A Bug’s Life Collector’s Edition on DVD

Pixar’s first follow up to the groundbreaking “Toy Story” was this tale of ants trying to defend themselves from a swarm of mafiosa-like bully grasshoppers.

It’s kind of “Disney meets The Magnificent Seven” as our hero, Flick (Voiced by Dave Foley) - an inventor with a black cloud following him around - is sent off (well, exiled is probably more accurate) in search of some heros who can come in and save the ant colony from the evil hoppers.

The exile happens after Flick accidentally destroys the food offering the ants are required to leave for the grasshoppers (okay, it isn’t just “Magnificent 7,” it’s also “The Grasshopper and the Ant”). He heads across country to the “big city” (a remarkably rendered scene of digital imagination) and comes across a circus act of misfits he mistakes as the heroes for which he’s been searching.

He enlists the gang to help him and they go along with him, thinking it’s just another gig. But the mistaken identities are corrected, and the gang leaves the ant colony in shame.

Naturally, they come back and together they and the ants concoct a scheme to defeat the hoppers and this leads to an action packed finale that’s highly enjoyable.

While Toy Story may be a bit better movie, A Bug’s Life is no less enjoyable and includes some terrific stuff. The bird attack sequence, for example, is an outstanding bit of movie action - animated or live action - that really deserves to be seen on a big screen TV. The computer generated imagery is first rate, and the voice cast (which includes Kevin Spacey, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Phyllis Diller, David Hyde Pierce and more) delivers wonderful characterizations that are beautifully matched by the animation.

It was also A Bug’s Life that introduced audiences to Pixar’s outtakes which, though beginning to wear thin now with subsequent titles, are nothing short of hilarious. What a concept: a blooper reel where the actors fluff their lines, knock over cameras and the like - even though these creatures exist only inside the computer, which means true outtakes are impossible and have to be written, performed, and animated just like the rest of the movie!

The DVD is advertised as the world’s first to be created directly from the digital source (being merely the digital output from the computer fed to the digital video medium) and this has kicked off a wonderful tradition of high quality DVD releases from the likes of Disney and Lucasfilm.

This means the video quality is spectacular, whether you watch the anamorphic widescreen (16x9 TV compatible) version or the also-included Pan&Scan one (why can't all dual aspect ratio DVD's be put into one box like this one is?). We obviously recommend the widescreen version, which is presented in the ultra-wide 2.35:1 aspect ratio - the only Pixar release as of this writing to be that wide.

Audio is Dolby Digital 5.1 and it’s also superb. You can hear absolutely everything, from little ant footfalls to the thundering of multiple hoppers. This disc, in the Disney/Pixar tradition it helped to pioneer, is an outstanding audio and video experience.

And you get plenty of extras in this two disc set, too, including (in this new version), some “Fish facts” that manage to whet your appetite for the upcoming (as of this writing) Pixar feature “Finding Nemo.”

You also get a running commentary by director John Lasseter, Co-Director and Co-Writer Andrew Stanton and Supervising Film Editor Lee Unkrich, theatrical trailer(s) and "A Bug's Land" activity games.

And there’s plenty more! You get an isolated music score (in 2 channel stereo, which is fine), an isolated sound effects track (in 5.1 Surround), Pixar's Oscar-winning animated short "Geri's Game," and a bunch of behind the scenes stuff including 1) Early Presentation Reel (“Fleabie”), 2) Original story treatment and pitch boards, 3) Character designs, concept art and color script, 4) Early production tests. There are also featurettes on the creation of “A Bug’s Life”, the voice talent, and a fascinating look at how the movie was reformatted from its original widescreen presentation to a Pan&Scan (which as you’ll see, means that calling it Pan&Scan isn’t really a fair description of what they’ve done). There’s also a feature with Sound Engineer Gary Rydstrom outlining the movie’s sound design, storyboard-to-final film split-screen comparisons, deleted sequences, and more.

It’s enough to drive you buggy!

A Bug’s Life, Collector’s Edition, from Walt Disney Home Video
95 min. anamorphic widescreen (2.35:1, 16x9 TV compatible)/Pan&Scan (on one disc), Dolby Digital 5.1 surround
Starring the voices of Dave Foley, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Kevin Spacey, Phyllis Diller, Dave Hyde Pierce
Produced by Darla K. Anderson and Kevin Reher
Written by Andrew Stanton and Donald McEnery & Bob Shaw, co-directed by Andrew Stanton and John Lasseter

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