Hall of Shame (35% or Less)

Disney(ish) Reviews with the Unshaved Mouse: Pocahontas 2: Journey to a New World

I was once a mouse of honour.

Once I had a code.

My very first post on this blog, half a goddamn decade ago, set out some rules that I swore I’d follow come hell or high water:

No live action movies.

No Pixar movies.

No direct to video Disney sequels.

So here we are. Come and witness as my last scrap of virtue is torn away. Today, I review a direct to video Disney sequel, the cinematic equivalent of hiring a prostitute to dress up like your high school sweetheart, something beautiful and pure rendered tawdry and mercenary.

Oh come, come, Mouse, I hear you cry. Are they really as bad as all that? Well…

Okay, real talk time. None of the direct to video sequels made for the canon movies are as good as or better than the movies they are based on. Not one. By definition, really. I mean. If Disney Toons had somehow made a sequel to The Little Mermaid that was even better, they wouldn’t have released it straight to video, right? They’d have given it a full theatrical release and made it an official entry in the canon like The Rescuers Down Under or Winnie the Pooh (is Winnie the Pooh still in the canon? Disney?)

“Um…yes? I dunno. Look, the canon is just a marketing gimmick, who even cares?”

“Oh yeah, sure, I understand, I just dedicated FIVE YEARS OF MY LIFE to this, no biggie.”

But, y’know. I’m fair. I’m a fair mouse. Everyone says so. Believe me. And while all of the Disney cheapquels are objectively worse than the movies they were based on, that doesn’t mean that they were entirely without merit. In fact, let’s play the game that’s taking the globe by storm, Mouse Says Nice Things About Disney Sequels For As Long As He Can!

Return of Jafar: Obviously (OBVIOUSLY) not as good as Aladdin but it actually did some interesting stuff plot wise by giving Iago a character arc and actually leaving a real, lasting change to the status quo by having him become a hero. Maybe not a great movie but a very decent pilot for a better than decent TV show.

King of Thieves: Robin Williams back as the genie, some much needed delving into Aladdin’s backstory and a fairly satisfying conclusion to the story of the Agrabah gang.

Lion King 1 ½: As a sequel it busts the original’s continuity straight to hyena infested hell buuuuut…great cast, really nice animation, some genuinely funny gags and Diggah Tunnah is honestly a good enough song that it could have been in the original movie (and a good song in a Disney sequel is a rare, precious thing indeed).

Bambi 2: Patrick Stewart as the Prince of the Forest. It’s truly sad when a Disney Sequel is making better use of Patrick Stewart than the actual canon movies.

Cinderella 3: A Stitch in Time: Faced with the task of making a second sequel to Cinderella and with the imminent closure of their studio, Disney Australia went all in on a batshit insane time travel caper. They went out fighting. They went out weird. And we salute them.

And as for today’s movie…

Okay, look. We need to take a minute to talk about the plight of a certain persecuted minority. A proud people who have suffered indignity after indignity in the face of a hostile and uncaring majority.

I refer, of course, to Pocahontas fans. And I am sorry that I must add to their legacy of suffering, because the truth is this:

I prefer Pocahontas 2 to the original.

“Never thought we’d be mobbin’ for Pocahontas of all gol-durn things.”

No, I’m not joking.

No, I’m not just trolling you.

No, I’m not being contrarian.

No, I haven’t suffered some kind of head injury.

Here’s the thing, if you love Pocahontas you probably love it for the music and the animation and I’m obviously not going to pretend that Pocahontas 2 holds a single solitary candle to the original in either of those categories. But in terms of story…

Okay. It’s not perfect. It’s not even particularly good. But. This is the story of a young Native American woman who most leave her home, travel across the sea and navigate the intrigue of a strange and hostile foreign court with the survival of her entire tribe hanging in the balance. And that, to me, is automatically more compelling than the warmed-over Romeo and Juliet plot of the original.

Let’s take a look.

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Space Chimps (2008)

Never pick a fight with an Australian. Lesson. Fucking. Learned.

This one hurt, folks. Space Chimps manages to encapsulate so much of what has gone wrong with 21st century animation that I almost feel like if I burned the DVD all those sins would just evaporate as the spell was lifted. It’s awful, but it’s awful in so many different ways at once that it has inestimable value as a teaching tool. I feel like you could teach an animation course on what not to do based on this movie alone. This is the first movie by Vanguard Animation that I’ve reviewed on this blog as I’ve not had the unalloyed pleasure of viewing Valiant, Happily N’Ever After or Space Chimps 2: Zartog Strikes Back….

Sorry. When I typed that last one I felt an ice-cold shudder and had to go check that all the doors and windows are locked. Anyway, Vanguard is at the rearguard of modern American animation and was founded by John H. Williams who is, as the DVD cover is quick to remind us, one of the primates who brought us Shrek. And I have one question. What the hell is Shrek? Shrek? Sounds like an Eastern European currency. Boris bought a red cabbage and a bottle of vodka for three shrek.

Highest grossing animated film of all time you say? No, doesn’t ring a bell.

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“Could you please pull over? I think I’m going to be sick.”

Captain America is old school. Real old school. One of the very earliest generation of superheroes who has managed to remain not only relevant but arguably more popular than ever…

Hello?

Where is everyone?

“C’mon guys, we got a review to do!”

“Fuck you, mazerunner!”

“WHOAH! DUDE!”

“We don’t review movies on 1st April. We told you this.”

“We don’t review movies on April 1st. We told you this.”

“Yeah dawg, this mo-fawkin day is like your personal “Friday 13th done knocked up Halloween and this here’s there ugly-ass day baby.” day”

“We all know what’s going to happen. Horned King or BluCatt or one of the bajillion evil dudes you’ve managed to piss off will make you review something terrible and who suffers?”

“Me?”

“US! So I refer you my previous “Fuck you mazerunner!” Good day!”

“Guys…”

“I said “good day” sir!”

Guys c’mon. That was the old Mouse. This blog has become a lot more serious since I started reviewing Marvel movies. As the movies have become more mature, I say, so too has Mouse. Look, today’s movie is Captain America: The Original Avenger. It’s a great film, nothing bad’s going to…

“Don’t you mean “first” Avenger?”

“No, look, it says here right on the cover…”

Wait. That’s not Chris Evans and his boyish blue eyes that would melt your heart.

Oh no.

“Mouse. Sit down. Our game is about to begin.”

“Katzenberg?”

“Please. Please. Red Skull is fine. I have come to collect on that favour you owe me.”

“I owe you a favour?”

“Of course. I allowed you to review How to Train Your Dragon and now you must do something for me. You must review 1990’s Captain America, one of the worst Marvel movies ever made!”

“Shock! Gasp! That thing you said would never happen happened!”

“Skull. You forget who you’re talking to. I’ve reviewed Foodfight. Your ninties Golan-Globus schlock has no power over me.”

“Skull. You forget who you’re talking to. I’ve reviewed Foodfight. Your nineties Golan-Globus schlock has no power over me.”

“Then come. And let us see if this snark of yours is stronger than my hate.”

So I hope no one will object if I skip the historical overview and earnest analysis of Captain America as a character until the next review? When I review a Captain America movie that wasn’t assembled by meth-addicted gibbons? Brilliant, let’s crack on.

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Saving Mr Banks (2013)

(DISCLAIMER: This blog is not for profit. All images and footage used below are property of their respective companies unless stated otherwise. I do not claim ownership of this material. New to the blog? Start at the start with Snow White.)

Previously on Unshaved Mouse: After learning that he’d been secretly manipulated into destroying the career of Don Bluth, Mouse swore revenge against his former mentor Walt Disney, promising to review “The Worst Disney Movie”. However, it seemed that the two had finally buried the hatchet after Mouse reviewed Big Hero 6 i~~n an attempt to boost his flagging page views~~ just ‘cos. But then, Walt was kidnapped by Mouse’s entire rogue’s gallery who it turned out had been led by none other than…Mouse.

Now read on.

“You’re kidding. Saving Mr Banks? That’s your pick for worst Disney movie?”

“Yup.”

“Not one of the straight to video sequels? Not the High School Musical movies?”

“Nope.”

“Not the one where we literally threw tiny lemmings off a cliff to their deaths?”

“Pff. Lemmings. Who cares? Buncha racists.”

“FUCK YOU, MAZERUNNER!”

“Saving Mr Banks was a critical darling! It grossed over a hundred million dollars! How can it possibly be the worst Disney movie?”

“Well, “worst” can have very different meanings.”

Pamela Lyndon Travers, born Helen Lyndon Goff was a remarkable woman who led a remarkable life. At various times a Shakespearean actor, a scholar of Native American cultures, a propagandist during the second world war, a member of the literati who rubbed shoulders with the likes of AE and WB Yeats and the creator of Mary Poppins, one of the most popular children’s characters in English language literature. She was also, by most accounts, a bit of a pill. In fact, it’s been said that she died “loving no one, and loved by no one.” Who said that? Her own grandchildren. Yikes.

A question I got asked a lot after my review of Mary Poppins was whether I had read any of the original books and the answer was “No.” I have since had a chance to rectify that, or at least, I’ve managed to read the first book, the one that the 1964 film was based on. In my opinion it’s a charmingly written, often very witty book that’s let down by a somewhat ramshackle episodic structure and the fact that the main character is WORSE THAN HITLER.

Sorry, I know a lot of people love these books and prefer the literary version of Mary Poppins but oh my God, no. No, no, no, no, no, She is awful. Vain, mean, borderline emotionally abusive, contemptuous of everything and everyone, snobbish, nakedly hostile to anyone who is not on their knees kissing her very shoes and she sniffs. Constantly. “Mary Poppins sniffed…” it was like a goddamn tic. By the end of the book I was like…

And today’s movie, Saving Mr Banks, is about how that book and its fairly unlikable author and its deeply unpleasant main character were somehow corralled into making one of my favourite movies by one of my favourite film-makers. You could not engineer a safer audience for this movie than me. So how badly do you think they had to fuck it up for me to hate this movie, to hate the Disney corporation that made it and even for a little of that hate to wipe off on my memories of the original film? How hard do you have to try to fail that badly?

Let’s take a look.

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Captain Planet and the Planeteers: If it’s Doomsday, this must be Belfast

Reality, as Stephen Colbert once patiently explained to George W. Bush, has a well-known liberal bias. The flipside of that is that fiction tends to be conservative. In a typical narrative there are good guys, there are bad guys, and there are few problems caused by the latter that can’t be solved by the former punching them repeatedly in the goolies. In the real world the big problems that bedevil mankind tend to be big, messy and complex and fixing them is an absolute slog with no clear-cut right or wrong and often very little visible sign of victory or even progress.

Take, for example, the question of how to best leverage the advances of industrialisation to improve the standard of life for the maximum number of human beings without causing irreparable damage to the bio-sphere and rendering the entire planet and uninhabitable hellscape? That’s a bit of a poser. And how would you dramatise that question, particularly for a young audience? Say, for example, in a thirty minute animated series running for over a hundred episodes?

To create a cartoon show that deals with this problem maturely and intelligently while still working as a compelling and dramatic piece of entertainment would take something close to genius.

Yes. That is what it would take.

So around 1990 millionaire Ted Turner decided to create a cartoon show about heroes who took on the issues of environmental devastation and social injustice instead of doing stuff that was fun. It was called Captain Planet and the Planeteers and the premise was this: Gaia (Whoopi Goldberg), the spirit of the Earth, wakes up from a long nap and sees that human beings have been trashing the place for the last thousand years or so (well, maybe if you had actually been around to tell us to knock it off we would have known better, lady). Despite the fact that she was asleep at the switch and this is kinda her mess to clean up as much as anyone’s, she enlists five teenagers with ~~attitude~~ respect for nature and all its living things. They are Kwame (Levar Burton) from Africa, Wheeler (Joey DeDedio) from North America, Linka (Kath Soucie) from the Sovie…I’m sorry, EASTERN EUROPE, Gi (Janice Kawaye) from Asia and Ma-Ti (Scott Menville) from Latin America. She gives them five elemental rings with Kwame, Wheeler, Linka and Gi getting the powers of Earth, Fire, Wind and Water and Ma-Ti getting stuck with the power of Heart because poor Latin America is always the pathetic butt monkey.

“It’s true.”

Whenever they’re faced with a threat they can’t defeat alone they ~~summon the Zords~~ combine their power to summon Captain Planet. Who has a green mullet.

Now, as a premise it’s not…terrible. And on paper the show had a lot going for it. The animation was better than a lot of Saturday morning fare of the time and the cast was RIDICULOUSLY high-powered thanks to Turner roping in his Hollywood friends to voice the various villains including Martin Sheen and Meg Ryan back when she was probably the most successful Hollywood actress on the planet. But it also had problems, not least of which was the fact that Captain Planet is, no question, the worst superhero ever to achieve mainstream success.

Why was he so terrible? Was it the puns? The awful puns? The terrible, excruciating, abominable puns? The puns that made you want to curse God for giving you ears? The puns that made you smell colours, taste sounds and gibber in unknown tongues? The puns that made you want to tear off your skin and fold it into a little swan? The puns that made you head to the nearest clock tower with a high-powered rifle and start picking off the fleeing figures below while muttering “There’s Captain Planet. There’s Captain Planet…”?

No, it wasn’t the puns.

I first realised the utter crapitude of Captain Planet as a child, when I watched the episode “A Good Bomb is Hard to Find” where the Planeteers travel back in time to prevent Doctor Blight from selling a nuclear bomb to Hitler.

“Hey boss, how can we make sure people know it’s supposed to be Hitler?” “Hitler had a moustache, didn’t he?” “Yeah.” “Give him a moustache. That way they’ll know.”

Captain Planet comes face to face with Hitler and immediately curls up in a little ball because the hatred coming off him is so strong that it’s a form of pollution. It was at this point that I stood up, pointed an accusing paw at the TV and loudly declared:

“NO! NO! A superhero who comes face to face with Adolf Hitler and does not punch him right in his stupid face is not a superhero! Good day sir!”

“But what we’re trying to show is that prejudice can…”

“I SAID “GOOD DAY” SIR!”

Think about that for a minute. They created a superhero whose kryptonite is evil. Captain America is one of the greatest superheroes ever because in his very first appearance he punched Hitler right in the face. He didn’t collapse weeping in a puddle because HITLER DIDN’T COME WITH A GODDAMN TRIGGER WARNING!

Warning for: Hatred. Genocide. Inaccurate moustache.

As notorious as that episode is, there’s one that (in my neck of the woods at least) is even more infamous; “If it’s Doomsday, this must be Belfast”, better known here as “The one where the IRA got a nuclear bomb.”

I have never actually seen this one but this thing is legendary in Ireland. I have, no lie, been waiting to do this review all year. I have a feeling this is going to be the greatest experience of my life.

Let’s take a look.

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The Fantastic Four (1994)

Sometimes, a movie comes along that is so notorious, so terrible, so gosh-fucked appalling that no one reviewer may safely tackle it alone. To that end, Unshaved Mouse has teamed up with the illustrious NewtCave and Erik Copper to review the never-released Roger Corman-produced superhero movie; The Fantastic Four.

UM: Hi guys and welcome to Unshaved Mouse. Make yourselves comfortable, don’t touch the continents. They bite.

“Hssssssssssss!”

UM: So. Erik. Newt. What the fuck did we just watch?

EC: I was under the impression that we were just witness to the birth of the anti-christ of comic book movies.

NC: Pretty much. This thing gets my vote for “Worst Marvel Film.” Including Howard the Duck.

UM: Was it though? I mean, can’t we grade of a curve? There were extenuating circumstances here.

NC: Fair point, furry one. But let me put it this way. Elektra? Released in theatres. Hulk? Released in theatres. Howard the Duck? For some reason, still released in theatres. Roger Corman’s Fantastic Four? Kept secret. Kept safe.

EC: Gandalf’s wise words were still not strong enough to keep this mess off of the internet, though. Because as we all know, technology is the MOST powerful of the dark arts.

UM: Speaking of dark arts, Erik, aren’t you supposed to be dead?

EC: Huh?

UM: Yeah. I totally fed you to a shark at the end of our last review.

EC: Oh yeah. Dick! That was the single most tortorous experience of my life! I had to chew my way out of the shark’s stomach! I still have nightmares! I

UM: Heh.

EC: It’s not funny!

UM: It was funny to everyone who wasn’t you. Which, y’know, was the entire human race. Needs of the many, Erik.

NC: Should I step outside while you two work through your prior history?

UM: Nah baby, we cool. Let’s get started. Newt, as our resident Marvel buff, what can you tell us about the good ol’ Fantastic Four?

NC: Probably more than is either necessary or interesting. But, limiting myself to relevant information, the Fantastic Four have often been referred to as “Marvel’s First Family.” and that’s only because that’s exactly what they are. Back in the ancient past of 1961, Stan Lee took it upon himself to create a team of superheroes like none that had come before. Instead of a bunch of square-jawed Super Friends, he elected to make a team that was more like a family trying to make the best of a bad situation.

UM: With Square Jaws.

EC: Rather rubbery and slightly malleable jaws, too.

NC: When The Fantastic Four #1 hit newsstands, they didn’t even have costumes or secret identities. They were all about breaking the norms of what people had come to expect from the superhero genre.

UM: I think the FF was really the big bang of the modern Marvel universe. So many of the characters and concepts that make up that world got their start in the pages of Fantastic Four. Doctor Doom, Black Panther, the Inhumans, the Skrulls, the Kree, the list just goes on and on.

NC: Exactly. The company wasn’t even called “Marvel” before the FF came along. Anything before that was published under the not-so-timeless brand of “Timely.”

EC: It was incredible how fast the superhero boom took off. Most of the heroes we know today didn’t even start off as anything other than one-off stories that were just too popular to remain that way. Spider-Man? He first appeared in Amazing Fantasy #15. Thor? He was first introduced in Journey into Mystery. Iron Man? Tales of Suspense. These heroes didn’t start off timeless, but they slowly captured our hearts. The Fantastic Four is no different.

UM: Which is kind of why it’s so sickening how Marvel are treating this title now, basically sweeping it under the rug because they can’t get the movie rights back from Fox.

NC: Well, to be fair, they’re doing that with ALL the properties they haven’t regained the movie rights to, which seems a bit like dirty pool to me.

UM: I dunno dude. The day I see Wolverine and Spidey at the dole office maybe. It seems like the Fantastic Four have gotten it worse than anyone.

EC: I don’t even know who’s side to be on. Fox is being a child not willing to share its toy, and Marvel is being a child throwing a tantrum because they want that toy SO VERY BAD.

NC: It’s a crappy situation, and I think everybody involved lost. I mean, I know we’re supposed to reserve judgement on Fant-four-stic… but yeah. ‘Nuff said, am I right?

UM: I will lay good money on it being the best Fantastic Four film ever.

EC: I will lay good money on it being an attempt. And that’s about all I can give it.

NC: I will lay good money on the team being rebooted with the SAME DAMN STORY enough times that the filmmakers all throw their hands in the air and finally adapt Neil Gaiman’s Marvel 1602.

UM: Ah, the Fantastick Four!

EC: Yes, and Peter Parquagh! (GOD WHY?!)

UM: Okay, but what about today’s movie? If I may?

NC: Go right ahead.

UM: I thank ye. So, back before Marvel decided to stop letting other companies fuck up their characters and just do it right themselves, they sold the movie rights to the Fantastic Four for a song and a wink to a German producer named Bernd Eichinger. Eichinger had a limited amount of time to make the movie or else the rights would revert to Marvel so, when he couldn’t get the money in time, he teamed up with legendary cheapo movie-maker Roger Corman to make a superhero movie in three weeks with $1 million. The resulting…thing…was never meant to be seen by human eyes. It was solely created to allow the company to hold on to the movie rights. Thankfully, such shady business practices would never occur in Hollywood today.

Ha! It's a joke! Because it happens all the damn time!

Now how did that get there?

UM: So, just how bad can it be?

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Asterix in Britain (1986)

TINTIN CAN SUCK A DICK!

Sorry! Sorry! That was uncalled for. I apologise unreservedly. Old habits just die hard. See, when I was growing up, every public library in Ireland had a well stocked collection of both Asterix books and Tintin books (because this is the greatest damn country on Earth). And pretty much every playground was divided, Sharks and Jets style, between Tintin fans and those of us who felt that the tales of a group of superpowered Celtic warriors battling against the most powerful empire on earth might be a tad more compelling than the adventures of LITERALLY THE MOST GENERIC MAIN CHARACTER IN ALL OF FICTION…

Sorry. Sorry. Sorry.

I apologise to all fans of Tintin and Hergé and his wonderfully crisp ligne claire style. Some wars are still being fought long after they say “We have peace.”

I acually love the Tintin books, I just wish Herge had wised up and renamed them “The Adventures of Captain Haddock and his ginger sober companion.”

Okay. So. Asterix. When I announced two weeks ago that I’d be reviewing an Asterix movie the response was predictable mix of “Yay Asterix!” from my non-American readers and a big “who’s the blonde midget Viking?” from my American readers so now’s probably a good time to explain who and what Asterix is.

Hey, I know which side my blog is buttered.

So Asterix is a Franco-Belgian comic that is still going since its first appearence in 1959 but was originally created by René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo. The setup is this; it’s 50 BC and Rome has conquered all of Gaul (modern day France). All? Not quite. A tiny village of indomitable Gauls stills holds out against the Roman invaders thanks to a magic potion brewed by their druid, Getafix, that gives the Gauls superhuman strength. The heroes of these stories are Asterix, the blonde short-arse, and his buddy Obelix, who was dropped in a cauldron of magic potion as a baby and so is just superhumanly strong all the time (why the Gauls don’t just do this with all their babies is never explained). The main gag is not entirely dissimilar to that of the Flintstones, the past and present are pretty much exactly the same. The series draws its humour from many sources; slapstick, political satire, puns (as in, every single character’s name is some kind of play on words) and especially from affectionate riffs on European cultural stereotypes (the Goths are always punctual, the Greeks have flat noses like figures on urns etc). Despite the basic premise being “French people make fun of foreigners” the series is hugely popular, not only in its native France but everywhere in Europe from Malta to Finland.

“I literally could not give two fucks about…holy shit, ASTERIX!? I love that guy!”

Asterix is also huge in Latin America, India and even China. How popular is he? Goscinny and Uderzo have sold more books worldwide than any other French author. That’s right. More than Victor Hugo. More than Balzac. More than Dumas.

Well, its not like DArtagnan has his own theme park, does he?

Well, D’Artagnan doesn’t have his own theme park, does he?

So why are these books so popular? Well firstly, they’re just really, really good. Seriously. The artwork is beautiful, the character designs are Disney good in terms of being expressive, appealing and versatile and they’re goddamn hilarious. Also, the Asterix series have been blessed with legendarily good translators (the series has been adapted into over 100 languages). And yet Asterix has never really found much purchase in the United States. Why is that? Culture gap, partially. A joke about how Corsicans are constantly swearing vendetta would probably prompt some head-scratching on the other side of the Atlantic.

“You’ve made an enemy today, Mouse.”

“Oh, get in line.”

But mostly I think it was just due to bad timing. To get a foothold in the United States comic market Asterix would have needed to become popular in the fifties, before the Silver Age began and American comics just became SUPER HEROES SUPER HEROES SUPER HEROES SUPER HEROES FROM NOW UNTIL THE END OF TIME. The distributors for European comics just weren’t there and so Asterix missed his shot unfortunately. Oh well. Fear not Americans. It may be tricky for you to track down copies of his books but you can still watch one of the many fine animated adaptations of Asterix books that have been made over the years HAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAHAHAAAAAA …*collapses into a weeping pile.*

Oh Christ.

There have been nine (NINE!) animated Asterix movies and four live-action movies (all starring Gerard Depardieu as Obelix).

My God man. You were in Jean De Florette.

Now, I haven’t seen all of the animated movies. But I have seen a LOT of them. And they can be broken down into four categories;

1) The ones with terrible animation,

2) The ones with terrible voice acting,

3) The ones with terrible animation and voice acting.

4) The ones with ALL THREE.

But honestly I think that even with top-notch talent in every area it would be damn hard to make a good Asterix movie that still resembled the original in any meaningful way. The comedy just doesn’t…work when you translate it to film. The timing is always off, it just doesn’t translate well (which is ironic, since Asterix is one of the most successful examples of translating comedy in human history). Today’s movie is Asterix in Britain, an adaptation of the eighth Asterix book and one of my personal favourites, firstly because it’s just classic Asterix and also because it included this guy:

His name is O’veroptimistix. He was the only Irish character to ever appear in these books. He had one line, that included the word “Begorrah”. And I loved him.

So. Will the movie be a one, a two, a three or a four? Let’s find out.

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A Troll in Central Park (1994)

(DISCLAIMER: All images and footage used below are property of their respective companies unless stated otherwise. I do not claim ownership of this material. New to the blog? Start at the start with Snow White.)

Previously on Unshaved Mouse: After months of ominous threats and warnings, Mouse finally came face to face with his most determined enemy yet; the mysterious, lethal, Blucatt. Blucatt brutally murdered Gangsta Asia and then revealed himself to be none other than legendary animator Don Bluth, who accused Mouse of destroying him as an animator, a charge which Mouse shockingly did not deny…

“…and another reason why Emperor’s New Groove is the third most under-rated Disney movie…”

“SHUT. UP. Shut up. You’ve been stalling for two weeks. Now tell everyone why it’s your fault that my movies suck.”

Alright. Alright. I knew this day would come. I’ve talked about Don Bluth on this blog before, mostly in the American Tail review and in passing when I covered The Fox and the Hound. But now it’s time to talk about Bluth’s legacy as an animator and how that legacy was destroyed by many factors.

“By you.”

“By many factors of which I was one.”

“Funny, I don’t really remember there being that many factors.”

Okay, animation history time. Don Bluth split from Disney halfway through production of The Fox and the Hound, taking a good chunk of the Disney animation team with him.

He told them they were going to pick apples. They never got to pick apples.

Now this group was known as Don Bluth Productions (and then later on as the Bluth Group) and in 1982 they released Bluth’s first directorial feature, the now legendary Secret of NIMH. NIMH had critics slavering all over it but died at the box-office as it only had a limited release and was released during one of the best years in history for genre movies.

There is no shame in losing to ET.

In fact, between ET walloping NIMH at the box-office and an industry wide animators-strike, Bluth had to declare bankruptcy. NIMH was therefore a once-off. Don Bluth Productions did not release any other feature length animations; the rest of their output during this period was stuff for TV like Banjo The Woodpile Cat (no, I’m not reviewing it. I’m done with cartoon cats for a good long while), the computer games Dragon’s Lair and Space Ace and animated sequences for the movie Xanadu. Most of what people consider “Don Bluth movies” were actually made by a company called Sullivan Bluth. Well, you all know who Bluth is, who the fruck was Sullivan? Sit down and I’ll learn ya.

By 1983 Bluth had managed to turn things around thanks largely to the phenomenal success of Dragon’s Lair and Space Ace.Sure, they played like mules on Quaaludes but those games looked a good two decades ahead of anything else on the market. But then, the video game market imploded in late ’83/early ’84 thanks in no small part to the white-hot grease fire of pure failure that was the Atari tie-licence game of…ET.

Man, Don Bluth must have hated that alien so much.

“He’s next on my list”

This left Bluth bankrupt again and it’s at about this point in the story that Sullivan enters the picture. Morris Sullivan was an Irish-American businessman who was also an avid cartoon nut who decided to invest in Bluth. To bring down costs and also to avoid the kind of industrial disputes that had plagued NIMH (and were also causing trouble for the early production of An American Tail) Sullivan convinced Bluth to move the newly formed Sullivan Bluth Studios to Dublin, Ireland*. This was pretty much the big bang for Irish animation, and the impact is still being felt to this day. Bluth set up an animation course at Ballyfermot Senior College that trained a whole generation of Irish animators. Nor was Bluth by any means the only animation company that set up shop here to take advantage of generous government support and an underemployed, English speaking workforce desperate for wages to pay the landlords and their thrice cursed gombeens.

The Bluth Animators circa 1989.

They were daycent, hardworking animators. Quick with their fists, and quicker with their brushes. Why, you might even have heard of some of the movies and TV shows they created…

Remember this little thing? Rather popular at the time if you can believe it.

So, what’s all this got to do with little ol’ Mouse? Well, Sullivan Bluth employed hundreds of Irish people and one of those was my aunt**. So I guess you could say I had a very personal relationship with these movies growing up. I was able to hold the original cels from An American Tail and Land Before Time that my aunt kept around the house. I was at the European premiere of An American Tailin Dublin with my massive plushy Fievel Mousekewitz and wearing a Sullivan Bluth An American Tail kid’s T-shirt.

Mouse. Pre…mouse.

I saw all of Don Bluth’s movies. And the weird thing about that is I saw them even though they all TERRIFIED THE SHIT OUT OF ME LIKE RIGHT OUT SHIT EVERYWHERE.

I mean, I’ve already told you what a nervous child I was.

“I believe the term is “snivelling coward”.”

So how do you think I handled this?

These movies were not fun for me! They were endurance tests! Which is why…

Oh boy…

Okay, so…you’ve all heard of Rock A Doodle? You know the bits at the beginning in live action with the little blonde kid who makes Jake Lloyd look like Laurence Olivier? What you probably don’t know is that originally that movie was going to be all-animation. So, like when they brought deer and lions into the studio at Disney when they were making Bambi and Lion King, Don Bluth had a load of kids brought into the studio to run around and tumble and generally act like little idiots so that the animators could get an idea of how kids walk and run and act like little idiots.

And…I was one of those little idiots...

And it was during this child-zoo that I found myself face to face with Don Bluth. And I told him his movies were too scary.

Now, you gotta understand, by then the Disney renaissance had started and Bluth had just been pummelled by Oliver and Company and The Little Mermaid. Things were looking grim and I can only imagine that Bluth was trying desperately to figure out a way to get back in the lead. Something, anything. And here’s a member of his target audience telling him to his face that his movies are just too damn scary.

Shortly after that, pre-production started on Thumbelina.

Guys, I’m sorry.

I am so, so sorry.

“After that everything fell apart. My movies became saccharine dreck. It was like I was cursed. That’s when the Horned King approached me. He offered to give me a world where I could rule for all time and all I had to do was slowly torture you for all eternity. It was win win. Win fucking win. But you couldn’t even let me have that, could you? You had to escape and ruin everything.””

“Look Don, I don’t know what to say. I was a stupid kid. I didn’’t know what I was talking about.”

“Alright. Well, the important thing is that you learned your lesson. Bye.”

“Really, that’s it?”

““HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA…no. No, revenge will be mine. You’re going to review A Troll in Central Park.”

“Never heard of it.””

“Stanley’s Magic Garden.”

“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO…”

(more…)

Felidae (1994)

“Let me in you oversized landmass! I have to talk to Mouse!”

"Not happenin' man. I'm handlin' Mouse's security. And until we know who this Blucatt guy is no one sees Mouse. Got it?"

“Not happenin’, man. I’m handlin’ his security. And until we know who this Blucatt guy is no one sees Mouse. Got it?”

“But that’s why I need to see him! I know who Blucatt is!”

“So spill. Who is he?”

“I can’t tell you. I have to tell Mouse in person. He has to know why I…”

“Why you WHAT, Moustache Man?”

“Forget it. Just…give him this note.”

“Aiight. But I won’t have a chance to until he finishes reviewing Felidae.”

***

Guys…I…I think I may be going crazy.

I mean, really, I think I might be starting to lose it. First there were all those weird messages appearing, and then this whole stuff with Blucatt and then suddenly there’s Foodfight! fanfiction appearing on my blog (who would even do something like that?)…

I’m starting to feel my hold on reality loosening and I don’t think it can be entirely explained away by the fact that Class A drugs were briefly legal in my country. Which brings me to today’s movie; Felidae. I knew next to nothing about this movie going in but my research seemed encouraging. Most expensive animated film ever to come out of Germany, based on one of the best selling German novels of all time. Large cult following, 7.9 rating on IMdB, 85% viewer approval on Rotten Tomatoes (though no reviews from professional critics). The consensus seems to be that this was a dark, engaging film noir murder mystery with cats. Okay, sounds cool. I can dig it.

And then I watched it.

What. The. Close. Up. Mouth. Whore. FUCK?

People like this? People? Actual people?

Because I can honestly say, without a hint of hyperbole, that I have never reviewed a movie for this blog that I hated more than this one. No. Not even Home on the Range. Not even Dinosaur. Not. Even. Foodfight!

Now I know what you’re thinking. “Mouse. You’ve lost it. You’ve gone nuts…”

Yes, did you not read the first lines of this review?

“Shut up and let me finish. You gave Foodfight! 0%. Zero. The big goose-egg. How can this possibly be worse than that?”

Well I didn’t say it was worse. I said I hated it more. Foodfight is just total, utter failure on every level. Felidae is not like that. There is a base line of competence that it never goes below. But…that actually makes it more unpleasant. Because they succeed in what they set out to do. It’s relentlessly, repulsively nasty and it’s good at it.

It sets out to appall you and it succeeds.

How bad is it?

Let’s take a look. But you won’t thank me.

(more…)

Space Jam (1996)

So I have a confession to make.

For the longest time, I thought it was “Looney Toons” and not “Looney Tunes”.

Alright fine, but in my defence it makes sense, right? I mean, they’re cartoons. Why would they be called “Tunes”?

Well, why indeed.

The reason the early series of cartoon shorts have names like “Looney Tunes”, “Merrie Melodies” and “Silly Symphonies” is because that’s what they were selling. Film studios like Warner Brothers did a tidy side business off their movie soundtracks by selling phonograph records and sheet music for playin’ on the ol’ pianey.

The idea was, you go to a movie and see, say, I Love to Singa’, and say to yourself “smartass owl thinks he’s so big, I could do that.” and before you know it you’ve gone down to the local music shop and blown the money you were saving in case you got tuberculosis (spoiler, you got tuberculosis). The unpleasant truth that I’m tip-toeing around here is that the Looney Tunes were, at least in their early days, basically advertisements.

Ergo, if you hate Space Jam because you don’t like to see your favourite characters schilling, I got bad news for you friends; They were schilling when your grandparents were throwing toys out of the pram.

(more…)