Having been the subject of countless movies dating back to 1918, Edgar Rice Burroughs' Tarzan has become a genre all its own. In 1999 Disney pitched the tale of a boy raised by apes in the African jungle to an audience of younger viewers using lush animation and a soppy soundtrack by Phil Collins. The formula worked; critics praised its easy mix of action and romance and families flocked to watch. Six years later comes this two-disc Special Edition DVD.

Jungle Fever

Producer Bonnie Arnold introduces three deleted scenes presented in story-reel format (ie roughly sketched animation). It's action-packed stuff that includes an alternate opening sequence showing the events surrounding Tarzan's abandonment in the jungle. Arnold explains that it was cut because it didn't follow the "emotional thread" of the story, but in a forthright audio commentary admits that test audiences were confused about the fate of Tarzan's parents.

Elsewhere on Disc One are three brilliantly animated interactive games (of varying difficulty levels) that'll have you surfing vines at dizzying speed. For educational value there's a Disneypedia entry on apes and a section of music videos includes a studio session with Phil Collins and 'N Sync. In case you thought song writing was easy, lyrics like, "zapee dappee doo-ah doo" will prove you right.

From Burroughs To Disney gets back to the roots of Tarzan with Edgar's grandson Danton Burroughs. He explaining why Disney's rendering is one of the most "realistic" adaptations he's seen - except for the talking animals obviously. Like the rest of the featurettes that make up this package, it's very short at 2-3 minutes long, but altogether they paint a comprehensive picture of development. Research Trip To Africa plays like a trailer for Gorillas In The Mist while Building The Story invites you inside development meetings where all the key decisions are made.

Going Ape

The Characters Of Tarzan gets up-close-and-personal with each of the key players, offering design galleries along with behind-the-scenes featurettes. For instance in Creating Tarzan the filmmakers talk about "feeling the animal inside the man" in terms of his movement while Tony Goldwyn (who provides the voice of Tarzan) describes the character as "a guy in search of the truth about himself".

Deep Canvas is a relatively new technique developed on Tarzan, which is explained in another short featurette. Essentially it draws the audience deeper into the action by taking the camera "inside a painting" and exploring it up and down and through 360 degrees. To give you a better sense of what it's all about there's a separate demonstration that deconstructs a scene layer by layer.

Other extras see Phil Collins banging a lot of pots and pans in Oscar-winning style and singing the finished soundtrack in French, German and Spanish. (Whether that's good or bad depends on you.) There's also a moving tribute to the French animators who assisted on the film: supervising animator Glen Keane notes, "There was a trust that developed between us, even though we're American and they're French..." Warms your heart, doesn't it?

While all the featurettes are brief and there's very little contribution from the cast (Minnie Driver, Glenn Close - hello?), this Special Edition draws a detailed picture of the film's evolution. Together with its sophisticated games and activities section this is a typically polished and generous package from Disney that'll give kids a new appreciation of their opposable thumbs.

EXTRA FEATURESDISC ONE

DISC TWO