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M O N D AY, N O V E M B E R 2 7 , 2 0 0 6Happy Feet -- The ReviewI'm glad George Miller's "Happy Feet" is a huge smash. As I've saidbefore, he's one of my favorite directors working today. But having seenit over the holiday weekend, I have to admit I'm rather disappointed.This is Miller's first movie in many years that won't make my Best ofthe Year list. ("The Road Warrior," "Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome,""Babe" -- which he produced but did not direct -- "Lorenzo's Oil" and"Babe: Pig In The City" all did and the original "Mad Max" probablywould have too if I'd seen its original version instead of the dubbed UStake on it.) In it, penguins are shown singing pop songs -- each one hasa heart song that will attract one other penguin. So we get everythingfrom Prince's "Kiss" to a Spanish language version of "My Way." Ourmisfit hero sticks out because he can't sing worth a lick but loves todance, something penguins just don't do. Plus, the supply of fish isrunning out for some mysterious reason...."Happy Feet" is technically dazzling: Miller used camera moves rarelyseen in animated films, his motion-capturing of dancer Savion Gloverto depict our hero's dance moves is top-notch and there are some funaction scenes. It's a fine film well worth taking the kids too. But whatbothered me was the film's creative randomness. All the clever touches-- the pop songs, the idea that each penguin has their own particulartune, the characterizations of Happy Feet's mom and dad as MarilynMonroe and Elvis sound-alikes -- were haphazard and not thoughtthrough.Take the parents. For no particular reason, they use the voices of Fiftiesicons. It doesn't affect their characters in the least as far as how theybehave. And why are they the only ones to mimic stars? If the moviewanted to be consistent, all the other adults could have been Fiftiesicons too, from Bogie to Bobby Darin to James Dean. And that couldhave solved the movie's other random problem -- the songs. If theadults consistently favored early rock n roll like Elvis and Bobby Darinand Little Richard and the Everly Brothers, then the kids could haveembraced newer rock like Queen and "Boogie Wonderland" and thatgenerational divide would have been starker and more convincing.(When the kids start boogieing with joy, the elderly parents arehorrified.)Next Blog»sal1mineo@hotmail.comSEARCH BLOG FLAG BLOGFOLLOW BLOGP O P S U R F I N G . C O MS U R F I N G T H E WAV E S O F P O P U L A R C U LT U R EB Y M I C H A E L G I LT Z & F R I E N D SPOPSURFING.COM: Happy Feet -- The Reviewhttp://popsurfing.blogspot.com/2006/11/happy-feet-review.html
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POPSURFING.COM: Happy Feet -- The Reviewhttp://popsurfing.blogspot.com/2006/11/happy-feet-review.html
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