Showing posts with label animated movies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label animated movies. Show all posts

Oct 4, 2021

NIGHT OF THE ANIMATED DEAD (2021)

There’s never been a more abused horror title than George A. Romero’s original Night of the Living Dead (1968), as its strange and immediate classification as a public domain title allowed decades of ensuing filmmakers to pick its bones in all kinds of ways without legal ramifications, from creating unauthorized remakes to remixing the movie with new edits and presentations to straight up showing scenes from the movie in their own low budget endeavors. At this point, I’ve seen more characters in horror films settle down in front of their TVs on Halloween night and begin watching Night of the Living Dead then I’ve seen them wandering around dark houses or backyards while asking, “Is anyone there?” (I can speak with authority on this because even I’ve been personally involved with two crappy projects that desperately clung to the OG movie’s coattails. Any moron can do it.)

To date, only one project, officially sanctioned by Romero, has brought any class to the Night of the Living Dead name and that’s been the 1990 remake by longtime Romero collaborator and special effects maestro Tom Savini, which starred Candyman himself, Tony Todd, as the ill-fated Ben. Since then, we’ve had 1998’s 30th anniversary edition of Night of the Living Dead, which went back to the original movie and added newly filmed scenes to fill in some of the “gaps,” and which included returning actors who were very clearly thirty years older, as well as 2001’s Children Of The Living Dead, starring a now-regretful Savini, which was designed to be a direct sequel to that specific version of the movie and has since been disowned by nearly everyone involved in its making. Then came Night of the Living Dead 3D (2006) with Sid Haig, in which zombie Johnny TEXTS his beleaguered sister with “COMING 4 U BARB,” and its prequel Night of the Living Dead 3D: Re-Animation (2012) with Jeffrey Combs. Mimesis: Night of the Living Dead (2011) vied for a meta-approach by taking its own universe and meshing it with that of the classic undead zombie shocker. 2015’s Night of the Living Dead: Darkest Dawn was the first attempt to present an all-animated take on the zombie classic and was produced by, of all people, Con Air’s Simon West, and featured voicework by Danielle Harris and a returning Tony Todd. Honestly, this list could keep going but it’s already becoming tedious, so the last one I’ll mention is the recently filmed, odd-but-curious sounding project Night of the Living Dead II, which seems to be more of a straight-up sequel to Day of the Dead (1985), as it brings back the main trio of Lori Cardille, Terry Alexander, and Jarlath Conroy. As you can see, nothing about Romero’s original is safe – not the concept, not the title, and not the actual film, which is a trend that refuses to stay buried, as we now have Night of the Animated Dead, courtesy of Warner Bros., who hasn’t touched hands with anything remotely tied to this universe since 1988’s lousy but harmless Return of the Living Dead II.

With voicework by people you’ve actually heard of, like The West Wing’s Dulé Hill, the Transformers series’ Josh Duhamel, and It’s Always Sunny’s Jimmi Simpson, as well as the animation’s mostly loyal depictions of the characters/actors from the original film, it’s tempting to think this return trip to the well has finally figured out how to rebirth Romero’s film in a way that’s honorable, entertaining, and even substantive. Known actors, familiar characters, a major studio – clearly, they’ve nailed it this time, right? But if you think Night of the Animated Dead is going to be the title that finally gets it right, then buddy, you’re chewing a mouthful of Greek salad.

Die-hard fans of Night of the Living Dead will notice as soon as it starts that Night of the Animated Dead is using the original screenplay nearly word for word, which immediately robs the movie of any suspense. Instead of pondering what will happen and the new directions the movie will explore, your anticipation will be reduced to a basic curiosity for how the animators will present some of the original’s more notable sequences. This kind of approach to a movie, especially one you know so well, frankly isn’t enough to keep interest sustained, so once the novelty of the animation wears off, and once the first few words of each voice performer are spoken and you get the sense of how that performer meshes with his or her character, Night of the Animated Dead has trouble keeping viewers invested. One would also assume, being what it is, that the animation on display would be impressive, what with it being the selling point of the movie, but it’s not. It’s haphazardly done and very cheap looking, with herky-jerky movements that, at times, can actually be nausea-inducing. It’s that kind of Hanna-Barbera animation where if none of the characters are speaking to each other, everyone’s at a dead still like a photograph, and this happens so many times that you begin to wonder if your Blu-ray player is on the fritz.

The voicework ranges from perfectly fine to downright confounding, and it’s difficult to ascertain if certain choices were purposely made or accidental byproducts of the actors’ voice performances. Hill’s take on Ben is much gruffer than Duane Jones’, while Duhamel’s take on Harry is more subdued than Karl Hardman’s, whose Harry Cooper is still one of the all-time great dicks in cinema—and this while recognizing that Hardman wasn’t a professional actor. This might not feel like a big deal, but the dynamic shared between Jones and Hardman in the original movie put them on equal footing: they were both comparably bossy, domineering, and alpha male. Meanwhile, Hill comes off as the aggressor while Duhamel makes Harry Cooper seem more desperate and afraid, and whose dickishness seems to spur from fear instead of dominance and egotism. For reasons that should be obvious, and considering the decades of film theory that have examined the racial themes in the original movie, that’s…not a good thing to present for 2021. Really, the only voice actor who seems entirely comfortable with her work is Nancy Travis, who voices Helen Cooper. Confident with the medium and with a firm grasp on her character, hers is the only performance that blends well into the presentation; meanwhile, the other actors’ voice performances consistently blast you back out again. (Katee Sackhoff as Judy is bewilderingly bad.)

The only new thing Night of the Animated Dead brings to the table is its graphic depiction of violence, which was left unexplored in the original movie (at least by comparison). Instead of Johnny bumping his head on a tombstone, now his skull cracks open, brains leak out, and blood pours from every hole in his face. Instead of Tom and Judy blowing up unseen in a pickup truck, the engine block explodes through their windshield and takes out whole chunks of his face and her neck. It’s gratuitous, for sure, but it also comes across as disrespectful, though I can’t say why, considering how hyperviolent Romero himself would make his later sequels. And maybe that’s because the filmmakers felt constrained by sticking with the original screenplay and even the physical appearances of the original actors, so this was their way of putting their stamp on the movie…but then again, who asked them to stay so loyal in the first place?

Really, Night of the Animated Dead never feels respectful to its parentage, even if it does reuse the same words Romero wrote and the physical embodiments of the actors Romero cast. Even certain scenes’ choreography and staging are re-used, as if the filmmakers were looking at the original movie’s storyboards when creating their animations. But one thing stuck out more than anything else: in spite of Night of the Animated Dead borrowing the script, the actors, and the shot setups from the original movie, one scene in particular was pared down from its original incarnation, which Romero and co. had filmed guerilla style in Washington, DC, and depicted several governmental figures being grilled by the media while walking down the busy city street on the way to their car. Instead of re-using this walk-and-talk sequence, those same three government figures are placed in front of a static shot of the Capitol Dome while fielding questions from off-screen reporters—which, in essence, completely removes Romero’s in-film cameo as a reporter from this new iteration. I have to wonder if the filmmakers of this new version even knew he was in that scene to begin with. I wouldn’t be surprised if they didn’t, because if they did, why cut the director out of his own movie? Why not take that moment to tip their hat to the man whose seminal film they’re making a buck off? That, right there, seems to sum up Night of the Animated Dead: it’s the same screenplay, the same “actors,” and mostly the same shot compositions, and yet, somehow, there’s a complete lack of George A. Romero. And that’s the worst thing this newest take on the title could’ve done.

I wish I could delude myself and believe that, at the very least, Night of the Animated Dead might help to introduce the original film to newer audiences, but I doubt that’ll be the case. If you’re born with horror in your blood, that path was always going to lead you to the godfather of the zombie sub-genre anyway; for the newest generation, however, there are an army of imitators to wade through before arriving at the main event. One thing’s for sure: it’s more than worth the journey.

Oct 29, 2014

RECOMMENDED HALLOWEEN VIEWING: THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW


Somewhere along the line, Washington Irving's The Legend of Sleepy Hollow became the official Halloween "story." Celebrated every October as regularly as A Christmas Carol is revisited every December, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow's association with Halloween simply just is. Funny, being that not only is the word "Halloween" never once uttered in the story, the events are also set about fifty years before Halloween ever traveled all the way from Ireland to American shores. Where it may lack in anything Halloween, it makes up for with its huge emphasis on autumn celebrations with no details spared on October foliage and (obviously period) culinary favorites to honor the season.

There have been so many print editions of the original story that it would be near impossible to collect them all. (I have this handsome edition specifically.) There have been dozens of iterations of this famous story, ranging from big budget Hollywood reimaginings to animated Disney shorts to an inspired episode on "Are You Afraid of the Dark?" Tall animated busts of the Headless Horseman can be found in Halloween stores and catalogs every year. 

Of all the different incarnations, this particular one is my favorite. This simple effort, that equates to nothing more than a slideshow featuring still art complemented by an adapted audio telling of the original text, was my first ever exposure to Washington Irving's tale, and it's stuck with me ever since having rented it repeatedly from the library when I was a lad. Confined to only a VHS for the past many years (having been out of print for most of its existence), a recent re-issue on DVD had me cautiously excited to revisit the film so many years later.

To watch it now is to be both charmed and slightly embarrassed by its simplicity. The text, as narrated by Glenn Close, is not that of Washington's original story, but a toned-down version more traditionally told to appeal to the young audience at which this presentation is aimed. While the paintings by Robert Van Nutt are eye-catching, and Close does a fine job playing multiple characters, I could see the Power Point-ish presentation turning off younger audiences used to more modern Pixar-ish animation. Still, the simplified adaptation takes no liberties, presenting the story as originally written. (Sorry, kids: there is no tree filled with heads, nor any sexy time between the Headless Horseman and his witchy subjugator. Nor is there anything nearly at the heights of absurdity as is currently going on with Fox's "Sleepy Hollow" series.)

"The old country wives, however, who are the best judges of these matters, maintain to this day that Ichabod was spirited away by supernatural means; and it is a favorite story often told about the neighborhood round the winter evening fire...The schoolhouse being deserted soon fell to decay, and was reported to be haunted by the ghost of the unfortunate pedagogue and the plowboy, loitering homeward of a still summer evening, has often fancied his voice at a distance, chanting a melancholy psalm tune among the tranquil solitudes of Sleepy Hollow."
If you've stuck with me for this long, you may have read my Unsung Horrors column on Lady in White, during which I muse on the importance of nostalgia as it pertains to my appreciation for Halloween. This particular video edition of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Rabbit Ears Entertainment goes a long way, as does Lady in White, in bolstering that nostalgic love. It may not feature heads flying through the air and Johnny Depp being Johnny Depp, but it does manage to be what I hope Halloween will be and how it will feel every year: perfect and pure.

Oct 7, 2012

DAY SEVEN: RECOMMENDED VIEWING – THE HALLOWEEN TREE


I tried to make my recommended viewings a little less typical, but I couldn’t help but include 1993’s animated take on the Ray Bradbury novel of the same name. It just wouldn’t feel right leaving this one in the dust, considering that it’s so widely beloved by so many people in so many age groups, yet here we are in the dying DVD age and the damned thing still doesn’t have a proper DVD release. (I mentioned in an earlier post that it is available via the Warner Bros. Archive Collection on DVD-r only, which I guess is good enough. For now.)

I discovered Ray Bradbury late in life, roughly two years before the man passed away with disappointingly little fanfare while most “readers” were too busy masturbating to Fifty Shades of Grey through their granny underwear. (But I’m not bitter.)

As much as I enjoyed his novel The Halloween Tree, it wasn’t until seeing the animated movie of the same name that I fell in love with the story. I wish I could be one of those people who say “I’ve been watching that movie ever since I was kid, ” but sadly I can’t. I’m also that person who never saw It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown until many years out of my youth.

Once I did, my response was, “That’s it?” (Sorry!)

Fortunately, my lack of exposure to The Halloween Tree in my youth did not prevent me from loving it. It’s become yearly and required viewing for me, and since discovering it I’ve been depending on a crappy VHS rip burned to an undependable DVD. Thankfully, the recent Warner Bros. Archive edition offers a very good looking and sounding presentation. (Also, would it be wrong of me to tell you the entire movie can be watched on Youtube?)

As clichéd as it’s become to say, the whole family really can sit down and enjoy this production. Yes, it’s animated, but don’t let that scare you, cooler, older adult man/woman. It may be animated, but like Pixar’s filmography have proved, it doesn’t mean weighty themes about life and death, friendship and sacrifice, can’t be present, shared, and appreciated.


 
Ray Bradbury provided the teleplay adaptation of his novel (which earned him an Emmy award) and also provides the narration for his tale about a group of kids all set for a night of Halloween night trick-or-treating until they see one of their friends, Pip, being taken from his home in an ambulance. The kids are distraught, unaware of what to do or how to think…until they spot Pip somehow tearing ass through the woods. The friends follow after him and come across a dilapidated old mansion where they meet the very mysterious Mr. Carapace Clavicle Moundshroud (voiced by Leonard Nimoy) and see his very tall and very unusual Halloween tree – made of dozens of glowing jack-o-lanterns. They see Pip go AWOL with a pumpkin from the tree, and Moundshroud demands that it be returned, being that it now “belongs” to him.  A chase ensues, not across the town but through time itself – from the pyramids of ancient Egypt to the cathedrals of Notre Dame – each providing a bit of history on Halloween’s beginnings.

The Halloween Tree sees little change from its novel form to its teleplay. The number of kids shortens to four (one of them becoming a girl), and some of Bradbury’s more flowery and abstract descriptions are toned down to be a little more accessible, but the spirit of the story remains firmly in place.

Nimoy does a good job with voicing Moundshroud, though it’s peculiar he would choose to utilize such a strange, almost bird-like screeching voice instead of relying on the deeper, baritone voice for which he is well known. Still, odd choice aside, his voice acting is effective, as are the kids’.

Famed studio Hanna-Barbera provided the animation, and while it’s a reflection of the time it was made, it’s still certainly more than satisfactory.


Regardless of when you discovered this movie – whether in your youth or your adulthood – it contains the power to enthrall and fill you with that certain kind of nostalgia that only usually happens by accident. But The Halloween Tree works in this regard like gangbusters. It will fill you with the kind of melancholy that only occurs when revisiting your childhood, but you’ll also laugh and maybe tear up as you watch these kids tumble through different lands and time periods, all in hopes of saving their friend. By the end, you’ll be wishing your friends were as loyal and devoted as Jenny the Witch, Ralph the Mummy, Wally the Monster, and Tom Skelton the you-know-what.  


Sep 9, 2012

BUY ME THIS: THE HALLOWEEN TREE DVD


Courtesy of Warner Bros. Archive, 1993's animated version of The Halloween Tree (the one narrated by author Ray Bradbury) is finally seeing a DVD release. Unfortunately, because it's being released through the archive collection, the disc is considered "made to order," which means you'll be receiving a DVD-r of the film, not a typical pressed DVD. Still, it would be nice to finally get rid of the bootleg version I, ahem...acquired...several years ago.

This helpful review explains exactly what you'll be getting. Basically, full screen format, no special features, but a good looking and sounding picture.

Buy the DVD here. (For me.)