Necessities and I Wanna Be Like You, the latter of which remaining one of their crowning musical achievements that easily withstood the brutal assault of a horrific cover by Smash Mouth. The horror. The horror...

I suppose there is a bit of melancholy to The Jungle Book, as it signifies the last of Disney's "Silver Age" of movies and the transition into their "Dark Period", in which the animated films seemed to have lost a bit of their magic (Aristocats, Robin Hood, Rescuers, Fox and the Hound) but regardless of that, Jungle Book remains many things but far from unheralded.

See? Disney nerds and their soapboxes... It's sad huh? ;)

I think the Jungle Book is probably my favorite of the Disney Classics, partly because it was the first one I remember seeing in the theater. Having watched it a zillion times a few years ago when my kids were younger, the music holds up the best of any Disney film, at least for my tastes.

On the VHS version we used to have there was a featurette that had a couple of the animators and also a clip of the Louis Prima band bopping through a performance. You could really see his movements in the animation of King Louis. Is that clip of Louis Prima and his band in one of the special features of the new DVD?

It wasn't that bad, but compared to the Jonas Brother's cover, it's a masterpiece. I just saw the first 30 seconds on Youtube. After that limited exposure, I can safely say that Brian was 100% right about it. Awful, awful cover. To me, the only 'weak spot' in Platinum releases are these modern renditions.

Why is there no, NO discussion about the color differentiations? It was such a hot topic in the forums and it's never even mentioned in the review.

This is the first that I heard about it. Are we talking "Peter Pan" colour differentiation?

Yeah, that's what stirred it up. Go look at that Peter Pan thread and you'll see what I'm talking about.

one of the reviews at Amazon say they just cropped the picture to give it fake widescreen, is that true?