Dog days

We've been watching films here in the PM household over the last couple of days. It's been raining and, after a spell of lovely sunny weather it's sometimes nice just to kick back with a good movie (or three).

Yesterday we headed over to Cardigan to watch Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs at Theatr Mwldan. This was one of those Saturday cinema visits when they have to turn up the volume to cover the good-natured crunching of a hundred little hands into buckets of popcorn. It didn't drown out R5, however, who laughed so joyously at Sid the Sloth's antics with his three dinosaur eggs that people had to turn around and Look.

It is totally hilarious. Sometimes sequels can be disappointing, but I think Ice Age gets better and better with every film. The biggest laugh of all though was when we heard the first cry of Ellie the Mammoth's new baby and it was answered by the baby in the audience.

We've also been watching two more Disney Blu-ray discs supplied by ThinkParents.Net. This time we were treated to Beverly Hills Chihuahua and Bolt. The former has real life action and has a somewhat thin plot whereby Chloe the Beverly Hills chihuahua gets lost in Mexico and roughneck chihuahua Papi goes to rescue her. On the way Chloe discovers her 'bark' and that, though diminutive, chihuahuas can be tough and save the day. Not my cup of tea, admittedly, but H7 and R5 loved it to bits. Real dogs 'talking' is very much their kind of thing.

Much more to my taste was the animated Bolt, with the lead (geddit?) voiced by John Travolta. I'm not a massive Travolta fan, but he does good dog. Astonishingly even the annoying Miley Cyrus (aka Hannah Montana) is excellent as the voice of Penny, Bolt's devoted co-star.

Bolt is the super-powered dog star (with Penny) of the biggest show in Hollywood, but he does not know that really he just an ordinary dog with special effects. He accidentally gets sent in a parcel to New York and has to find his way home aided and abetted by Mittens the cynical cat and Rhino the hamster. In Disney-speak on the journey from East cost to West Bolt discovers that he doesn't need his superpowers to be a hero.

I roared with laughter all the way through. So much so that H7 and R5 were forced to turn around and Look. Like Ice Age III it has many levels, the kids laugh at the slapstick and the toilet humour (as do the dads) and the mums laugh knowingly at the other bits. Clever stuff.