Jackboots on Whitehall

I was reading about alternate history outcomes of WW2 and wanted to enjoy a film about it. I had seen and really enjoyed "It Happened Here" and almost watched it again but decided to look for another title. Many were unavailable but this one was, I'm happy I decided to watch. A puppet war comedy film, in my opinion, will have a small target audience. I believe that this audience would mainly be males. Now the puppet aspect may limit it further as not many people will watch a full length puppet film. I know about Team America and its success, so I take it that it was the inspiration for making the film. Being a British film makes a lot of sense. The Brits are known for all of the Anderson's productions which I grew up on in the 1960s to present. I actually showed my wife an episode of Stingray last week by coincidence and she enjoyed it, it was not only cool to watch but fun to crack jokes to. I completely understand why so many hate this film, times have changed since the 1960s. Back then (in the USA) males would watch war shows that glorified heroics. Then the Korean War and Vietnam War happened and views about the military's status changed in USA society. To serve was glorified prior to the 1970s. Then gradually, military service was considered not glamorous and for people that could not cut it in the non-military economic world. In the UK which has had to use its military on its own soil, I suspect that today their is more "patriotism" for military service then in the USA, despairingly labeled as the world's policeman. I don't fit the USA mold as I am a veteran, and a proud citizen. Since I enjoy puppet films this is a natural choice for me, but I doubt my wife would want to watch it. This movie was made for males who love alternative history, puppets and escapism.

Maybe it's because I grew up on Supermarionation but I loved this! The references to war films - and their clichés, they come thick and fast. Trying to guess who voiced which character. It also for me referenced British children's comics from the 70s, for e.g. Commando for the boys and Bunty for the girls. The animation was bad enough to be inspired. The individual characterisations made me think of the old Margaret Rutherford films. The young are all beautifully bland and everyone over 40 is a grotesque. If you want a film that evokes wet Saturday afternoons sat on the hearth rug in front of a black and white TV clutching your comic, this is it. It could have only been improved if Al Murray had been the village pub landlord!

The Story: Okay, since it will be important for audiences to know before they watch this, is this actually a Team America ripoff? Well, both yes and no. What I mean is that it does copy some of the core aspects of that movie, whilst other aspects are noticeably absent. When it comes to Jackboots, it certainly takes Team America's core of being a satire of a specific film genre as well as its stupid style of humour, whilst other clever or entertaining elements, such as the songs and social commentary, are left out, leaving the film to simply present itself as a dumb, satirical war comedy through and through. However, the film's desire to be like Team America in spirit leaves the feature with a lack of actual writing. Hell, at least Team America had an actual plot, which is not really the case for Jackboots as its plot is more of an excuse for overly drawn out action scenes, dull cliches and nonsensical plot twists.

I mean, seriously, some of these choices are just mind-boggling. But I think that anyone coming here isn't really gonna care about the storytelling, because the selling point of Jackboots is how it shares the same comedic style of Team America. So, I must ask, is this film at least funny? Unfortunately, it isn't. In fact, whilst Team America had some funny moments despite its weak story, Jackboots barely managed to make me chuckle, let alone laugh, where most of the jokes are either lazy, awkward or just plain random. I'm not kidding, some of these jokes really feel like they came out of nowhere. And because of the movie's main focus falling flat, it makes the feature feel like some of the longest 90 minutes of my life, as well as give off a dreary tone that left me bored and exhausted after watching it.

To be honest, I didn't have high hopes on this film's story being all that great, but I wasn't really expecting an uneventful plot full of drawn out action scenes and cliches, a sluggish pace that makes the movie feel way longer than it should be and comedy that is just absolutely pathetic, all of which combined to create a story that just proves itself to be a drearily bad attempt at copying Team America. (2/10)

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The Animation: Since the film's obsessed with being like Team America, of course it tried to emulate its visuals through the use of puppets. However, is it capable of capturing the same effects as that movie did visually? Honestly, no, not even close. Not that I'm saying Team America's puppet animation is amazing or even good, but at the very least, Trey Parker & Matt Stone knew the limitations of their puppets and tried to make the most of them and have fun with it to help the humour. With Jackboots, however, instead of trying to use the limitations of the puppetry to its advantage and make them the basis for some jokes, it decides to stay constrained to the limits and ignore the comedic potential that could come from them. For example, the puppets don't really have that much articulation and thus move in a manner that feels stiff and awkward, as well as ill-fitting for a bombastic puppet comedy, which would hinder the humour by leaving the visual gags to fall flat and make the movie look like it had a rather low budget.

However, the movements of the puppets aren't the only issue with the presentation, as the puppets themselves are lacking in terms of expressions, as they just look lifeless and empty, not to mention that the CGI used to give the puppets more life instead made them look downright terrifying. And with such limited puppetry, it makes the feature's visuals come off as underwhelming and even kinda cheap. Despite the puppetry's problems, however, not everything that was done visually is all that bad, as the film does feature some great backgrounds that not only match the time period of its setting but also shows tons of detail to catch the viewers' attention. Also, even with the issues, you can still tell that the puppets were crafted with effort and care, and that the puppeteers and sculptors were trying the best they could with what they had at their disposal.

Honestly, I can't help but feel bad, because it's clear that a lot of talent and care was put onto the puppetry here and that there are talented people working on the visuals, but unfortunately, these talented people had very little, if anything, to work with, and they were just too held back by certain limitations and a lack of creative vision to really present their true potential, and thus they're stuck with a movie that just looks subpar. (5/10)

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The Characters: Well, I think it's fair to say that, with how the movie was so obsessed with copying Team America, you'd safely assume that the characters were imitations of the characters from Team America. However, whilst that isn't really the case at all, that doesn't mean that the characters in Jackboots get a pass, as what's wrong with them instead is that they're not only one-dimensional, but sometimes they can leave so little of an impression that they feel pointless. When it comes to describing the heroes, there's Chris, the young "Everyman" protagonist with big hands and a secret heritage, Daisy, who's just the typical and generic supportive love interest, The Vicar, Daisy's mean and xenophobic father with a deep hatred for Scots, Winston Churchill, the powerful leader with incomprehensible monologues aplenty, Billy Fiske, a confident American pilot, Tom, Chris's supportive father figure and Gaston, a promiscuous Frenchman who appears from time to time.

Then there are the villains, consisting of Adolf Hitler, who barely appears in the film enough to have a real personality, and the trio of Heinrich Himmler, Hermann Göring & Joseph Goebbels, who're all just presented as ridiculously cartoony and goofy Nazis. As descriptions for the characters, that's all I can really say about them, and sometimes, certain characters just come out of nowhere, such as a pair of Nazi dominatrixes and even a confusingly major cameo of Braveheart. Yes, you heard me correctly, Braveheart appears in this movie. Yeah, I don't know why, either. However, despite how bad this feature is, there's one thing that it did do right, and that is the voice acting. As weak as the characters are, they do have some talented British personalities voicing them, such as Ewan McGregor, Timothy Spall, Richard E. Grant, Stephen Merchant, Pam Ferris, Richard Griffiths, Alan Cumming, and many more, not to mention how they all did a great job and brought some enjoyment to this dull film, especially considering what they had to work with.

Sure, maybe there are some talented actors who've done a solid job and added something enjoyable, but unfortunately these great talents had to be saddled with a cast of characters so bland and one-dimensional that they're not even worth remembering in the slightest. (3/10)

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Now, time to answer the big question, is this a Team America ripoff? And my answer is yes, it undeniably is. Jackboots on Whitehall lacks any sort of interesting identity or personality, as all it wants to do is copy Team America to try and bank off of its success, but in the process of mimicking Team America, it's left feeling like little more than a greedy, soulless scam. Sure, the feature does have a team of talented puppeteers and set designers with keen attention to detail, as well as a great all-British cast at its disposal, but unfortunately, it was hopeless to salvage, as it suffers from an uneventful story that is mostly made up of cliches, overly drawn out action scenes, sluggish pacing that makes the movie feel near never ending, limited puppet animation that can sometimes look creepy, generically one-dimensional characters that leave little impact and jokes that fall so flat that it makes the film feel boring and tiring.

Honestly, the best recommendation I have is to skip this and stick with Team America. Sure, personally, I don't think it's all that good, but it still offered me way more enjoyment than Jackboots ever did. Hell, it's not even so bad that it's entertaining, it's just a boring waste of time. Now, if you excuse me, I've just been drained from watching this feature, so I'm gonna have a nap right now. (3/10)

I can see what they were going for with this film, a knock-about pastiche of the Victor, done comically badly with tabletop dioramas and Action Men and Barbie style dolls - and right there was the first swing- and-a-miss.

With the voice cast and budget, they could and should have licensed actual Action Man. And surely the distinctive looks of the British Sindy doll would have been more apropos than Barbie.

So the stylistic tone was flat from the beginning, and then we get to the sheer woodenness of the (non) animation. Yes, I get that they're just moving dolls around, but there was no personality in the movement, nor expression in the faces. It was freakish and creepy and that jars with the comic tone that they were striving for. Rather than appearing deliberately and charmingly awful, it feels like this is the best that they could achieve, and shoddy work can only receive pity praise.

On the comic tone, strive as they might, it mostly failed. There are a few, a very few, smile (or grimace) inducing lines, but no consistency either in writing or scripting, with scenes dribbling on to no good purpose or conclusion. The pacing is also erratic, and the editing lazy. I suspect that every second of footage ended up on screen.

All in all a dire, disappointing mess that blows both the premise and the stellar cast on a dull, pointless exercise.

The glaring obviousness of the shilling in the early reviews and review- ratings doesn't do it any favours either. This is not a film that can stand on its own merits, and instead needs to rely on the kind of propaganda and suppression of which Goebbels would have been proud.

This movie is NOT for people whose idea of humor is "South Park." It's more for people who enjoy "Little Britain" or "League of Gentlemen." I laughed all the way through, not only because of the jokes (some of which appear to be far too subtle for most of the reviewers here), but because of the audacious premise of using what appear to be Barbies and GI Joes to "act" in a WW2 film. If you don't know the Ealing comedies, or British war films, or history for that matter, you will probably scratch your head at this film. But if you enjoy the quirky, or you were ever a little boy who made war SFX while playing with toy soldiers, you just might enjoy it. The voice cast features some of the finest British actors.

This is NOT a movie for kids, as there is a fair amount of "language" (mostly from an insane vicar played by Richard E. Grant), some brief sexual humor, and some graphic, bloody violence (which nevertheless is very funny since it involves the dismemberment of plastic action figures). Enjoy this weird spoof of war movie clichés, and don't complain about the quality of the puppets. If you do, you're completely missing the point.