We've got Easter
coming up, a time when the family may dress up nicely, gather
at their House of Worship, then return home for a neo-pagan
ritual in which eggs are given tribal tattoos, lulled into
a false sense of security that they may escape into the
backyard, then hunted down and devoured. Then there's the
basket full of goodies, mostly sugary and/or chocolatey,
at least if you're a decent parent. To my friend Doug Livingston,
enjoy that Easter banana, buddy, and don't eat that Hershey
bar all at once.
But after the
hysteria and honey-glazed ham has come and gone, what to
do with the children? This is America. We show them videos.
And here are three recent offerings on DVD that may keep
the little ones quiet without making your brain run should
you accidentally catch a glimpse.
The
Easter Bunny Is Coming to Town
Adults of a certain age have a fondness for the works of
Rankin-Bass, those wizards of bizarre stop-motion puppetry
that brought Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer to life, and
gave us the dueling theme songs of the Snow and Heat Misers.
They didn't just do Christmas specials, though that was
definitely their forte in their heyday - then again, what
other holiday can spark such great mythologies?
Twice, however,
they ventured into Easter, first with Here Comes Peter
Cottontail, which featured Vincent Price and Danny Kaye,
and which I'll admit I thought this DVD was under a new
title. The Easter Bunny Is Coming To Town must have
hit at that awkward few years in which I didn't care about
cartoons, or at least when I was busy with high school and
we didn't yet (gasp) have a VCR in the McCaw household.
In a strange
way, it's a sequel to Santa Claus Is Coming To Town,
tied as it is by the presence of Fred Astaire as the narrator,
the same postman who has told generations of children the
truth about Kris Kringle. This time he turns to the Easter
Bunny, named Sunny by the inhabitants of Kidville, a place
where only orphans live, and apparently never grow up. Except
the postman did, so…well, as often happens with me, this
would be the point where my wife hits me and says, "you
think too much…"
Kids will absolutely
enjoy this, but the older ones might start to notice how
many story beats this has in common with Astaire's Santa
Claus story. Instead of the Winter Warlock, Sunny has to
face down a mean old bear named Gadzooks, whose heart is
melted by the gift of a nice suit for Easter. The residents
of Kidville might as well be Kringles, and the grim childless
kingdom on the other side of the mountain should have been
ruled by the Burgermeister Meisterburger.
The real oddity
- and this often happens with these Rankin-Bass specials,
products of a simpler time - is the inclusion of Hallelujah
Jones, a hobo that moves into Kidtown. Tattered, bedraggled
and obviously unwashed, he helps Sunny overcome the obstacles
placed by other adults, and reveals that he and his hobo
buddies are the best gandy-dancers in the world. If you
don't know what that is, well then, this video will be more
educational than you thought.
The songs are
catchy enough, though none of them quite have the hook of
"One Foot In Front of the Other" or the brilliant "Miser"
songs. For me, one bonus is that Sunny is voiced by Skip
Hinnant, a member of The Electric Company best known
as Fargo North, Decoder. So the kids might not get a kick
out of that, but I do. Skip, where are you now?
Johnny
and the Sprites -
Meet the Sprites
Absolutely just in time and probably overdue because of its
hypnotic power, Johnny and the Sprites hits home video.
Spun out of a series of five-minute shorts, the show features
John Tartaglia as a would-be musician who goes to a country
house in order to write songs. However, the house is surrounded
by a magical garden that accesses a grove of Sprites, mystic
and naïve creatures of various shapes, sizes and colors.
Every episode
features songs, gentle life lessons and an uncanny ability
to mesmerize small children. This DVD features five episodes
from the show - is it worthwhile to release complete seasons
for kids' shows like this? - and each one follows a similar
formula. But the songs are always catchy and the Sprites
pretty bold characters.
Gifted puppeteer
Tartaglia spent time on Sesame Street, too, where
he honed his craft before originating the roles of Rod and
Princeton in "Avenue Q." While he doesn't bring that devilish
sensibility to this show, he does project sincerity and
enthusiasm for Johnny and the Sprites, absolutely
why it works so well. When a creator is this earnest, kids
eat it up.
Unstable
Fables - 3 Pigs and a Baby
Since they sold the Muppets to Disney, the Jim Henson Company
has to try and create a new franchise. They revive a staple
of Henson's work here with the concept of Unstable Fables,
though it bears a strong resemblance to co-producer The
Weinstein Company's earlier theatrical efforts Hoodwinked
and Happily N'ever After.
Post-modern
fairy tales are tricky ground to walk, but when done well,
they're really satisfying. That's not quite the word to
use with 3 Pigs and a Baby, though it has some bright
spots. A snarky sense of humor runs throughout without being
too adult, but at the same time the script doesn't seem
to be written by somebody who really understands kids.
After reviewing
the events of "The Three Little Pigs" pretty much as we
know them, if you accept that the Big Bad Wolf was part
of a larger paramilitary wolf operation, the wolves hatch
a diabolical plan for revenge. Taking a cub and leaving
it on the steps of the house of bricks, the lupine villains
intend for the cub to grow up and let his real pack in to
eat the pigs.
Sure, it's silly,
but on the surface, it's a funny idea to pit fairy tales
along with an 80's French farce. However, small kids will
get very distracted by a central question: what wolf mommy
gave up her baby for this plan, and why isn't she looking
for him? In reality, only one female wolf seems to be around
- "Teen Girl Wolf" - and maybe one and a half if you count
"Musical Comedy Wolf," played by Tom Kenny doing his best
Paul Lynde impersonation.
Breaking the
string of double-adjective wolves, the mastermind seems
to really be Dr. Wolfowitz (Kenny again), a character stolen
directly from Dr. Strangelove. Meanwhile, the pigs are a
well-meaning bunch of stereotypes, with a surfer dude (Steve
Zahn), a metrosexual (Jon Cryer) and an anal retentive bricklayer
(Brad Garrett).
They all live
in a pig neighborhood, though cows exist too as contractors.
Nobody seems to notice that baby Lucky isn't a pig,
including Lucky himself. Those big teeth, those big claws,
that need to howl - he's just going through a difficult
adolescence.
The character
design doesn't quite work, either, though it's not so annoying
with the pigs. The wolves have mouths separate from their
snouts, making them look sort of like bizarre clowns with
wolf noses. As seems to be happening more and more often
with less expensive CG animation, the figures move only
slightly better than those in a Rankin-Bass special, which
makes the featurette on the animation well-meaning but embarrassing.
Not as embarrassing as Jesse McCartney talking about his
character motivation as Lucky, but still…
Call it an ambitious
effort, as the disc includes a preview for the next one,
a sequel to "The Tortoise and the Hare." That one looks
like a more solid piece, with better character design. Despite
a cursory framing sequence, the Henson Company also needs
to decide if these are all going to inter-linked. Is it
an anthology or a franchise? There's a difference, and they
need to commit to it.
