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Director: Brian Fee
Release date: March 28, 2017
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Cars’ was the first Pixar film after Toy Story to get a sequel in 2011. Unfortunately, ‘Cars 2’ was as much as a digression from the original narrative as it was disappointing. With ‘Cars 3’ the studio returned to the original source material, once again focusing on Lightning McQueen.
The film takes a brave step in showing the effects of getting older and realizing that you’re not young anymore, and thus is a film more appealing to parents than to youngsters. The whole idea of characters getting older is a bold one in animation land, and the film does a good job in the depiction of passing the torch from one generation to a new one.
Unfortunately, Lightning McQueen never was a wholly sympathetic character, and he certainly isn’t in this film. When his reign on the racetrack is threatened by a new generation of rookies, he desperately tries to stay in place. But his reckless and selfish behavior leads to disaster, and when he’s offered a training program, he’s too impatient and too self-centered to follow the rules, wrecking some expensive equipment and putting his younger trainer into danger.
In fact, this trainer, the female car Cruz Ramirez (wonderfully voiced by Cristela Alonzo), by far is the most interesting character of the movie. She’s apparently from a humbler background and shows McQueen that some people must struggle hard to achieve the confidence and success he took for granted. But the film is not her story, and this important message is pushed aside by McQueen’s struggle with his own ageing and mortality.
In this, the film relies heavily on McQueen’s relation to his own mentor, Doc Hudson. This character was voiced by Paul Newman, who passed away in 2008, so his dialogue comes from unused recordings for the first film. This mentor-theme is pushed rather forcefully and heavy-handedly into the story, with a series of flashbacks in which McQueen realizes how he has mistreated Cruz as a low point of stating the obvious.
Moreover, for a large part the film blindly follows the rules of the sports film, with an unlikely outsider winning from the established and unsympathetic competitor thanks to an unconventional training scheme. This training part, under the auspices of Smokey, Doc Hudson’s former partner, is by far the weakest part of the film. This cliché path fills most of the second part of the film, hampering a story that could have been more daring and more original.
The characters from the first film are hardly present in ‘Cars 3’. Even Mater’s role is surprisingly modest, considering he was the leading character of ‘Cars 2’. Especially disappointing is the role of Sally, McQueen’s girlfriend. In fact, McQueen hardly behaves as if he were in a relationship, at all. There’s no conflict at all between him and Sally when he goes training at the other side of the continent, nor when he sees the younger woman Cruz more than he sees her. This somehow feels like a missed opportunity.
Meanwhile, the effect animation, the background art, the scene setting, and lighting are all of the highest quality. The world building of ‘Cars 3’ feels so effortlessly, one can focus on the characters and forget how well it is done. In fact, the character animation of the cars themselves remain the weakest element of the animation, as the car-living-being-combination remains a bit uncanny and unconvincing, with those large continuous eyes filling the front window, and those odd mouths in the bumper regions.
‘Cars 3’ pleasantly rounds up McQueen’s story, from an all too hasty rookie in ‘Cars’ to a veteran who realizes his days are over, but who manages to pass his knowledge to a new generation. I certainly hope Pixar does not make the same mistake as with ‘Toy Story’ and leaves the franchise with a perfect ending after three films.
Watch the trailer for ‘Cars 3’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Directors: Ivan Ivanov-Vano & Yuri Norstein
Release date: 1971
Rating: ★★★
Review:
Veteran director Ivan Ivanov-Vano and young and up-and-coming talent Yuri Norstein co-direct the rather enigmatic ‘The Battle of Kerzhenets’.
Set to music by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov (excerpts from his opera ‘the Invisible City of Kitezh’), the film tells of a legendary epic battle of a Russian army against an invading army of Mongols, and of its aftermath. The film consists of three parts: in the first we watch the soldiers saying goodbye to their wives and children, the second depicts the battle itself, and the third part shows how life continues, with images of farmers sowing and harvesting and of children playing.
The short stops quite abruptly, and it’s quite unclear what the duo wanted to tell with their film. Nevertheless, the film is a marvel to watch. As the directors state themselves in the opening of the film, the visuals are based on Russian icons and frescos of the 14th to 16th century, and these give the short its unique style.
The cut-out animation is fair, and more emblematic than realistic, but the real treat lies in the way the two directors filmed their short. For a film about a battle, the filming is remarkably poetic: the images often flow into each other by the use of dissolves into black and back, and there’s a lot of soft focus on the images, creating a magical distance. In fact, the images are mesmerizing throughout the picture, and clearly look forward to Norstein’s individual poetic style.
Watch ‘The Battle of Kerzhenets’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘The Battle of Kerzhenets’ is available on the DVD ‘Masters of Russian Animation Volume 2’
Director: Julian Antonisz
Release date: 1970
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘How Is That…?’ is another children’s film by Julian Antonisz and this film is made in the same vein as ‘How Learning Came Back tothe Woods’. This time a little girl tells us how television works.
Antonisz again illustrates the narration with very rough designs, and cut-out animation of household objects on top of a light table. For examples, the people wear real glasses, and some nature is suggested by real flowers and plants.
‘How Is That…’ is not too serious. At several points things go wrong, and a ‘Please Stand By’ sign is shown. The result is a very original and delightful little avant-garde film for children.
Watch ‘How Is That…?’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘How Is That…?’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Anthology of Polish Children’s Animation’
Director: Ryszard Czekała
Release date: 1970
Rating: ★★★
Review:
In ‘Syn’ (The Son) an old couple at the countryside wait for their son, who has gone off to lead a different life in the city. But when he arrives at his parental home, his visit turns out to be a deception.
‘Syn’ shows Ryszard Czekała’s original style: the film is in black and white, and features a very original cinematography: altering extreme close-ups of hands, ears and such with strange depictions of the barren wintery landscape, with the ground filling up almost the complete frame.
The story is told without dialogue, and because of Czekała’s extreme graphical style, rather hard to follow. Most striking is the sound design, which arguably is as important as the imagery. The result is a puzzling, but quite unsettling and bleak short.
Watch ‘The Son’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘The Son’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Anthology of Polish Animation’
Director: Gary Rydstrom
Release date: June 24, 2011
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Hawaiian Vacation’ is the first of three ‘Toy Story Toons’ produced in 2011 and 2012. The short opened for ‘Cars 2‘ and is set in Bonnie’s house after the events of ‘Toy Story 3’.
The film opens on a wintery day with Bonnie’s family going on a vacation to Hawaii. Ken and Barbie have been hiding in her rucksack as stowaways, for Ken has decided he will give Barbie her first kiss on the tropical island. Unfortunately, they’ve been hiding in Bonnie’s school rucksack, which remains at home, but Woody and the other toys have an idea.
‘Hawaiian Vacation’ relies a lot, and maybe too much on the familiar tropes of all the Toy Story characters. The idea of friends helping out a friend distress is charming, but I wonder whether Ken and Barbie were the best choice as the film’s main protagonists. Oh well, it accounts for six minutes of unpretentious fun.
Watch an excerpt from ‘Hawaiian Vacation’ and tell me what you think:
‘Hawaiian Vacation’ is available on the Blu-Ray/DVD of ‘Cars 2’ and on the Blu-Ray/DVD ‘Pixar Short Films Collection Volume 2’
Director: Oh Sung-Yoon
Release date: July 28, 2011
Rating: ★★★
Review:
I once grabbed a copy of this film from a Tesco’s in Northern Ireland because it looked visually interesting. But I must be one of the very few people who have seen this movie: the film remains totally obscure: I’ve never encountered this feature on any animation festival, review site or such, and it’s not even getting 1000 viewers on the IMDb. This film certainly deserves better, as we shall see below.
‘Daisy, a Hen into the Wild’ turns out to be a Korean film: it was made by Lotte Entertainment and Myung Films, both based in South Korea, and indeed the film’s visuals are a strange mix of Western and Eastern tropes. Especially the character designs are a mixed bag, with some animals looking very Disneyesque (e.g., the little Duckling), others genuinely Asian (e.g., the barnyard ducks and the otter mayor). Most ridiculous is the heroic gander Wilson, who’s a strange combination of a duck and a handsome anime hero, with a waving hairdo.
Nevertheless, ‘Daisy a Hen into the Wild’ is a very attractive film to look at. The coloring is bold and glowing, with bright oranges and greens popping from the screen. Moreover, all characters have an airbrushed coloring, rendering them soft and rich in color. Even better is the background art, which consist of soft, poetical story book-like painting, unlike anything you’ll encounter in either American or Japanese cinema. In fact, the background painting style reminded me most of Jimmy Murakami’s films based on Raymond Briggs’s stories. Some of this background art is extraordinarily beautiful and a real feast to the eye. The animation is of a high level, too, if not too outstanding, often strangely blending naturalism with both Disneyesque character animation and Japanese anime animation styles. There’s a splash of functional computer animation, most interesting when showing moving sceneries.
The story is very surprising, too, and unlike any American animation film. The story takes place within one year, and tells about Daisy, one of countless hens in a battery cage. Daisy’s clearly pining away in this depressing environment. At the start of the movie, she looks sickly and sad, and yearning for the outside world, especially that of some prime fowl that can walk the barnyard freely. At one point she plays dead to escape. The escape succeeds, but if you’d think this would be a film on freedom, you’re mistaken.
It soon becomes clear the loud and naïve Daisy is ill-suited for the outside world. The barnyard fowl expels her and there’s a one-eyed weasel roaming about. Luckily, the gander Wilson helps her, as does the otter, mayor of a large pond, even though the waterfowl despise the newcomer, too. Then things take an unexpected dramatic turn, and the Daisy’s tale becomes one of motherhood, selflessness and even sacrifice.
It’s best not to reveal too much, for this film’s story takes surprising directions up to a final twist unheard of in any animation film from the Western world. For example, Daisy faces some real limits to her possibilities in the outside world, so unlike the limitless American Dream so often depicted in American animated cinema. Even if she wanted to, she can’t be everything she wants to be, and part of the film is about making brave decisions, nonetheless. The only cliché part all too familiar to Western eyes is that of an outsider winning an important competition.
The story is surprisingly serious, and the film contains very little comic relief (only in the form of the otter and some of the barnyard fowl). The Korean makers don’t shun the cruelty of nature and show that every creature has its own very good reasons for what it does, even if it’s killing other species. And they’re able to do so in a moving tale with an attractive visual design.
In all, ‘Daisy, a Hen into the Wild’ is an original and unconventional film that deserves to be seen more. The movie shows that South Korea can have a strong own voice in the animation world, independent of either Western or Japanese animation traditions, or least blending these to a unique style of its own.
Watch the trailer for ‘Daisy, a Hen into the Wild’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Daisy, a Hen into the Wild’ is available on DVD
Director: Carlo Vogele
Release date: June 4, 2012
Rating: ★★★
Review:
A fish sings his last aria with the voice of Enrico Caruso, in a 1904 recording of the sad aria ‘una furtiva lagrima’ from Gaetano Donizetti’s opera ‘L’Elisir d’amore’. We see the fish at the fish market and on the way to his last destination: the frying pan, singing all the time.
The film is very well made and blends stop-motion with live action quite effortlessly (even though at one point some threads are visible). Unfortunately, this is a one idea film, with nothing surprising happening in the few minutes the short lasts.
Watch ‘Una furtiva lagrima’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Una furtiva lagrima’ is available on the The Animation Show of Shows Box Set 7
Directors: Amanda Forbis & Wendy Tilby
Release date: June 1, 2011
Rating: ★★★
Review:
In this short Amanda Forbis and Wendy Tilby tell about a young Englishman migrating to Alberta, Canada in 1909, where he ends in a small hut on the countryside. The young man’s letters to his father and mother paint a rosier picture than his actual circumstances deserve.
For their short Forbis and Tilby use a very attractive form of painted animation, mixed with a little traditional animation. They tell their story using “interviews” with people who knew him and with intertitles, which often rather puzzling tell us about comets.
The film is told rather tongue-in-cheek, but the story is ultimately tragic, and the film could be seen as a meditation on loneliness and failure. But it’s to the viewer to connect the loose snippets of information together in his head, for Forbis and Tilby don’t tell their story straightforward, but associatively and free flowing. The soundtrack is great, using very fitting original songs, as well as old recordings and an instrumental rendering of Gilbert & Sullivan’s big hit ‘I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major-General’.
Watch ‘Wild Life’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Wild Life’ is available on the The Animation Show of Shows Box Set 9
Director: Eric Khoo
Release Date: May 17, 2011
Rating: ★★★
Review:
The film ‘Tatsumi’ celebrates the work of Japanese manga artist Yoshihiro Tatsumi (1935-2015). Tatsumi is the inventor of the gegika manga style, a grittier, more alternative form of manga for adults. The film re-tells five of Tatsumi’s short stories in this this style, all from 1970-1972. These stories are bridged by excerpts from his drawn autobiography ‘A Drifting Life’ from 2008.
Thus, the film is completely drawn (only in the end we see the real Yoshihiro Tatsumi), but to keep the manga style intact the film was animated with Toon Boom Software, specialized in ‘animatics’, which brings story boards to life. Thus, full animation, although present, is rare, and most of the motion is rather basic, often lacking any realism of movement. The animation is enhanced by limited digital effects, and the first and last story are digitally manipulated to make the images look older.
The complete film thus is little more than slightly enhanced comic strips. One wonders if this is the best way to present Tatsumi’s work, as most probably his stories work better in their original manga form, but of course the movie is a great introduction to his work, which without doubt is fascinating and original.
Tatsumi’s manga style clearly deviates from his example, the great Osamu Tezaku. Tatsumi’s style is more raw, sketchier and knows nothing of the big eyes so common in manga. All but one story use a voice over narrator. And all but one are in the first person. The stories themselves are gritty, dark, depressing and bleak. The second story, ‘Beloved Monkey’, in which a factory worker falls in love with a girl at a zoo, is particularly bitter. The outer two take place just after the end of World War II and show the effects of Japan’s traumatic loss. All are about the losers in life, struggling at the bottom of society. As Tatsumi himself says near the end of the movie:
“The Japanese economy grew at a rapid pace. Part of the Japanese population enjoyed the new prosperity. The people had a great time. I couldn’t bear to watch it. I did not share in the wealth, and neither did the common people around me. My anger at this condition accumulated within me into a menacing black mass that I vomited into my stories.”
Surprisingly, the protagonists of all first-person stories, including the autobiography, all look more or less the same, as if Tatsumi couldn’t create more than one type of hero. Only the third story, ‘Just a Man’, the only one to use a third person narrator, stars a different and older man, while the last story, the utterly depressing ‘Good-bye’, is the only one to have a female protagonist. Tatsumi’s own life story is told in full color which contrasts with his short stories, which are mostly in black and white. Tatsumi’s autobiography is less compelling than his story work but adds to the understanding of the artist and his work.
Surprisingly, for such a Japanese film ‘Tatsumi’ was made in Singapore and animated in Indonesia. According to Wikipedia Singaporean director Eric Khoo was first introduced to the works of Yoshihiro Tatsumi during his military service, and immediately was stricken by his stories. When ‘A Drifting Life’ was published in Singapore in 2009, Khoo realized that Tatsumi still was alive and wanted to pay tribute to him. Tatsumi himself was greatly involved in the film and narrates his own life story. The movie is a great tribute to one of the more original voices in Japanese manga, and well worth watching, if you can tolerate a dose of sex and violence.
Watch the trailer for ‘Tatsumi’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Tatsumi’ is available on Blu-Ray and DVD
Director: Makoto Shinkai
Release date: May 7, 2011
Rating: ★★★
Review:
After the intimate and realistic ‘5 Centimeters per Second’ (2007) director Makoto Shinkai embarked on an ambitious, long and way more fantastical project, which is ‘Children Who Chase Lost Voices’. The film remains an oddball inside Shinkai’s oeuvre and shows a huge Ghibli-influence absent from his other films.
The film starts realistically enough, with little schoolgirl Asuna exploring some gorgeous nature at the other side of a railway bridge and visiting a secret hideout there. But the fantasy immediately kicks in when she brings forth a strange radio-like apparatus based on some sort of crystal. The use of this device triggers a series of events that eventually leads her to no less than the boundary between life and the afterlife.
‘Children Who Chase Lost Voices’ knows high production values. Like ‘5 Centimeters per Second’ the background art is no less than stunning to begin with, especially the views of and from Asuna’s hill are gorgeous pieces of mood and light. Other scenes are perfect renderings of a hot summer. And like in the previous films, some of these intricate background paintings are only visible for a few frames. Typically for Japanese films some shots are just short mood pieces, in this film surprisingly often depicting insects, like dragonflies and cicadas.
The animation, too, is excellent, as is the shading on the characters themselves. The character design, on the other hand, is less original, and remarkably reminiscent of Miyazaki’s and Takahata’s work at the Toei Studios during the 1970s.
But this is only one of the obvious Ghibli-influences. Asuna herself is almost a typical Miyazaki-heroin: living without a father and a largely absent mother she’s depicted cooking and caring for herself and doing all the household work. She’s thus one of those working children that crowd the old master’s films. She’s joined by a cat called Mimi, which immediately brings Jiji to mind from ‘Kiki’s Delivery Service’ (1989). There’s a villain that echoes colonel Muska from ‘Laputa: Castle in the Sky’ (1986), and there are some God-animal hybrids seemingly coming straight out of ‘Princess Mononoke’ (1997).
Shinkai absolutely succeeds in painting Asuna’s world. It’s a pity that most of the film takes place in Agartha, a mythical place underground the design of which is less compelling and even disappointing. When compared to the fantastical works of Ghibli’s ‘Laputa: The Castle in the Sky’, ‘Princess Mononoke’ or ‘Spirited Away’ (2001) Shinkai’s worldbuilding clearly is subpar. For example, this subterranean world knows blue skies, sunlight, clouds, and rain, which all go unexplained. Apparently, there are no stars, but that’s about it. The underworld characters live in some quasi-medieval society, but this too, is hardly worked out or explained to the viewer. Shinkai’s erratic handling of the underworld seriously harms its believability. After all, it’s hardly different from ours, and both its reason of existence and its purpose remain vague and undecided.
It doesn’t help that Asuna explores this world with one Mr. Morisaki, who is a member of some secret society, but who descends into the earth to retrieve his deceased wife. Both Morisaki’s background story and introduction make frustratingly little sense. For example, there’s a flashback which seems to indicate he was alive during world war I, and for no apparent reason and with little likelihood he poses as Asuna’s substitute teacher. The secret society is utterly unnecessary to the plot, which is too complex for its own good. Moreover, Morisaki remains a vague and unconvincing character getting much too much screen time, and he never turns into either the scary villain Muska was in ‘Laputa: The Castle in the Sky’ or one of those cleverly ambivalent antagonists of Miyazaki’s other films.
In fact, the scenes in Agartha start to drag, and the film loses focus, when leaving Asuna to concentrate on one of the underworld’s inmates, a boy called Shin. In the end Asuna is an all too will-less pawn in Morisaki’s scheme and she lacks her own clear story arc. This is in fact the film’s core problem: this should be Asuna’s story, but the film loses her halfway. It doesn’t help that Asuna’s own relationship to her deceased father is hardly developed, if at all. Particularly puzzling is a scene in which Asuna suddenly utters that Morisaki is like her father. Now where did that come from?!
The roles of Shin and the mute Manna remain vague, too, and feel half-baked. For example, Manna is abandoned halfway the film not to return. Instead, they add to the complexity of the story, further obscuring Asuna’s story arc. During the finale, in which Morisaki finally meets God (!) and Asuna is even depicted in the afterlife (!!) the last traces of believability go out of the window. Compare this rather blunt and all too direct storytelling with the Orpheus myth itself, which is clearly one of its inspirational sources, and one regrets Shinkai didn’t go for much more mystery.
The aftermath, in which our protagonists wander all the way back home is even worse, done in a short montage the story deflates over the end titles, accompanied by a cheesy song. This is a disappointing ending of an overlong and poorly timed film, indeed. Add some unnecessary gore, a plethora of unresolved story lines, three all too forced explanation scenes, and one can only conclude that Shinkai utterly fails where Miyazaki succeeds.
Luckily, ‘Childern Who Chase Lost Voices’ remained a one-time experiment. With his next film, ‘The Garden of Words’ Shinkai returned to much more familiar terrain, with far better results.
Watch the trailer for ‘Children Who Chase Lost Voices’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Children Who Chase Lost Voices’ is available on Blu-Ray and DVD
Director: Martin Georgiev
Release Date: October 17, 2012
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘7596 Frames’ is a computer animated film taking place in an endless black and white landscape, in which countless abstract black shapes fly by due to an extraordinarily strong current.
One of the abstract shapes crashes amidst the debris already present, and starts to wander against the never changing wind, gaining material as it walks along, as objects keep on flying into him. When the semi-abstract figure has grown too heavy for its legs to carry it collapses, but manages to become a more dragon-like shape. At this point it comes under attack, and in the end its struggle is in vain.
At points Martin Georgiev manages to give his semi-abstract forms real character, allowing the viewer to sympathize with the creature’s helpless struggle and its suffering before its final defeat. The camera is never still, and takes some striking positions to show the creature’s efforts, e.g. taking a worm’s-eye view to show the thing towering above. Less successful is the industrial music, which unfortunately adds nothing to the animation.
Watch a preview of ‘7596 Frames’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘7596 Frames’ is available on The Animation Show of Shows Box Set 9
Directors: Gary Trousdale & Kirk Wise
Release Date: June 21, 1996
Rating: ★★★
Review:
After feature adaptations of several fairy tales and children’s books, and even a non-fiction book on aerial warfare (‘Victory through Air Power’ from 1943), ‘The Hunchback of the Notre Dame’ marks the studio’s very first animated adaptation of classic literature, in this case the historical novel of the same name from 1831 by French author Victor Hugo.
Of course, Disney’s version is not the first movie adaptation of Hugo’s hefty book. The most famous predecessors are a silent version from 1923 starring Lon Chaney as the title character, and one from 1939 starring Charles Laughton. The latter adaptation changed Hugo’s bleak and depressive ending into a more uplifting one. Disney gladfully follows suit, ending its own film remarkably upbeat, which is something the more avid Victor Hugo fan will hardly get used to. But more about that later.
The film starts with a ‘Pinocchio’-like opening shot with the camera zooming into the streets of Paris. Immediately it becomes clear that this new adaptation of ‘The Hunchback’ will be a musical, because the first song, ‘The Bells of Notre Dame’ kicks in right away. It is sung by puppet player Clopin (Paul Kandel), whom we zoom into shortly, and who is the initial narrator of the tale, telling about events occurring twenty years before. This is the first of nine songs in 81 minutes, making ‘The Hunchback of the Notre Dame’ one of the most song-rich of the Disney musicals.
After the six-minute intro the film’s title appears, and we immediately cut to young adult Quasimodo (voiced by Tom Hulce of Amadeus fame), who remains misshapen as in the original novel, having both an asymmetrical body and face, with one bad eye, a hump, and a limping walk. But the animators also immediately make clear that this is a friendly, kind-hearted, and harmless person. Disney’s Quasimodo is kind and gentle and has a nice voice (by Tom Hulce), so we as an audience hardly must overcome any prejudice.
Moreover, within the limitations of the character’s literally description, the character designers really tried to make Quasimodo as appealing as possible. For example, compare his appearance to that of either Chaney or Laughton, who both look much uglier, and must overcome initial repulsion by the audience by great acting. Disney’s Quasimodo, on the other hand, is instantly likeable, and the viewer even struggles to comprehend why he isn’t loved more by the citizens of Paris.
Quasimodo’s first scene also shows the weird dualism of this movie: at one hand the studio really wants to tell a serious story, with heavy-handed themes, and dramatic music. On the other hand, the film makers apparently don’t dare to leave the cuddly-wuddly world of earlier Disney children’s films, and this leads to a schizophrenic end product, failing to be either entirely for children or the dark tale it could have been.
For example, the studio gives Quasimodo three humanized gargoyles to talk to (perhaps another idea taken from the 1939 film version, which ends with Quasimodo talking to a gargoyle). The appearance of the three gargoyles feels disappointingly formulaic and out-of-tune after the dramatic introduction. The childish half of the movie is further enhanced by the present of an intelligent pet goat and an equally humanized horse called Achilles. These two animal characters don’t speak, but clearly belong to the world of obligate animal sidekicks, which permeate the Disney films since ‘The Little Mermaid’ (1989).
True, the gargoyles appear only to be real to Quasimodo, turning to stone as soon as any other character is in the same room, but as we often watch them move without Quasimodo being aware of them, we’re led into believing these stone characters are real, and only pretending to be lifeless when other people are around.
Despite the presence of these cute characters, ‘The Hunchback of the Notre Dame’ is arguably Disney’s darkest movie since ‘Pinocchio’ (1940), addressing issues like prejudice, discrimination, intolerance, and hypocrisy.
Most striking in this respect is the character of the villain judge Frollo, voiced forcefully by Tony Jay. His lust for Esmeralda is clearly an adult theme. This becomes most apparent in the character’s own song of desire, with its erotic fantasy depictions of Esmeralda depicted in the flames he watches. Masterly animated by Kathy Zielinski, this is arguably the movie’s best song, highlighting the complexity of the character. Frollo isn’t just bad, he’s torn inside. Frollo all too willingly marries his lust to his sense of justice and sees no problem in purging the town’s gypsies only to find his object of desire. In fact, Frollo is the most interesting character of the whole film, and certainly one of the most interesting of all Disney villains, for his evilness comes from partly from fanatism and bigotry, and is not purely selfish, even though that’s an important component of his character, too.
Another adult theme is the love triangle between Quasimodo, Esmeralda (voiced by Demi Moore) and captain Phoebus. Esmeralda is the focal point of the movie, being the object of desire of the three male leads, if in different ways for each of them. Phoebus is a bland hero character, and the only one who doesn’t sing. At one point Quasimodo actually believes Esmeralda loves him, and he has to overcome his jealousy of his more handsome rival to help Phoebus finding Esmeralda.
Yet, as the film makers don’t really choose between a light-hearted and a serious narrative, the film remains an odd blend. For example, Quasimodo’s rescue scene is played out very dramatically and seriously. But this scene is followed by a rather frivolous storming of the cathedral, full of silly gags and broad, cartoony animation. One can even hear the Goofy yell when the soldiers fall from great heights to a – I’d say – certain death. This lack of choice troubles and harms the film big time. A Disney cliché scene in which a character seems dead but turns out not to be (see ‘Pinocchio’ and ‘Jungle Book’) doesn’t help either.
But what really becomes hard to swallow is the film’s ending, which is all too happy, defying every believability. In Disney’s version Quasimodo seemingly starts a revolution, and the film makers want us to believe that following the film’s events the Middle Ages stopped right there and propelled all citizens of Paris into a post-modern world of tolerance and rainbow harmony, free from despotism, prejudice, and discrimination. If only. For example, ninety years after the events depicted here Paris would witness the atrocities of the St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre. I’m afraid that although Victor Hugo’s original ending may the more gruesome, it’s also the more realistic one.
The film is more successful as a musical than as a retelling of Victor Hugo’s novel. Alan Menken’s music is in the same modern musical vein as earlier Disney musicals, like ‘Beauty and the Beast’ (1991) and ‘Aladdin’ (1992), but the tone is much more dramatic, verging on the edge of bombast. Unique for this movie is that the score remains its musical character even when there’s no singing. An unexpected element of his score is Menken’s use of leitmotivs. Especially Frollo is identified by a particularly well-composed melody, which recurs throughout the movie. Menken may count this melody as one of his very best ever. Frollo’s song is the film’s dramatic highlight, and as said the best song of the whole film, but Menken’s score reaches epic heights during the rescue scene, when a choir singing in Latin adds to the musical suspense.
The only real mistake in the score is the Gargoyle’s song, the film’s only light-hearted tune. In this tune we’re suddenly confronted with many anachronisms and French cliches completely out of tune with the rest of the movie, like images of a casino, a barber, and a grand piano. What worked in ‘Aladdin’ falls completely flat in ‘The Hunchback of the Notre Dame’. These anachronisms come across as a lack of ideas, instead of original twists, and pull the viewer out of the story, instead of taking him further in. Yet, it must be said that even this song shows the grim image of three people being hanged, even if it’s in puppet form. In the same way, a later song by a bunch of scoundrels remains very merry, even though it’s about killing.
The film’s design is noteworthy for its moody color palette, with blues, purple and orange as its principal colors, which permeate almost all scenes. The human designs are more elaborate, yet less artful than before, with Esmeralda and Phoebus being particularly bland. Unfortunately, somehow, it’s this more generic design that would become standard in the final traditionally American animated films of the late nineties and early 2000s.
The human designs may lack character, their animation is by all means outstanding, and shows that the Disney studio was at the very top of its craft. An example is the Topsy-Turvy song. Set at the Feast of Fools (which was actually forbidden by 1431, while the action takes place in 1482, but this is Victor Hugo’s error), this song features elaborate movement, fast cutting, all kinds of camera angles, and many different characters, both traditionally animated and computer animated. But all the movement and the characters’ emotions remain readable all the time. In fact, one can watch this sequence in silence and still know what’s going on.
Other pieces of animation I particularly like is when Frollo wriggles his sword out of a piece of wood while entering the cathedral, and the one in which Esmeralda asks Quasimodo to come outside, shot from Quasimodo’s perspective, thus making Esmeralda reaching out to us. But these are just examples in a film overflowing with excellent character animation.
Computer animation is limited to special effects, especially for creating crowd scenes. With help of computers, the studio could generate crowds of hundreds of people, without having to animate each person individually. When one looks closer, the animation looks terribly stiff and lifeless, but as the eye normally follows the fully animated leads, the result is convincing enough, and luckily not out of tune with the fully animated lead characters.
In all, ‘The Hunchback of the Notre Dame’ is a well-made film with a very interesting musical score, and great animation. It’s a daring piece into more serious territory, something the studio would never repeat. And I understand why, because as long as the Disney studio doesn’t dare to leave its compulsory family character, it will never succeed in retelling dramatic stories like Victor Hugo’s ‘The Hunchback of the Notre Dame’ convincingly. This film certainly fails to do so, despite all the effort, and remains a schizophrenic product that leaves the viewer wondering what it could have been if the studio would have made more daring choices.
Watch the trailer for ‘The Hunchback of the Notre Dame’ and tell me what you think:
‘The Hunchback of the Notre Dame’ is available on Blu-Ray and DVD
Airing Date: 25-12-1996
Dexter’s Rival (a rerun of episode 4)
The Justice Friends: Bee Where
Directors: Paul Rudish & Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: The Justice Friends
Rating: ★
Review:
In ‘Bee Where?’ a bee visits the home of the three justice friends, scaring Major Glory to death.
This must be one of the most tiresome of all Justice Friends episodes. It just drags and drags on, without getting funny. Even the antics with the open or closed windows fails to become funny, lacking proper timing.
Mandarker
Director: Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dexter
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Mandarker’ sees the return of Mandark, whose laboratory is still destroyed.
This time the two combat to win first prize at the science fair, a prize normally going to Dexter. It becomes clear Mandark goes to great lengths to achieve his goal, while Dexter has become arrogant enough to assume he will win anyway. Nevertheless, once Mandark enters the fair, events get a different turn.
It’s always nice to see the two rivals, but the best part of this episode is the finale in which the dialogue consists of the words Dexter and Mandark, only.
‘Dexter’s Rival/The Justice Friends: Bee Where/Mandarker’ is available on the DVD ‘Dexter’s Laboratory Season One: All 13 Episodes’
Airing Date: December 11, 1996
Way of the Dee Dee
Directors: Paul Rudish & Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dexter
Rating: ★★★
Review:
In ‘The Way of the Dee Dee’ Dee Dee shows Dexter that he has become out of touch with nature, so Dexter begs her to show him ‘the way of the Dee Dee’.
With Dee Dee as his guru Dexter steps leaves not only his lab, but dares to go outside. What follows are some antics in the backyard, but for the final challenge Dee Dee takes Dexter back to the lab for some self expression…
‘The Way of the Dee Dee’ plays with the themes of gurus and enlightenment. The scene in which Dexter steps into the light, accompanied by sitar music is the episode’s highlight in that respect.
The Justice Friends: Say Uncle Sam
Director: Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: The Justice Friends
Rating: ★★
Review:
Major Glory’s Uncle Sam will come to visit, so Major Glory teaches his friends how to behave, much to the latter’s distress.
Highlight of this otherwise dragging episode is the scene in which Major Glory calls his justice friends to assemble, accompanied by some particularly heroic music.
Tribe Called Girl
Directors: Rob Renzetti & Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dexter
Rating: ★★
Review:
‘Tribe Called Girl’ is an episode like ‘Dee Dee’s Room‘ and ‘Dollhouse Drama‘, without adding much.
Once again, Dexter goes to Dee Dee’s room, this time to observe the behavior of girls. But then he’s discovered by Dee Dee and her friends Lee Lee and Mee Mee…
Dexter is presented as being completely unable to communicate with the girls, who, in one scene, treat him like a shy animal.
‘Way of the Dee Dee/The Justice Friends: Say Uncle Sam/Tribe Called Girl’ is available on the DVD ‘Dexter’s Laboratory Season One: All 13 Episodes’
Airing Date: November 27, 1996
Babysitter Blues
Directors: Craig McCracken & Rob Renzetti
Stars: Dexter
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Babysitter Blues’ immediately makes clear that Dexter is in love with his babysitter. The scene in which he prepares the room for her arrival is priceless, with its strong posings on the little boy.
But when Lisa, the babysitter, arrives, it quickly turns out she has a boy friend, prompting Dexter to think out a devilish scheme.
Dexter is far from sympathetic in this cartoon, and the love theme with ca. ten years age difference between Dexter and Lisa is a little bit uncomfortable, but the episode still is great fun. Apart from the opening scene highlight of this episode is Dee Dee looking for something without knowing for what.
The Justice Friends: Valhallen’s Room
Director: Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Justice Friends
Rating: ★
Review:
‘The Justice Friends: Valhallen’s Room’ starts with Major Glory calling the others for breakfast. When Valhallen doesn’t show up, he and Krunk enter his room…
This episode contains some nice references to Norse mythology, but otherwise is very tiresome and not even remotely funny. Most enjoyable of this otherwise forgettable short are the dramatic poses of Major Glory and his American themed breakfast.
Dream Machine
Directors: Rob Renzetti & Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dexter
Rating: ★★
Review:
This episode starts with Dexter having a nightmare. Apparently he has had many lately, so Dexter builds himself a dream machine, which requires Dee Dee as its operator.
The premise of this scheme is all too predictable, and after Dexter’s initial dream there’s little to enjoy. Even Dexter’s second dream doesn’t really deliver, and most frustratingly, the episode ends abruptly and inconclusively.
‘Babysitter Blues/The Justice Friends: Valhallen’s Room/Dream Machine’ is available on the DVD ‘Dexter’s Laboratory Season One: All 13 Episodes’
Director: Phil Mulloy
Release Date: 1996
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Thou Shalt Not Covet thy Neighbours Goods’ is the ninth installment of Phil Mulloy’s The Ten Commandments series.
Once again the short is told by Joel Cutrara and this time he tells about Cisco, who builds a commercial success out of electronic torture devices. Cisco is presented as the hero of the movie, but his story is a cynical one, involving exploitation of workers and suppression of the masses.
Despite the bleak images, Cutrara’s voice over remains joyful, and the happy atmosphere is enhanced by some particularly cartoony vocalisations.
‘Thou Shalt Not Covet Thy Neighbours Goods’ is available on the DVD ‘Phil Mulloy Extreme Animation’
Director: Phil Mulloy
Release Date: 1996
Rating: ★★★
Review:
Based on the reminiscences of violinist and composer Alex Balanescu ‘The Wind of Changes’ is one of Phil Mulloy’s longest and most poetical films.
Balanescu’s portrait of communist Romania is a dark one, but his impressions of New York and London are hardly any better. Balanescu’s remarks are wry and depressing, and Mulloy illustrates these with associative and sombre pictures in his typical crude cut-out animation style.
The film jumps forward and back into time and has a stream-of-consciousness-like feel. Some of the images are very powerful, like a snowman being shot. But it’s Balanescu’s score that despite Mulloy’s powerful imagery, is the most beautiful aspect of the film. Unfortunately, Balanescu’s music almost drowns out the voice-over, making the narrative hard to follow.
Watch the first part of ‘The Wind of Changes’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘The Wind of Changes’ is available on the DVD ‘Phil Mulloy Extreme Animation’
Director: Igor Kovalyov
Release Date: 1996
Rating: ★★★
Review:
Made during his stay at the Klasky Csupo studio ‘Bird in the Window’ is Igor Kovalyov’s first film made in the US.
Despite his contemporary commercial work on e.g. Rugrats and Duckman: Private Dick/Family Man, Kovalyov’s independent style has lost nothing of its enigma. ‘Bird in the Window’ is a film in several very short scenes with mutual relationships that are hard to decipher.
A man returns home to his house in the countryside, but his wife clearly hides something for him. Why can’t he see the child that’s running around? What’s with the two Chinese characters playing chess? And what’s the role of the gardener? ‘Bird in the Window’ certainly suggests a lot without clarifying a thing. Even the opening scene in which a bird violently chases a winged bug is as disturbing as it is puzzling. ‘Bird in the Window’ may be less obviously surreal than his celebrated ‘Hen His Wife’ (1989), Kovalyov’s way of story telling still is one of suggestion, not explanation.
Note how Kovalyov uses seemingly trivial images to tell his tale: the man throwing an apple at the gardener, the man eating all the grapes, the woman lying in a bath, a cockroach creeping – all these short scenes contribute to the ominous feeling, full of suppressed eroticism.
The tense atmosphere is greatly enhanced by the great sound design, which offers us many noises not seen on the screen: cows mooing, a plane flying by, a clock chiming, the woman running down the stairs and slamming doors, a dog barking etc.
Watch ‘Bird in the Window’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Bird in the Window’ is available on the DVD ‘Desire & Sexuality – Animating the Unconscious Vol.2’
Airing Date: May 11, 1996
Dexter’s Rival
Director: Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dexter, Dee Dee, Mandark
Rating: ★★★★
Review:
‘Dexter’s Rival’ introduces Dexter’s arch nemesis, Mandark (who apparently is called Astronominoff in real life).
In this episode Mandark outwits Dexter in every single task at school, being genuinely smarter than Dexter is. Even Mandark’s lab is much bigger than Dexter’s (and even contains a death star lurking outside). This of course, greatly upsets Dexter, but then he discovers that Mandark has one weak spot…
Mandark immediately is a priceless character – his arrogance, his typical way of talking and his trademark offbeat laughter make him a perfect foe. The way he perceives Dee Dee is a particular highlight of this episode, turning Dexter’s big sister in a piece of pure romantic beauty.
Dial M for Monkey: Simion
Directors: Paul Rudish & Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dial M for Monkey
Rating: ★★★
Review:
In ‘Dial M for Monkey: Simion’ monkey does not only have superpowers, he also lives in a futuristic science fiction world, even though this episode has the same introduction as the previous two Monkey episodes.
In this episode we see a little more of agent Honeydew, but most of the time is devoted to a very long speech by the villain, Simion. This tale of revenge simply bursts with familiar superhero tropes, but that doesn’t necessarily make it very funny. Like the other ‘Dial M for Monkey’ episodes ‘Simion’ remains mediocre at best, and the episode pales when compared to the bridging Dexter’s Laboratory episodes, ‘Dexter’s Rival’ and ‘Old Man Dexter’.
Old Man Dexter
See the post devoted to this episode
‘Dexter’s Rival/Dial M for Monkey: Simion/Old Man Dexter’ is available on the DVD ‘Dexter’s Laboratory Season One: All 13 Episodes’
Airing Date: May 4, 1996
Dexter Dodgeball
Directors: Craig McCracken & Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dexter, Dee Dee
Rating: ★★★½
Review:
In ‘Dexter Dodgeball’ Dexter gets a substitute coach at school, who doesn’t care for the boy’s excuse note to excuse him from gym class. Instead, Dexter is forced to ‘play’ dodgeball every day of the week, which means he’s bombarded by bullies every day of the week. But then next week Dexter takes revenge…
The substitute coach is a direct echo from similar personas in Ren & Stimpy, while the scenes of Dexter’s Revenge have clear mecha anime influences. Like many other episodes of Dexter’s Laboratory the episode ends rather abruptly and a bit cornily.
Dial M for Monkey: Rasslor
Directors: Paul Rudish & Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dial M for Monkey
Rating: ★★★
Review:
In ‘Dial M for Monkey: Rasslor’ an alien wrestler called Rasslor challenges all earth’s superheroes to combat him. If they lose, he will destroy the Earth.
Rasslor is voiced by real wrestler Randy Savage (1952-2011), but more interestingly, this episode introduces the Justice Friends, which eventually would replace Dial M for Monkey as bridging parts of Dexter’s Laboratory episodes. Thus we can already see the Captain American-like Major Glory, the Thor-like Valhallen and, yet unnamed, the Hulk-like Krunk, as well as numerous other superheroes. None of these manages to beat Rasslor, and the alien wrestler refuses to combat Monkey…
The result is one of the more enjoyable Dial M for Monkey episodes, even if the speed drops as soon Monkey enters the stage.
Dexter’s Assistant
Directors: John McIntyre & Genndy Tartakovsky
Stars: Dexter, Dee Dee
Rating: ★★★
Review:
In ‘Dexter’s Assistant’ Dexter conducts an experiment in which he needs somebody to press a button at the bottom, while he is on top of a giant machine. Because Dee Dee clearly isn’t able to do the job, he makes an assistant out of his sister by replacing her tiny brain for a giant one…
This is a fun episode, but it unfortunately has a rather predictable story line, and as often in this series, it ends rather inconclusively. The best scene may be that of Dexter with long hair, courtesy of Dee Dee’s hair lotion invention.
‘Dexter Dodgeball/Dial M for Monkey: Rasslor/Dexter’s Assistant’ is available on the DVD ‘Dexter’s Laboratory Season One: All 13 Episodes’
Dr. Grob's Animation Review 