CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG
Release date: November 2, 2010
Blu-ray version (some materials may not appear on the DVD version)

“Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” is a great live-action fantasy film, and although it’s not a Disney film, it’s very Disney-like, starring Dick Van Dyke, with songs by the great Sherman Brothers who wrote hundreds of Disney songs, and a musical score by Irwin Kostal, who, amongst other films, scored “Mary Poppins.” Even choreographers Dee Dee Wood & Marc Breaux worked on “Poppins.”

Sally Ann Howes is so enchanting as Truly Scrumptious, and the children actors, Adrian Hall and Heather Ripley are charming and unaffected in their first movie role.

"Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" is a silly film that’s appropriate for the whole family, and it still holds up today as it did when it was first released in 1968.

BONUS FEATURES:

The SHERMAN BROTHERS DEMOS are certainly an audio treasure! How great to hear how the songs were originally proposed, as well as some songs that didn’t make it to the final film and a version of the theme song with new lyrics!

DICK VAN DYKE PRESS INTERVIEW is actually a vintage piece in which Dick van Dyke sits in the car during the interview. He answers questions, some about the film, some are quite dumb, such as “What’s wrong with television today?” but he always answers with class.

THE POTTS CHILDREN’S FEATURETTE

Created at the time of the movie, this is narrated by the children and features incredible rare behind the scenes footage as the kids travels around the country. Don’t know if this was ever released before, but WOW!

THE DITCHLING TINKERER

Another vintage piece, this spotlights a real live inventor, Rowland Emett, who is a lot like the main character Caractacus Potts. In fact, his creations are the actual props that were used in the movie.

The SING ALONG songs jump to each selection with lyrics to sing along. If you just want to jump to the individual songs, but without the onscreen lyrics, just select MUSIC MACHINE.

There are two games on here. CHITTY CHITTY’S BANG BANG DRIVING GAME lets you control Chitty with the left and right arrow buttons. It’s simple enough, but the arrow keys stopped working during the game many times. Not sure if it’s a glitch in the game itself or just an incompatibility issue.

To play the TOOT SWEET TOOTS MUSICAL MAESTRO, you must watch the entire film. Only six times throughout an icon will appear and you play a memory game, similar to “Simon,” where you must remember a color pattern. And yes, you read this right. You must watch the entire film to play a memory game six times.

The PHOTO GALLERY is comprised of about four dozen crisp publicity photos and behind-the-scenes images.

The VINTAGE ADVERTISING GALLERY contains several theatrical trailers and television spots.

There are a couple of newer bonus features as well:

A FANTASMAGORICAL MOTORCAR (9:44) is a featurette about the genial Pierre Picton, who is the owner of the actual Chitty Chitty Bang Bang car from the film. It’s a fascinating story about how Pierre was approached to use his breakaway circus car for a scene in the film, and how he ended up with the vehicular star of the film. The second half of this featurette offers a close-up look at the car.

REMEMBERING CHITTY CHITTY BANG BANG WITH DICK VAN DYKE (25:58) looks back at the film with Dick telling interesting and entertaining anecdotes over clips of the film. He discusses all of his co-stars and many of the crew members. It’s just a fantastic piece!

“Chitty Chitty Bang Bang” on blu-ray won’t disappoint you! The film looks great, and there are some wonderful vintage and newer bonus features.

Hope this helps you know what’s on this uncategorical, pantasmagorical blu-ray!