Synopsis:

This is a documentary on the life of the fly that was broadcast on The Learning Channel a couple of years ago. Now before I go on, I have to get this out of my system YUCK AARRGGH! Ok, Let me first say that while extremely informative, this is probably one of the most disgusting things I have ever seen. The opening of the disc has an extreme close-up of the Proboscis of a fly as it's pulsating and flexing. Definitely not one to watch during dinner or even many hours later. Anyway, it's full of facts on the fly and I'm gonna drop a few of those on you the disc so graciously imparted. There are 60,000.00 species of fly and they include look-alikes of both wasps and bees. It's presumed that the fly got it's start on the savannah of East Africa where Big animal slobber and droppings were plentiful. Did you know that the fly's eyes allow for 360 degrees of viewing, hence why you can't sneak up on them to swat them. Did you also know that the wings on a fly beat 4x faster than a hummingbird at 330x per second! Now onto the truly gross stuff. Flies dig anyplace that has moisture and warmth. Especially bathrooms. When these little monsters are finished climbing all over the toilet both inside and out, they then find their way to our foodstuffs and walk all over it. Then like ruminants (four-chambered stomach animals, Cows for example) they regurgitate what they have consumed and then re-swallow it. Sometimes they don't and that lovely bit of yick ends up on something we'll eat later! I can't really blame them for walking on our food since, they taste with the bottom of their feet but the vomit thing is just way too gross-even for them! Anyway, if you've a hankering for the be-all and end-all in fly information, this disc has your name all over it.

Audio/Video:

The audio for the film is presented in a Dolby 2.0 Channel platform with no surround effects to speak of. It's already a very unnerving visual experience and the added benefit of having the buzzing of a fly about your ears and head would have added another level of grossness. Would have been a nice effect had it been included. The dialogue was clear and well understood. The video is presented in a full frame format. Largely shot on video the images go from crystal clear to slightly hazy but on the whole the images were clean and showed no other obvious transfer errors.

Extras:

There are no extras on the disc.

Overall:

Highly informative and definitely a gross-out classic. Flies are really nasty little buggers and carry all sorts of disease. The bad rep they get is well deserved and this documentary goes all out to explain every aspect of "fly life". All kidding aside though, don't even think about eating and watching this. You'll be real sorry. In the event you have a science project due on these flying toilets, this is the one disc that's done all the groundwork. Rent it.