The Velveteen Rabbit   Starring: Jane Seymour, Tom Skerritt, Ellen Burstyn, Matthew Harbour and Kevin Jubinville Signature Entertainment www.signature-entertainment.co.uk RRP: £5.00 SIG34 Certificate: PG Available 17 October 2011

Sent to live with his grandmother while his father is off on business, Toby finds his Grandmother’s house cold and forbidding. Until one day he finds Rabbit, a toy who feels that he could be real through the power of love. Through Rabbit, Toby also gets to know some of the other toys who also yearn to be real, Horse and Swan. Toby is drawn into the fantastical world of the animals and eventually the power of does build a connection between Toby and his Grandmother...

The Velveteen Rabbit (2009 - 1 hr, 24 min, 45 sec) is a timeless tale taken from the 1922 novel by Margery Williams. The film has been made a number of times before and writer/director Michael Landon Jr has done well to keep the turn of the century sensibility, whilst trying to say something new with the story.

The tale is told with a combination of live action and animation, which are nicely blended. Young Toby (Matthew Harbour) slips easily into Rabbit’s (Chandler Wakefield) world, which is a combination of traditional 2D animation and computer CGI. Here he becomes acquainted with Horse (Tom Skerritt) and Swan (Ellen Burstyn). His adventures are not approved of by his stern Grandmother (Una Kay), who tries to squash his fantasy life.

The film is a modest affair, but you would not know it from what is on the screen. The actors, both real and vocal, are fine and the animation, whilst not as sophisticated as it could be, serves the story well.

The disc is presented with an aspect ratio of 16:9 and a passable DD 2.0 audio track, the only extra on the disc is a trailer.

The film stays this side of mawkish to produce a heart-warming tale for all the family to enjoy.

6

Charles Packer