TEENAGE MUTANT NINJA TURTLES 2
"Secret of the Ooze"
A film review by Scott Schultz
Copyright 1991 Scott Schultz
Yes, the Turtles are back and I got a chance to preview them at a local S.I.D.S. foundation fundraiser. Vanilla Ice was even there (ohh, ahh!) but I'm not a rap-fan so I didn't pay too much attention to him.
This film has many of the same flaws of its predecessor. Unfortunately, it also suffers from "How do we end this?" disease. The filmmakers come up with some interesting ideas during the first half of the film and then they fail to develop any of them. The last one-third of the film is one corny, illogical scene after another. The first Turtles film was made to cash in on the craze, but it had a certain amount of story to it that was based on a mixture of Eastman and Laird's comics, the animated series, and the writer's imagination. This is strictly mind-candy that is designed to entice kids into talking their parents out of some pocket money.
Without giving away too much of the plot, the story follows these lines:
The Turtles are living with April O'Neil while looking for a new hideout. They make a new friend, a pizza delivery boy who also knows martial arts. The Shredder comes back; I'd consider that a spoiler except that the TV ads have not only been showing that information but they have actually been showing pieces of the "surprise" ending. How the Shredder survived a 7-8 story fall into a garbage truck and subsequent crushing by the trash masher is unexplained. The rest of the movie involves the Turtles discovery of the origin of the radioactive ooze that created them and Shredder's simultaneous discovery of it and his use of it in his revenge.
This is a kid's film all the way. More than half of the jokes are drawn from the first movie though some of the rest are funny. The violence is toned down a bit from the first movie though there are more actual confrontations between the Turtles and the Foot Clan. My son enjoyed it and I didn't see anything in the film that would harm any child's psyche. My prediction is that this film will be out of the theatres in a few weeks and appear on video in November, just in time to be put in a bunch of Turtle Kid's stockings.
Bottom Line: Thumbs down if you're an adult. Kids are less critical and just want to see Turtles. I have to admit that I was disappointed because I was one of the minority of adults who liked the first movie. It wasn't Oscar material but it was a decent rendition of the Turtle's story. SECRET OF THE OOZE is the dog that I was afraid the first movie would be. C'est la Vie.
-- Scott Schultz -- uunet!microsoft!scottsc or uw-beaver!microsoft!scottsc
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