Anastasia (1997) Rating: 3.0 stars (out of 4.0) ******************************** Key to rating system: 2.0 stars Debatable 2.5 stars Some people may like it 3.0 stars I liked it 3.5 stars I am biased in favor of the movie 4.0 stars I felt the movie's impact personally or it stood out ********************************* A Movie Review by David Sunga
Directed by: Don Bluth and Gary Goldman
Songs by Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty
Written by: Susan Gauthier, Bruce Graham, Bob Tzudiker and Noni White
Starring the voices of: Meg Ryan, John Cusack, Kelsey Grammer, Christopher Lloyd, Hank Azaria, and Angela Lansbury
Ingredients: girl with amnesia, young love, singing
Synopsis: In real life the twenty-year reign of the monarch Tzar Nicholas of Russia ended with the Bolsheviks seizing power. The members of the Russian royal family including Nicholas and his daughter Anastasia were shot dead in a basement in 1918. But luckily this animation story is a lot happier; in this story Anastasia is alive and well! Young hustler Dimitri (voice of John Cusack) and his old fat partner Vladimir (voice of Kelsey Grammer) cook up a scheme to collect the reward money for returning a lost Russian princess to her grandmother in Paris. All they have to do is get an orphan girl named Anya (voice of Meg Ryan) to travel to Paris with them, and have her impersonate Anastasia in order to dupe the grandmother (voice of Angela Lansbury) for the reward money. Unknown to them, orphan Anya, an amnesiac, really is Anastasia. A long time ago, when the evil monk Rasputin (voice of Christopher Lloyd) assassinated her parents, the escaping Anastasia fell off a train and lost her memory. The journey to Paris is long, and Anya and commoner Dimitri fall in love. When she gets to Paris, will she choose her royal title or will she choose the love of a commoner?
Opinion: This film is just like a Disney film, only it's not made by Disney (it's 20th Century Fox). My guess is that the unevenly paced storyline will prove to be a little too complex for young kids, and a little sappy for adults to sit through, but it is just right for girls hovering above and below ten years old. On the good side this animated musical offers a superb cast, great acting and singing, and fantastic and realistic artwork. I like how the viewing angles zoom in, spin, and move around like simulated camera-work, despite it being a cartoon. And who would have thought Meg Ryan and John Cusack were so stellar at singing? This film proves that directors Don Bluth and Gary Goldman are (with minor adjustments in movie pace and target audience) certainly capable of making inroads into the formerly unassailable Disney cartoon market.
Reviewed by David Sunga November 27, 1997
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