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Before the Reality TV craze was sweeping the nation we had America's Funniest Home Videos. Basically, some very brilliant person got the idea to compile the mishaps that occur when "regular people? use video cameras. We get people falling off bikes, pets acting weird, kids hurting themselves and all of it is great. This is such a fun 4 disc set that I am actually going to say it is a •must own.?

While I am sure sure that after awhile, when this show became the hit that it became, some of these antics became •setups? of one sort of another. Truthfully, I don•t even care because these home movies give us such a rich glimpse into the lives of people all across this great land. We get to see how in one way or another, we're all similar, all different and all uniquely American.

America's Funniest Home Videos - Vol. 1 with Tom Bergeron is great fun for everyone!

Bonus Disc Featuring the 300th Episode
Broken up into two parts, this episode focuses on the best clips from the shows history. We have kids hitting other kids, parents scaring their kids, animals drooling and pretty much anything else you can imagine. I love the TLC that his been given to this episode, and I think that there is just something about people being candid using a video camera that is very easy for folks to watch. My favorite part? "The Greatest Groin Hits.?

 
The Look
Anamorphic Widescreen... okay, it•s America's Funniest Home Videos! This show has been shot with consumer video cameras. It is FULL SCREEN and it wouldn't work any other way. While the picture quality is obviously not the best, I was able to hear and understand everything that was being put across on these DVDs. When someone started crying, I knew why they were crying. When a child did something they probably shouldn't have done, I understood why they were dumbfounded. So don't let the "video look? deter you from watching this show.
  
 
The Sound
While I am not 100% clear on what type of sound this show used, I will say that coming from many •home video? formats, the people behind this DVD set (and the actual show) did a very good job with what they were given. I also liked that they added sound FX to get a certain point across, or they even used subtitles if it was hard to understand what somebody was saying. Never have sound and images merged together been so important in bringing across the idea of what is happening on screen. Okay, that may be stretching things a bit, but it•s still important.
  
 
The Packaging
Having an almost Girls Gone Wild look, this DVD cover is very colorful. It shows two people being involved in a stunt, one who is terrified and another who seems to be laughing. The colors are purple, red, yellow, white and blue. Not the most appealing combination, but the front of this set will get your attention. The back features a description of this 4 disc sets contents and a minor technical specs list. The packaging unfolds revealing all 4 disks housed in their own plastic tray. This set is very economically housed and isn't hard to navigate through at all. When you realize that you have 9+ hours of America's Funniest Home Videos, you will probably start with disk one and watch this set all the way through. Things are broken down but not in any kind of meticulous order.

  
I am sure that there are some party poopers who will find videos of adults scaring kids, or people getting hurt to be sort of sadistic. And on many accounts those people would be right. Yet, a show like America's Funniest Home Videos - Vol. 1 with Tom Bergeron, really is something akin to passing by a car wreck. You know that you shouldn't look, you probably should turn away or get as far away as you can (in this case turn the channel), but sadly it just isn't going to happen.

While I did say that this 4 disc set is a "must own?, it obviously isn•t for everybody, BUT for the people that it is for, it most certainly is a must own. So enjoy this box set and revel in the misfortunes of others.

I know I did.


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Reviewed: August 1st, 2005
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