THE ROAD TO EL DORADO (2000) / ** 1/2
Directed by Bobo Bergeron, Will Finn and Don Paul. Screenplay by Ted Elliott and Terry Rossio. Starring Kenneth Branagh, Kevin Kline, Rosie Perez. Running time: 91 minutes. Rated PG for frightening scenes (MFCB). Reviewed on April 13th, 2000.
By SHANNON PATRICK SULLIVAN
"The Road To El Dorado" is perhaps one of the most inappropriately-titled movies of the year. That's because DreamWorks' latest attempt to challenge Disney's animation stranglehold isn't about the quest for the fabled City of Gold so much as it is about what happens after the quest has succeeded. This is a movie not about adventure, but rather about friendship and sacrifice in the face of temptation.
Miguel (Kenneth Branagh) and Tulio (Kevin Kline) are con artists in sixteenth century Spain. After acquiring a map to the legendary El Dorado -- a City of Gold built by the gods themselves -- they inadvertently stow away on board the ship carrying none other than the infamous conqueror Cortes across the sea to South America. Escaping the boat with the help of the faithful horse Altivo, Miguel and Tulio eventually run aground somewhere in the New World. Following the map, they soon discover El Dorado itself, where they are hailed as gods.
Although the journey to El Dorado could easily have been the focus of the movie, here it is essentially just forms the preliminaries. The movie really gets going once Miguel and Tulio have reached the City of Gold, whose citizens are divided in their loyalties between the jolly Chief (Edward James Olmos) and the sinister High Priest Tzekel-Kan (Armand Assante). The Chief is suspicious of Miguel and Tulio's divinity from the start, but sees them as a harmless way to keep his people happy. Tzekel-Kan, on the other hand, believes the arrival of the "gods" signals the start of the Age of the Jaguar, a time of blood and human sacrifice when he will rule the people through fear. And meanwhile, Cortes himself has arrived in the New World, and has begun to follow Miguel and Tulio's trail toward unsuspecting El Dorado.
"The Road To El Dorado" is certainly not the most ambitious animated film of recent times. Storywise, it borrows from a number of other sources -- the "quest for the City of Gold", the "white men hailed as gods", and the "evil high priest seeks power" subplots are all tried-and-true staples of the genre. There is not much new here: even Tulio and Miguel's trick of pretending to argue with one another in order to get themselves out of trouble is a classic ploy. But it's all done with a healthy dose of humor, and the pacing is such that the movie never really drags. If nothing else, the relationship between Tulio and Miguel is well-developed. Although there's never really any doubt how things are going to turn out, the evolution of that relationship in the presence of temptations like gold, godhood and girls (in the form Chela, an El Dorado native who becomes the pair's partner in crime) is interesting to watch.
The real attraction of "The Road To El Dorado", of course, is its gorgeous animation. Much of the film is illustrated in the half-realistic, half-cartoonish style currently favored by Disney, but the movie is not bound by this technique. For example, some portions (the creation of El Dorado by the gods and an energetic feast segment) are drawn in the style of Seventies-era cartoons, employing two-dimensional shapes, unusual color choices and psychedelic imagery. There is also some gorgeous computer animation, particularly during sequences set on water.
The voicework in general is capable but not spectacular, with the best performances given by Kline and Rosie Perez, who plays Chela. Perez in particular is important because she provides a much-needed female perspective in the otherwise male-dominated picture. The music by Elton John is largely forgettable, with the most interesting track being one of the two end-credit songs, "Someday Out Of The Blue" (also the first single airing on the radio). But it's a song that doesn't really have much at all to do with the movie itself, and the rest of the tunes lack the punch of, say, "Be Our Guest" or virtually anything from "Aladdin".
Although not a spectacular entry into the field of family films, "The Road To El Dorado" is a movie which both children and their parents should find enjoyable. It's got humor which appeals to both age groups, and although the story is timeworn and simplistic, it's told with enough energy to keep the audience interested for an hour and a half. Dreamworks might not be challenging Disney with this release, but it's not doing too bad a job in its own right.
Copyright © 2000 Shannon Patrick Sullivan. Archived at The Popcorn Gallery, http://www.physics.mun.ca/~sps/movies/TheRoadToElDorado.html
-- _______________________________________________________________________ / Shannon Patrick Sullivan | "We are all in the gutter, but some of us \ | shannon@morgan.ucs.mun.ca | are looking at the stars." - Oscar Wilde | \___________________________|__________________________________________/ | Popcorn Gallery Movie Reviews www.physics.mun.ca/~sps/movies.html | | Doctor Who: A Brief History of Time (Travel) /drwho.html |
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