List Price: $14.98

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Starring: Really Wild Animals

Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)

Binding: VHS Tape

EAN: 9780792251927

Format: Closed-captioned, Color, NTSC

ISBN: 079225192X

Label: Nat'l Geographic Vid

Manufacturer: Nat'l Geographic Vid

Number of Items: 1

Product Group: Video

Publisher: Nat'l Geographic Vid

Release Date: 1997-10-21

Studio: Nat'l Geographic Vid

Theatrical Release Date: 1997

Title: National Geographic's Really Wild Animals: Secret Weapons and Great Escapes

UPC: 727994519126

Product Description: This entry in the Really Wild Animals series is a fast-paced introduction to animals' hidden defenses. Spin, an animated globe voiced by Dudley Moore, sets the scene by assigning the viewer a secret mission--to find and examine the hidden weapons of animals.

Spin leads his young detectives on an exploration of eight categories of secret weapons: bluffing, changing shape, smell, athlete's feet, the spurt that hurts, frog skin, poison-tipped harpoon, and venom. Well-chosen examples include the fake eyes of the owl butterfly, the scent glands of the skunk, and the tomato frog's ability to stretch its skin and ooze an oil that can glue a snake's jaws shut for two days.

Interspersed between animal segments are comical interludes including tongue-in-cheek advertisements such as the one suggesting that "Uncle Spin wants you to join the ant brigade," and entertaining music videos.

Spin examines islands in the second half of the video--specifically, unique island ecosystems that have formed as a result of geographic isolation. Informative segments on the lemurs of Madagascar, the iguanas of the Galapagos Islands, and other island-specific anomalies alternate with comic "commercials" about the "amazing ecosystem" and an "emergency broadcast system" test for determining if you're a marsupial.

Beautiful nature photography, a wealth of information, and comic relief abound in this 47-minute video that will have both kids and adults engrossed throughout repeated screenings. --Tami Horiuchi