DVD review: “DreamWorks Dragons: Gift of the Night Fury” Blu-ray + DVD
From Friday’s Weekend Look section of The Oklahoman.
“DreamWorks Dragons: Gift of the Night Fury” Blu-ray + DVD
DreamWorks Animation continues its tradition of revisiting its top franchises at various holidays, returning to the Viking hamlet of Berk for a Christmasy celebration with “Gift of the Night Fury” and delving deeper into the “Book of Dragons” with its new short film double pack.
The studio’s 2010 Oscar-nominated animated feature “How to Train Your Dragon” still flies high on my list of favorite movies of the past year, and the 22-minute seasonal tale “Gift of the Night Fury” gives another chance to experience the charming characters, engaging storytelling and exhilarating flying scenes of the film adaptation of Cressida Cowell’s book series.
As the title indicates, “Gift of the Night Fury” owes no small thematic debt to O. Henry’s classic tale “The Gift of the Magi,” as resourceful teen Hiccup (voice of Jay Baruchel) and the other Viking denizens of Berk prepare to celebrate their first Snoggletog, the community’s winter holiday, since making peace with the local dragon population.
But just as the Christmas-like merriment reaches its apex, all the dragons inexplicably fly away, except for Hiccup’s sleek buddy Toothless, whose damaged tail prevents him from soaring without his human pal’s help. The kind of high-quality short that alleviates the long wait for the 2014 full-length sequel, the new adventure packs plenty of holiday warm fuzzies, good humor and animated cuteness into its short runtime.
“Book of Dragons” is less a fully formed story than a light-hearted opportunity to expand on one of the key scenes of “How to Train Your Dragon,” in which Hiccup skims through his people’s encyclopedic record of the various types of the giant reptiles. The different varieties of dragons add so much visual and narrative interest, and the 18-minute short explores the seven classes of the fearsome creatures with intriguing detail and silly Looney Tunes-esque humor.
The Blu-ray offers an interactive version of the Book of Dragons, along with an animators’ commentary. The DVD-ROM comes with guidelines for creating several craft projects such as a replica Book of Dragons, Snoggletog party favors and paper dragons.
Other bonus features include “Gobber’s Training Secrets” vignettes, deleted scenes and a preview of the DreamWorks Dragons online video game. Each double pack comes with a code that grants access to the game.
— BAM
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Nice, I have seen ‘How to train your Dragon’ with my niece and we really had a great time. We were really hopeful for a follow-up film and we’re definitely watching this.