Der Pagemaster - Richies fantastische Reise

This was my favourite film as a kid. Being born the year it came out, I think i spent the majority of 1998 watching it as that is when my brain developed enough to remember a movie. I honestly remember sitting there in my lounge room literally wishing there would be a sequel or a longer version somewhere out there because even as a toddler there were still parts of the film frustrated the hell out of me. I wanted to see Richard at school, get better sense of his lack of friends and worried, overly cautious nature. I wanted him to have a girl he liked, or someone he wanted to impress, that he could after his adventures with the books. I wanted more Christopher Lloyd. I wanted the areas of the journey he embarked upon to go longer than about 15 minutes each, I wanted more jokes and maybe a few more characters for them to meet along the way. I also would have liked more books to pop up, maybe like action or something like that. Even just a little cameo would have been cool.

All that being said, what I was left with, I loved. More than anything. James Horner's score is easily my favourite of all time and summarises my awesome childhood. Macaulay Culkin was always my hero. I was delighted he was the star of this. It was a hell of a lot better than richie rich. Yeesh. The visuals were terrific and it really did have a sense of wonder. The very short runtime however, stopped it from being a real classic. Man oh man that was a small tragedy as a kid. It filled me with a rich sadness, because I didn't want the story to end. It did make me feel as hard as i think i ever felt as a child though, and for that, I cant fault it. Plus the bike scene made me want to jump 10 feet in the air with happiness.

Okay, in 1994 I was obsessed with Macaulay Culkin. When I saw a trailer for this film, I couldn't wait to see it. When I went to see it though, my family and I were the only ones in the theatre! The same thing happened to my aunt and my cousins. I remember loving the film. I wanted that awesome bike he had. I got the videogame, and I got my copy on video. AND JAMES HORNER'S SCORE WAS AMAZING! I thought it was a good movie that had all the genres, even cooler that it was live action/animation. It's sad about it's bomb at the box office. It's quite a forgettable film, but I love it and I still do. Don't forget that Joe Johnston who is now quite acclaimed directed the live action scenes. Great for him.

It's a great movie. This kid, Richard Tyler, played by young Macaulay Culkin, is really paranoid, and always talks about injury-related statistics. During a frightening storm, he takes temporary refuge from the rain in a library, run by the eerie Mr. Dewey, played by Christopher Lloyd. Richard is instructed to find a pay phone so he can tell his parents where he is.

In the middle of the library, there's a huge ceiling painting of Dr. Jekyll, Mr. Hyde, Long John Silver and his crew from Treasure Island, Captain Aham and Moby Dick, a fierce dragon, and in the center, an old man with a long white beard and nobleman clothes holding a scroll. The ceiling starts dripping paint, and the globs are transformed into a huge dragon, which transforms everything it touches into animation. Richard, now a cartoon, meets the old man, the Pagemaster, who tells him that to get out of the library and return to normal, he must past three tests, described only as adventure, horror, and fantasy.

Soon, he also meets three hilarious talking books. The first, Adventure, played by Patrick Stewart, is probably the funniest guy in the movie. The second, Fantasy, played by Whoopi Goldberg, is also funny, but it's because of her attitude. The third, Horror, played by Frank Welker, is a brain-dead coward who looks like Frankenstein's Monster. With his three new friends, Richard has to pass the tests to get his normal form back, admittance to the exit, and most of all...the courage he never thought he had.

Hello. This is gavin.thelordofthefuture and this would be a review of a film that I've seen twenty years ago when I was a kid. The story about an 11 year old boy with statistics named Richard Tyler who stumbles upon a library during a thunderstorm and enters it. After meeting an old librarian, he goes to the fiction section and sees a mural with four pictures, but little did he realized that he gets transported to a world where every fiction story comes to life and sees a wise old sorcerer called the "Pagemaster". Then, his adventure begins and meets three fiction books named Adventure, Fantasy, and Horror and together, they must encounter haunted houses, pirates, and monsters in order to help get Richard back home.

Why am I reviewing this in the middle of a Christmas break? Well, let's just say that I've been watching this since I was a child and seeing how it has been 20 years, that's why I made that risky decision. Now, is there anything that I don't like about The Pagemaster? Well, let's just say that the only nitpick I do have is the animation. Don't get me wrong. It's beautiful and is very creative in it's making of the world of literary including Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde, the pirates led by Captain Long John Silver, and the Dragon in the climax of the film, but as time went by, it became a little dated to me.

Anyway, everything else still holds up. The story is very engaging with very clever writing and the morals about facing your fears and using your imagination doesn't preach on you as it is done perfectly. Also, it has some very good characters and they still hold up to this day. Macaulay Culkin is likable as Richard Tyler, Christopher Lloyd relishes his role as the librarian Mr. Dewey and The Pagemaster, and the three talking books, Adventure, a swashbuckling pirate book with Patrick Stewart's solid pirate accent, Fantasy, a sassy, but caring fairy tale book who pulls off some nice humorous moments while being wise thanks to Whoopi Goldberg, and Horror, a fearful Hunchbook and also has some funny bits with the famous Frank Welker, known for voicing animal creatures in other animated films. The other characters are also good with cameos from Leonard Nimoy as Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde, Phil Hartman as one of the pirate crew members Tom Morgan and Jim Cummings as Long John Silver.

The pacing is very brisk and doesn't come to the point where it would bore me to death, but the best part about The Pagemaster is the music score from James Horner, one of my favorite music composers. To some, it does copy music elements from his other scores from Star Trek II and others, but to me, it has a nostalgic value to it. Why, you may ask?

Well, the reason why I brought this up is because it does a solid job interpreting the theme song "Whatever You Imagine" that plays throughout the movie and has been stuck with me since my childhood ended. That piece of music alone is what made me watch this film over and over again.

Overall, The Pagemaster became one of my childhood films and today, it still holds up. It has an engaging story, some likable characters, some clever writing, and some really beautiful music. As those aspects stayed with me in my memory, this deserves a gold trophy of recommendation as a film that is worth watching to some who hasn't seen it yet. Check it out and relive your imagination!

The Pagemaster in my opinion, was a wonderful film, and I do think the 4.8 rating is too low. I have seen much worse movies, that are rated higher than that. Sure it's not Disney, but it is a good family film that I guarantee if you give it a chance that the whole family will love. The animation is not so bad, perhaps a little dated and rushed, but I've seen worse, and the dragon was excellent. The music by James Horner was beautiful, very fitting with what was going on on screen, very reminiscent of Land Before Time and Once Upon a Forest, and Whatever You imagine was amazing. The story tells of a young boy named Richard, who is serious and fearful of everything, until an unexpected visit to the library changes his life forever. I loved the story and the clever and diverse references to the literary giants, like Treasure Island, Jekyll and Hyde and Moby Dick, and the message of the film about facing your fears that doesn't preach. Macaulay Culkin is excellent here as is Christopher Lloyd, and Patrick Stewart (rousing and witty), Whoopi Goldberg (sugar and starch) and Frank Welker (in a fine Igor impression) expertly bring the snappy screenplay to life. I loved the witty banter between Adventure and Fantasy, and the librarian's rant about the different literary genres. And I don't think it is Macaulay Culkin or Christopher Lloyd's worst film, Culkin's was Richie Rich, Lloyd's was My Favourite Martian. All in all, a terrific film, with a 10/10. Bethany Cox