Planes: Fire and Rescue Blu-ray review
“From above the world of Cars” was the tagline to the first “Planes” movie released in 2013 to moderate success. The aviation focused side-quel (?) to Pixar’s smash-hit Cars series has now produced a sequel of its own, which arrives on Disney Blu-Ray in the UK just in time for Christmas. In an attempt at getting a balanced opinion on the film, I sat down with my sons of 4 and 8 to review the Blu-Ray for Skwigly.
Released in the cinemas in August 2014, Planes: Fire and Rescue sees the return of plucky Crop-duster turned championship air-racer Dusty Crophopper (Dane Cook) who, upon discovery of a debilitating injury that forces him to retire from racing, begins an exciting new career fighting forest fires with the brave crew of The Piston Peak Aerial Fire-fighters. Oscar-nominated Actor Ed Harris plays Blade Ranger, gruff Mentor to Dusty and Battalion-Chief of the Piston Peak Air Attack team.
The movies tagline is “When others fly out, heroes fly in” and in a recent interview, Cook remarked about returning to the role of the heroic Dusty;
“In the first film, Dusty was a little anxious about leaving home—so he was tentative and cautious. [Director] Bobs Gannaway came in and said, “Dusty’s got to grow.” And I was like, “Okay, good. We’re both on the same page.” There was this amazing collaborative effort to achieve his vision together. This time, we wanted Dusty to be braver—less stammering, less quiet—he’s discovered himself. We wanted his newfound confidence to resonate in his voice. I was able to inject more humour. There was more room to play with the character, which was very exciting for me. “
According to director/co-writer Gannaway, “The first film [directed by Klay Hall] was a race film. I wanted to look at a different genre, in this case, an action-disaster film.” Production on Planes: Fire & Rescue began six months after the start of the previous film. “We’ve been working on this film for nearly four years.” And in an attempt to accurately portray the bravery of real-world Aerial Fire units, the filmmakers researched the world of air-attack teams and smokejumpers by working with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, and sent a crew to the US Forest Services’ annual training exercises for smokejumpers.
Although not deemed a critical success on cinema release, (it currently scores a 44% on Rotten Tomatoes “Tomato-meter) it has made $60 million thus-far from an estimated (Wikipedia) $50 million Production budget, highlighting that there is an audience out there hungry for more vehicular family-fare (stay-tuned for the upcoming Cars 3 from Pixar.)
Clocking in at a brisk 83 minutes running-time, Planes: Fire and Rescue is a Disneytoon Studios Production. Originally known as Disney MovieToons, the studio is a division of Walt Disney Animation Studios, responsible for creating direct-to-video and occasional theatrical animated feature films who, over the years, have produced 47 films, beginning with Duck Tales the Movie and including 1998’s The Lion King2 – Simba’s Pride and 2000’s An Extremely Goofy Movie with Planes: Fire and Rescue being its most recent release.
Gannaway is a veteran of the DisneyToon Studios, Writer and long-term Producer on Disney Junior shows Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Minnies’ Bow-Toons and feature-director of Stitch-The Movie the DTV sequel to Disney’s Lilo & Stitch.
As we’ve come to expect from modern Hollywood animated features, the film features an eclectic voice-cast. As Rusty gets up to speed, his presence in the unit catches the attention of Dipper (Julie Bowen), a cargo hauler-turned-water scooper and major racing fan, meanwhile wise, heavy-lift helicopter Windlifter (Wes Studi), hulking transport plane Cabbie (Dale Dye) and the Secretary of the Interior (Fred Willard) are joined by Nick “Loop’n” Lopez (Erik Estrada), a helicopter cop with an illustrious past (one of the cleverest of the many pop-culture references in the entire film, especially if you were a fan of 80s US show CHiPs like me!)
Overall, the film got a thumbs-up from my sons but I found it a bit slight for my own tastes. It certainly zips along at a decent pace and the 83 minutes running-time means it doesn’t out stay its welcome. The fire-fighting scenes are suitably dramatic and were definitely the favourite scenes for the boys. I have to admit a few chuckles whenever the CHoPs TV show was mentioned, but I couldn’t get over the lower-budget feel in comparison to other recent CG features currently on release.
Blu-ray bonus features include the exclusive six-minute animated short film Vitaminamulch: Air Spectacular, directed by Gannaway, in which Dusty and Chug participate in an air show disguised as absent stunt planes Air Devil Jones and Vandenomium. Additional material includes a mockumentary called Welcome to Piston Peak!, a CHoPs TV promo, a featurette called Air Attack: Firefighters From The Sky; a behind-the-scenes look at real smokejumpers and firefighters plus a making of the film with Gannaway and producer Ferrell Barron, a music video of Still I Fly by Spencer Lee, two deleted scenes with filmmaker intros, and two animated shorts introducing Dipper and the Smokejumpers.
If you have young children, Planes: Fire and Rescue is a worthy stocking-filler for the big day
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