Animation &Commentary &Daily post 07 Nov 2007 09:12 am
In Your Face
– Last night, I saw the Dreamworks/Seinfeld concoction of an animated feature. Bee movie. The title is meant as a pun on “B” movie; unfortunately, that’s what this really is – a second rate film.
I should keep my opinion to myself, but I can’t. I have no intention of putting down any of the excellent artists, designers, or animators that worked on this film. They did what they could given the circumstances.
Let’s talk about what I see as “the circumstances” given the fact that I know NOTHING about the making of this film other than what Jerry Seinfeld said on Charlie Rose or that I was able to guess from the movie, itself.
The story is pathetic. If it had been just a mass of uproarious, funny jokes, I’d have been happy. In fact, I didn’t hear too much laughter in the theater, and I wasn’t brought to smile even once. It wasn’t funny. In fact, about midway through the film, I felt that I was watching some kind of bastardized Industrial or Educational film about bee pollination. The only problem was that the information was so simple that I knew that wasn’t the case. Jerry Seinfeld should be ashamed of his role in this product, and I believe that was probably the problem.
Now, the problem with the “craft” of the film. It was all at the top.
For some reason, the actors were directed to push their performances way – I mean WAY over the top. Renee Zellwegger has given many fine performances during her career – including King of the Hill and Shark Tale. Her acting in Miss Potter was extraordinarily subtle and nuanced. However in Bee Movie, she shouts her lines, overperforms every word and telegraphs every simple sentence. Yet, alongside John Goodman, she’s the maestro. His performance as a prosecuting attorney allows him to don a Southern accent and pretend he’s doing Inherit The Wind in some regional dinner theater where he’s trying to shout over the clinking tableware and devour all of the scenery. It’s an embarrassing performance. Even Patrick Warburton, not the greatest actor is fine in many other animated films including The Emperor’s New Groove, yet here he’s required to scream his every line. I don’t get it; it’s as if they were all forced to give heightened performances to try to make the poor writing funnier. It didn’t work.
The poor animators, saddled with these readings, animated what they got. Hence, the shouted lines were overanimated – that’s the only way they could work – with an aggression that I haven’t seen in quite some time.
The film was dreadful. I’m sorry, I don’t mean to offend anyone out there who’s worked on it, but I did not enjoy the experience. Of course, it’s only my take on the thing, and my opinion is just that.
By the way, why is it that these animated features consistently rob the insects of two of their appendages? Bug’s Life and Bee Movie choose to illustrate bugs as having two arms and two legs, unlike real insects which have six. At one time, the Jerry Seinfeld character comments on the eight legs of spiders, making us even more aware of the shortchanged bees in this movie. For Pete’s sake, even the ugly Nasonex bee has six legs, though for some reason he has an hispanic accent. Who’s making these choices?
- Now let’s talk about ART in animation.
The ASIFA Hollywood Animation Archives is currently displaying an exhibit of early Grim Natwick art. There are photos of the exhibit at their site and a couple of excellent scans of Grim’s early animation drawings. If you haven’t seen these, you ought to visit their site – or the archive, itself.
GRIM NATWICK’S SCRAPBOOK
An Exhibit Presented By The ASIFA-Hollywood Animation Archive
2114 W Burbank Blvd
Burbank, CA 91506
Tuesday through Friday 1pm to 9pm
- This month, Jeff Scher reworks a 1945 musical film, Yours, for the NYTimes. Kudos to Jeff for another fine piece. One a month for The NY Times. Would that other newspapers would take it on to support a bit of animated art. Support it by adding your hit to their post.
Today’s NYTimes also includes a review of a number of animated DVDs including: “Ratatouille,†“Pixar Short Films Collection: Volume 1,†“Looney Tunes Golden Collection: Volume 5,†“Chuck Jones Collection,†and “Fantastic Planet.â€
If they’re animated, they must be connected.
on 07 Nov 2007 at 9:55 am 1.hans bacher said …
watching one of the worst trailers I have ever suffered through
gave me enough reason never ever spending 75 or whatever
minutes of my life to watch that crap. and I would go further,
i blame some of the artists. the character design is very
mediocre and the art direction doesn’t exist. that is based on
the trailer scenes, and I am sure they did not select the worst
stuff for that.
on 07 Nov 2007 at 9:58 am 2.Fred Sparrman said …
When Patrick Warburton’s character was onscreen in “Bee Movie,” I can’t recall when I’ve been more miserable in a movie theater. It made me want to go across the hall into “Saw IV” for relief.
on 07 Nov 2007 at 10:06 am 3.Bridget said …
Didn’t even occur to me to go… But the mental picture I have of you writing the splog review is pretty funny !
on 07 Nov 2007 at 10:07 am 4.Michael said …
Hans, I agree with you, but chose in this piece not to attack the artwork. The pastel colored world was particularly annoying. The hair looked great, but the faces and bodies under the hair didn’t. I think I’ll stop here.
However, particularly irritating was that all of the characters did nothing but smile large for the first ten minutes of the film; it felt like a commercial. I think smiles should be used sparingly so that they mean something.
on 07 Nov 2007 at 1:59 pm 5.drone said …
Hans, don’t blame the artists. What you saw wasn’t what Carlos or anyone else designed.
Final models along with every single other thing in the film, including, most unfortunately, the smallest bits of animated performance (with a few exceptions) were subject to one person’s approvals(or whims). No prizes to those who guess who that was.
As for Michael’s overall reaction, agreed 100%.
on 07 Nov 2007 at 2:19 pm 6.Julian said …
That Nasonex bee speaks with an accent because Antonio Banderas provides his voice. The gig must pay well.
on 07 Nov 2007 at 10:58 pm 7.Tom Minton said …
The New York Times DVD review states”…Jones seemed to be reaching toward a grander, more mythic scale in these films, of which the best is “Rikki-Tikki-Tavi†(1975), an adaptation of a Kipling “Jungle Book†tale. But the budget and the backup (the voice work of Mel Blanc, the music of Carl Stalling, the background designs of Michael Maltese) are not there, and the results fall short of what Jones, a giant in the field, was capable.” The legendary story man Mike Maltese would’ve been proud to be mentioned in the Times but probably baffled to be extolled as a background designer.
on 08 Nov 2007 at 8:47 am 8.Stephen said …
The first time I’ve seen the Bee it was on a Cheerios box and I thought why would they change that silly little bee so much? Then I relized that it was another silly little bee and it was just an ad for the movie.
(the Cheerios Bee has been robbed of its appendages as well)
on 08 Nov 2007 at 11:39 pm 9.daniel thomas macinnes said …
At the Mall of America, there are telescreens above all the map kiosks, and every one of them hammers the Bee Movie trailer endlessly. I’ve probably had that damned thing burned into my retinas. It wasn’t a very compelling sales pitch for the movie, but this is Dreamworks and I expect something along those lines.
I’m happy you mentioned Jerry Seinfeld’s appearance on Charlie Rose. It was a great interview, lots of fun to be had. That was probably better than the cartoon, although I haven’t seen it yet, and probably won’t.
I still try not to be too cynical about these things. I’d feel much better if these animated films were much better. I really want to like them, but they’re soooo stupid. If I want to surround myself with stupid, I’ll find Bush supporters. And then I’ll sell ‘em paint chips.
A short note about the new Pixar DVD’s. Who’s noticed that Ratatouille is so spare of extras? This is surprising – Pixar DVDs are always packed with bonus material. There’s practically nothing here, aside from one new short and a feature on cooking. Then again, I’m still surprised that the movie barely made $200 million at the box office. The Pixar shorts DVD is much better, and a long-awaited addition to the library. We’ve waited too long for this. This also raises my hopes – only a little – that Americans could finally see the excellent Studio Ghibli Short Short DVD.
on 09 Nov 2007 at 12:36 am 10.Michael said …
A recent post on Jim Hill Media talks about why there are so few extras on the new PIXAR dvds.
on 09 Nov 2007 at 12:46 pm 11.Mac said …
Bee Movie aside I found that Jeff Scher short difficult to watch (though probably not as difficult as sitting through Bee Movie). I’ve been really loving all these shorts Scher is making and I’m glad he’s open to experimentation but this one is just TOO bright and confusing with hardly any actual animation. The music was nice though.
on 09 Nov 2007 at 8:25 pm 12.Laura said …
Arg, maybe it’s because I’m British, but I don’t find Jerry Seinfeld funny in the first place, never mind when he’s badly animated as well. Shame though, I really enjoy Patrick Warburton’s voice work most of the time. I won’t be seeing Bee Movie unless it’s somehow for free and there’s nothing better to do, though.