THE ADVENTURES OF ROCKY AND BULLWINKLE A film review by Steve Rhodes Copyright 2000 Steve Rhodes RATING (0 TO ****): ** 1/2
Pity the poor toons stuck with such two-dimensional, (so-called) live-action figures in Des McAnuff's THE ADVENTURES OF ROCKY AND BULLWINKLE. The toons, namely the ever lovable Rocky and Bullwinkle of 1960's television cartoon fame, make the most of their lines, but it isn't enough to save the picture from such wooden performances by the human actors.
The worst of the lot are Jason Alexander and Rene Russo as live-action versions of cartoon villains Boris and Natasha. (Why Rocky and Bullwinkle are animated but their nemeses aren't makes little sense, of course, even if the movie provides a plot contrivance to explain it.) Alexander and Russo are as wooden and awkward as Al Gore and Calvin Coolidge would be as a comedy duo attempting a slapstick routine on vaudeville. Alexander and Russo are rarely funny and frequently embarrassing. Worst of all, their characters focus the story away from the squirrel and moose, who are delightful when the movie gives them a chance.
The most miserable performance however is turned in by Robert De Niro who plays arch villain Fearless Leader. He overacts with a vengeance worthy of Chevy Chase on a bad day. And since he produced the film one can only assume that he likes the way it was developed.
The movie has lots of jokes, many of which are aimed at Hollywood insiders and others which go by so fast that the vast majority of the audience will miss them entirely. One sequence involves breaking into the Green Light machine at Phony Pictures in order to get Rocky and Bullwinkle out of reruns -- where they earn 3 1/2 cents per paycheck for residuals -- and back on the air. Go ahead. Ask your kids about the definition of "residuals" and "green lighting."
The names are fun. The human hero is FBI Agent Karen Sympathy (Piper Perabo). Get it? Care and sympathy. Don't worry if you didn't. My family didn't either until I explained it to them in the car on the way home. Most of the movie is like that -- lots of missed opportunities. For every joke that works, there are dozens of others that miss their marks.
Other more obvious names are those of the President's army leaders which include General Store and General Admission. Town names are cute too. In the town of Cow Tip, Oklahoma the little theater is currently showing Love Story 2000.
The dastardly deed this time involves Fearless Leader's RBTV (Really Bad Television). Once the master control dial for it has been turned to "zombification," all of America will be enslaved and will vote on command for Fearless Leader. Bullwinkle remarks that even with RBTV, television is just as good as ever, something that struck a chord with me after watching a lot of television recently when I was laid up with a virus.
Most of the film's most effective humorous moments are provided by the numskull moose. Bullwinkle, rambling on, decides that two wrongs don't make a right, but two rights do make a U-turn.
The humans do get one truly funny bit of dialog. When Boris gets the "press any key to continue" error message on his killer computer, he can't get it to fire in time. "Which one is the 'any' key?" he asks in a panic.
After one of his many failed attempts at humor, Fearless Leader adds, parenthetically, "that was just a little joke." That, however, is the problem with the entire film. It is just a little joke. That they could make Rocky and Bullwinkle into a mixed animated and live-action film is obvious. The question that remains is "Why?"
THE ADVENTURES OF ROCKY AND BULLWINKLE runs 1:28. It is rated PG for brief mild language and would be acceptable for all ages.
My son Jeffrey, age 11, gave the movie ** 1/2. He liked the story and the cartoon figures but thought the action was frequently too stupid. He made the astute observation that the film's few profanities weren't needed, and he wasn't sure why they even bothered including them. The answer, of course, is that most studios have historically believed that a G rating is a kiss of death if they are shooting for a wide audience. Hopefully the enormously successful CHICKEN RUN, rated G, will disabuse them of that notion forever.
Email: Steve.Rhodes@InternetReviews.com
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews