The full monty music Despite

The full monty music

Despite Happily NEver Afters poor box office showing, Lionsgate hasnt skimped on the extras, gifting the film with a spacious BD-50 dual-layer disc, and porting over all of the extras from the standard-def DVD release of the film. Of course, why anyone would actually want to know about the making of Happily NEver After remains a mystery. Things kick off with a suite of three featurettes. Journey of the Characters in the Enchanted Forest 16 minutes and Creating the Happily Story: Bringing NEver After to Life also 16 minutes are straightforward EPK-like materials. Director Paul J. Bolger is our tour guide, giving us a peek at the development of the characters in the movie. I the full monty music I can give some praise to the films animators, who as it is shown at least tried to bring a new spin to the proceedings by updating and modernizing hairstyles, clothes, etc. Otherwise, there is little here of interest. The third featurette is about 5 minutes of From Storyboard to Fairy Tale: A Comparison, which provides a before-and-after split-screen montage highlighting various scenes from the film. Bolger reappears for a screen-specific audio commentary. This is one of those commentary tracks that is tough to judge, because though Bolger is a pleasant, thoughtful speaker, he is either unaware or unwilling to admit that the film he toiled away on for years is downright awful. In any case, he covers the typical bases, going over some of the same points he touched on in the featurettes, but offering further detail on individual performances from the voice talent, and some of the changes/deletions made to the final cut. Still, this is one long 87 minutes. Next we have the Lost in Fairy Tale Lane deleted scenes and the Happily NEver After? alternate ending. The quality is a spotty, and none of the excised material adds much that is missed. In total, the footage runs about 6 minutes. Finally, for the kiddies, we have three Games from the Department of Fairy Tale Security Munks Fairy Tale Fix, Mambo and Munks Magical Matchmaker and Create Your Own Witches Broom. Pretty standard stuff, with basic graphics and simplistic gameplay. Magical Matchmaker is probably the most fun Im using the term loosely, allowing you to pair off various characters in the film, with amusing results. Still, its hard to imagine even the youngest tots getting the full monty music replay value out of these games. Note that there is no theatrical trailer included for the movie. Also, all the video-based supplementary material is presented in 4:3 full screen and 480i/MPEG-2 only. HD Bonus Content: Any Exclusive Goodies in There? There are no Blu-ray exclusives. No easter eggs reported for Happily NEver After yet. Found an egg? Please use our tips form to let us know, and well credit you with the find. Happily NEver After was a critical and commercial bust during its brief theatrical release this past winter, and its easy to see why. The film is highly derivative of Shrek and a million other better animated fairy tales even the films animation is lackluster. On the bright side, at least Lionsgate has delivered an above-average Blu-ray release, with a transfer, soundtrack and supplemental package far better than the film deserves. But is it enough to rescue Happily NEver After from the One to Avoid dustbin of next-gen releases? Sadly, no. All disc reviews at High-Def Digest are completed using the best consumer HD home theater products currently on the market.