Disney

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Academy Award-winning Chicago director Robert Zemeckis for A Christmas Carol.

CHICAGO – This three-image slideshow contains our ribbon-cutting photography for Disney’s “A Christmas Carol” train tour at Chicago’s Union Station with Oscar-winning Chicago director Robert Zemeckis.

CHICAGO – Every Disney catalog Blu-Ray that has been released to date has been a must-own HD title. “Sleeping Beauty” may still be the most complete and beautifully designed Blu-Ray ever and “Pinocchio” is not too far behind. To no one’s surprise, “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” doesn’t break the pattern, even if it’s not quite the ‘game-changing’ release that its Disney HD predecessors arguably were.

CHICAGO – When it was announced that Disney would be releasing a new special edition of “Bedknobs and Broomsticks,” the little kid in me woke up and started pounding on my memory banks. I have such vivid memories of watching the film as a child, mouth agape, eyes wide, and falling in love with the blend of animation and live-action that looked so revolutionary to this future critic’s young mind. Pick up the DVD and inspire a child you know.

CHICAGO – The Walt Disney Studios is teaming up with acclaimed filmmaker Guillermo del Toro (“Pan’s Labyrinth,” “The Hobbit”) to launch a new production label called Disney Double Dare You. With the new production company they will create new animated movies that are full of “chills and thrills” for people of all ages, announced at D23 Expo last week by Dick Cook, chairman of The Walt Disney Studios.

CHICAGO – Writing about Disney’s nature documentary “Earth,” now available on Blu-Ray and DVD, is complicated because the movie itself contains undeniably beautiful imagery but, for a lot of people, it’s footage that they’ve seen before and the film never really registers as a complete experience. It’s a slice of nature mostly meant for children and, if you keep that in mind, it’s sometimes effective.

CHICAGO – “Race to Witch Mountain,” now on Blu-Ray and DVD, is a head-scratcher, a movie with more than enough individual elements that should work but proof that a film is not just the sum of its parts.

CHICAGO – There is an art to music. There is an art to writing a story and an art to telling that story. There is art in a great drawing, a great painting and a great photograph. There is an art to communication. And it may only be a matter of time before museums expand to include a whole new category of modern art: the animated film from Disney and Pixar.

CHICAGO – A Disney movie and two all-time classics being inducted in Paramount’s “Centennial Collection” make up this week’s version of the “DVD Round-Up,” your safety net for titles that may have slipped by your home entertainment radar.

Blu-Ray Rating: 4.5/5.0

CHICAGO – The first word I think of when I read or hear about Disney’s “Bolt” is cute. The movie is just cute, cute, cute. If your threshold for adorable cartoon characters and heartwarming messages is low, stay away, but if you’re looking for a bright smile to break the darkness of daily life, you could do a lot worse than this clever canine, now the subject of yet another nearly-perfect Disney Blu-Ray release.

Blu-Ray Rating: 4.0/5.0

CHICAGO – “High School Musical 3: Senior Year” certainly won’t stand among the best song-n-dance films of all time, but it delivers a jolt of escapist entertainment to its target audience and the expertly remastered, three-disc Disney Blu-Ray release should be a smash hit for everyone eager to buy it.