The Toys are back in Town

One of the joys of having 3 kids is that you get to watch all the old movies of Eldest's childhood with youngest who can not remember seeing them first time around if in fact he ever saw them at all. Hence, when looking for something to amuse after a hard day at the end of a rather traumatic week I was especailly thankfully that the nice people at Disney have afforded me the pleasure of watching the newly jigged and jiggled blu ray version of Toy Story

Toy Story was released in 1995 , we first bought it on video, now long warn out and defunct and I have been meaning to replace it with DVD's but am glad I didn't. I am not one for hype and following the crowd but the updated images on Bluray are so much crisper and cleaner, the colours brighter and the whole thing much more entertaining on a High Definition screen . HD Blu ray really is magic in high definition as youngest put it , "its as good as 3D without having to wear the silly glasses".

The story is as you will probably know, is about a group of toys who belong to Andy and the arrival of Buzz Lightyear, a spacetrooper toy, who threatens to take premier spot in Andy's life ousting Woody the cowoy from the top toy position. The plot is fun and fast enough to amuse young and old with lots of good clean fun and situations that kids can relate to. Hidden below the facade it is a tale with important messages for kids about belonging, respect and support and the value of learning to work together as a team. All for one and one for all. All of which reinforce the French education ethos nicely for my small Anglo/French brood.



But the tale does not end there Toystory 2 has all the old characters and a lot more as well...Middle roars with laughter at Stinky Pete for his appalling farting abilities ( every boys delight) where as Mr Potato head wins hands down for me. I had a Mr Potato head and we seem to have collected over the years an entire hoard of the related Toystory toys from kindly teenage cousins ,happily intent on munching their way through hundreds of Hamburger happy meals so that they could pass the toys on to our brood! Toy Story 2 has lots of action bringing the outside world very much into the toys lives with dramatic chases and last minute rescues. Someimes sequels are dissapointing but not here the story grows up just as my small audience have grown up and the animation is even better than Toy Story 1.


Just as a footnote... one of the great things about these movies on Blu ray is the added bonus features and it is interesting with to see the artistic and produciton crew describe how Pixar had such trouble producing the original movie for Disney failing badly and producing a real non starter trying to fit into what they felt was the Disney Ethos and not suceeding until they did it their own way. It just shows as I always tell the boys, you do better to be yourself to trust your own instincts if you want to suceed and boy did they suceed!We can't wait for Toy Story 3 which is due for release in July in the Uk ( earlier inJune in the USA).

If you havent seen them before then do go and get the two Toy Story DVDs ( preferably on Blu ray it really does make a difference!) before the new one arrives so that you can refresh your memory and reunite with all your old friends. here are a couple of trailers to remind you what you are missing..Toy Story 1 and Toy Story 2