Tom & Jerry: Il film

So back in 1992, we had the first attempt at a Tom & Jerry movie made for the big screen. Directed by TV animation veteran Phil Roman and released by Miramax, the film was a critical and financial failure upon its release and is often seen as the starting point of terrible Tom & Jerry movies to follow. It doesn't help that fans of the timeless cat & mouse look down on this movie for having the duo speak, but that alone is actually the least of the movie's problems. That being said, as poor of an effort as the movie turned out to be, there is a surprising amount of charm in it for all the wrong reasons.

Now despite the movie being named after Tom & Jerry themselves, the central problem with it is that the story focuses on a completely different character, Robyn Starling. Tom & Jerry end up taking a back seat to help this blandly written child escape her abusive aunt and reunite with her long lost father, even though this movie should have been theirs in the first place. Perhaps if the movie was executed in an Alice in Wonderland styled narrative where Tom & Jerry roam around the country in search of a new home, it would be a lot more fitting, but as is, we have to sit through a generic cookie cutter plot of someone who belongs in another film altogether. It doesn't help that the musical numbers by famed composer Henry Mancini and lyricist Leslie Bricusse range from charmingly upbeat to obnoxiously repetitive, some of which are immediately forgotten as soon as they're over. Also, you know a Tom & Jerry movie is in trouble when the duo not only barely chase each other around, but most of the slapstick is given to the villain's dumb dog on wheels (go figure).

However, despite the movie's flaws, what does make it somewhat of a curious viewing are the unexpected characters you couldn't imagine being in a movie like this. In addition to Robyn's hysterical aunt Pristine Figg and her hammy lawyer Lickboot, the people Robyn, Tom and Jerry encounter along their ways should have their own shorts altogether. From an obese dog who needs a roller skate to move around, to an insane animal physician sadly named Dr. Applecheek, to a gay Captain Kiddie and his puppet hand Squawk, this cast comes right out of nowhere and are just as bonkers as they sound in description. Plus, the voice actors and animators brought more life to them than the one dimensional script ever did, complete with over the top performances and appealing character designs. Also, as the film keeps on going, the stakes do at least get higher and higher, even if it's painfully obvious what happens at the end. After all, Tom & Jerry can't die in any cartoon, so why even bother trying to do so in the first place?

So in the end, while by no means a great watch, the 1992 Tom & Jerry movie is so bizarre in its execution that it leaves you wondering why the filmmakers chose to take the duo in this direction from the start. While there are better installments with the duo out there, I would recommend this over the 2021 movie, because this one at least has some weird plot points going for it compared to the corporately manufactured HBO Max original. Die hard fans of the duo might not like me in the morning for saying this, but the cat and mouse have been on worse adventures, as bad as this one is.

T&J are one my favorite cartoon characters. They are cute and cuddly, and they are a bundle of fun to watch. I used to giggled at their playfulness. Tom never gave up hope in trying to catch Jerry, and Jerry has never failed to find ways to avoid being caught. I still remembered that one time when my mom scolded me, I turned on the TV and watched T&J, and I was not sad anymore. That was how good T&J series were to me.

This film is a good, clean fun for the whole family. If I have kids, I would not mind them watch this film, rather than watching all those new cartoons that is filled with adult humors disguised in cute and cuddly characters. There were no sexual remarks or crass jokes and certainly no double meaning humor.

So who cares if T&J can talk to humans? So who cares if they stop fighting against each other and instead help each other to save the girl from the evil Aunt Pigg? If the film has to follow exactly from the TV series, then what is the point of having to make this film? So, a decent score of 8 out of 10. A clean, fun film for the entire family. And a definite watch for the young and the young at hearts.

After being rendered homeless when their animosity results in their owners inadvertently leaving them behind, Tom and Jerry are left to wander the streets without food or shelter. After the two reluctantly form an alliance of convenience despite their animosity, they come across a runaway named Robyn Starling who is under the neglect and abuse of her "Aunt" FIgg and corrupt lawyer Mr. Lickboot. The two team up to help reunite Robyn with her missing father.

Tom and Jerry are often considered the pinnacle of the works of William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, despite their legacy often being overshadowed by their cheaper more economical animated projects made for broadcast television (Flintsones, Jetsons, Scooby-Doo, etc.), Tom and Jerry is arguably the project that put the two on the map and gave them the necessary clout to establish themselves as a dominant force in the animation industry. The 114 shorts produced between 1940 and 1958 are still entertaining to this day, and their influence is second to none with the shorts winning seven Academy Awards. A Feature film had been in various stages of development since the 70s. Chuck Jones was one of the first to attempt the project, but script problems lead to it being abandoned, another project would've involved Chevy Chase and Dustin Hoffman playing the duo in a live-action format (but this appears to have never gotten passed the development stage. What we have here is a movie that isn't bad, but it's not good either, mainly because it feels like Tom and Jerry feel out of place in their own movie.

The plot itself is very standard stuff for a children's movie and plays like The Rescuers by way of Cinderella's evil stepmother. Charlotte Rae and Tony Jay are both talented actors who are clearly putting their all into characters that are very stock and don't have much in the way of substance or humor. A similar issue befalls the main character (yes, seriously) Robyn who isn't annoying or unlikable, but also doesn't have any real defining characteristics that leaves her as a blank audience proxy through which the viewer can project themselves as. The movie is also very slow paced and doesn't mesh well with the manic energy and over the top deliveries that are near synonymous with the cat and mouse duo. This probably explains why the movie will often contrive ways to separate Tom and Jerry from Robyn for extended periods of time but because most of the focus is on Robyn getting reunited with her father, it often feels like we're watching a trimmed down version of The Rescuers that is frequently inter cut with cameos from Tom and Jerry.

In terms of the voice acting it's a mixed bag. The controversial choice to have Tom and Jerry speak I don't think is too bad. TV character actor Richard Kind provides the voice of Tom and I personally feel he was well cast, his delivery does a good job of matching the arrogant cockiness that is often expressed on Tom's face in the shorts and I honestly wouldn't have been opposed to Kind voicing Tom in other incarnations. Dana Hill on the other hand I don't feel works nearly as well as Jerry. I'm not quite sure what it is about Hill that doesn't fit the role just right in my opinion, but personally when I see a character like Jerry, I usually think of June Foray's Rocky the Squirrel or Walt Disney's mickey voice being more fitting for such a character type. Maybe this isn't a fair assessment of the voice acting as it's derived from personal preferences, but that's more or less where I stand.

The rest of the voice actors are varying degrees of passable. Henry Gibson, Charlotte Rae, and Tony Jay are all voicing uninteresting characters but their deliveries do bring some life to them. Rip Taylor on the other hand playing captain Kiddie (who basically acts like Taylor down to throwing confetti on people) plays his part aggressively over the top and a little of him goes a long way. He's only in the movie for maybe five minutes, but his protracted yelling and self aggrandizement become tiresome within 30 seconds, especially a big musical number/

The musical numbers in this movie are not well done. Not only are they not pleasant to listen to as they're often sung by people not known for their singing abilities, but they also bring the movie to an abrupt halt by either describing things we already know or telling us things we don't need to know. The movie's score and songs were written by frequent Blake Edwards collaborator Henry Mancini who's done some amazing songs such as Shadows of Paris and Moon River, but his music feels as intrusive to this movie as Tom and Jerry do.

Tom and Jerry: The Movie isn't poorly made or poorly acted(mostly), but it is poorly conceived. This movie with an emotional core of a plucky orphan girl trying to be reunited with her lost father just doesn't fit with Tom and Jerry. I understand why they need a linking plot to justify Tom and Jerry as a feature film, but it was a mistake doing something this slowly paced. In order for a movie featuring Tom and Jerry intruding on another plot to work, the plot would need to be a fast paced farce that's more fitting with their comedic style. If the story Tom and Jerry were shoehorned into were something along the lines of Peter Bogdonivch's What's Up Doc? or John Landis' Oscar that might be serviceable material that could support a feature length film, but as is: It's putting a square peg in a round hole. The movie will entertain small children for its brisk 80 minute runtime, but it'll be forgotten about almost as soon as it's over.

It's a slightly well animated movie. I wish it could have more scenes with violent slapstick so the jokes will be more funny but the songs are alright. The plot to be honest dosen't fit with the 2 main characters. I really like how Tom and Jerry talk which is interesting to say the least because I just want to know the voice of a mute character or a character that barely talks. The girl is cute I guess. Lickboot has a funny voice and had a memorable qoute in one part of the film.

In total it's an almost decent film. 6.8/10.

How do you adapt two animated characters from 7-8 minute shorts into an 84 minute movie? There is never an easy solution. Typically it's easier to construct a narrative to entertain and occupy an audience's attention for a few minutes, but when the running time is much longer so must the narrative be. The importance when adapting short film characters for feature films is to keep the original spirit of the characterizations intact, while not forcing the characters far out of their element and having them deviate widely from the original source material. In other words Tom and Jerry: The Movie should not have been the talky, musical buddy-comedy it became. I can understand how the novelty of watching a cat and mouse fight for 84 minutes would eventually wear off; even watching several hours' worth of Tom and Jerry cartoons can eventually become routine, even if they are highly entertaining. This Film Roman production however made too many missteps in an attempt to be different, and instead became an underwhelming experience.

Tom and Jerry: The Movie marked the cat and mouse's first and only theatrically released film; made at a time when American traditional animation was rebounding from stagnation, experiencing a classical revival that lasted for most of the 1990s. Originally created for MGM theatrical shorts in the 1940s by William Hannah and Joseph Barbera, they have since gone through multiple iterations with other animation directors and studios, and spawned several spin-off shows and direct-to-DVD movies. Tom and Jerry typically shared a love/hate relationship; Tom would try to destroy Jerry, while Jerry would try and outwit (while painfully humiliating) Tom, though there were some situations where they would help each other if both could benefit from teamwork. What could have been a big hit in 1993 was instead soon forgotten. The movie opened at #14 at the U.S box office, was commercially unsuccessful and mostly a critical failure. Although the movie has some highlights with its 2D art and music score by Henry Mancini, they are largely overshadowed by poor choices in the script and direction, along with many unnecessary and unmemorable songs.

Tom and Jerry begin their movie in a suburban home not unlike the ones where they would wreck havoc in the original shorts. This time however, their antics cause their owners to accidentally forget them during their move to a new home. A wrecking ball demolishes the house and Tom and Jerry find themselves wandering the streets. Soon they encounter a dog and flea who are pals, and this is where the film introduces its first big mistake: giving Tom and Jerry voices.

Tom and Jerry were originally pantomimes. Up until this movie they had faithfully remained so, even when placed in situations where other characters were communicating with dialogue. Although some of the MGM shorts had Tom talking (though sparingly) in an exaggerated voice, the majority of the acting was done non-verbally, except with the occasional screams of pain emanating from Tom. Screenwriter Dennis Marks had previously worked on the series Tom and Jerry Kids (1990) which primarily led him to work on this movie, and it's unclear whether he or director Phil Roman decided to have Tom and Jerry talk. It's not that Richard Kind and Dana Hill's voice performances are bad, they just don't suit the characters, and giving the title characters voices significantly reduces their non-verbal dramatics. The musical numbers (for which virtually every character has one) further stretches the story which is too thin to last 84 minutes.

The biggest problem however comes later, when the movie introduces Tom and Jerry to a girl named Robyn Starling, and a plot that seems heavily inspired by Disney's The Rescuers. By this point Tom and Jerry are now friends thanks to earlier musical numbers, as they are mostly reduced to supporting roles for what unfolds as Robyn's movie. Robyn has run away from her nasty guardian Aunt Figg, who is keeping her as insurance, hoping that her adventuring father doesn't return from an accident in Tibet, so she and her lawyer Lickboot can keep squandering the Starling fortune. Tom and Jerry encounter Aunt Figg's dog, Ferdinand, whose excessive weight forces him to wheel about on a skateboard. This leads to mayhem in the kitchen, and one of the few times Tom and Jerry act like their natural selves. Their destruction leads to their incarceration with a veterinarian who is more of a prison warden than physician, and to a somewhat wasted cameo by another MGM character, that only older, astute animation enthusiasts would have recognized in the movie's initial run, and many kids today probably wouldn't identify him either. Robyn discovers her Aunt's deception and runs away again, and later winds up with a nautically-centric amusement park owner, Captain Kiddie, and his parrot puppet Squawk.

With all these supporting characters it's upsetting that none of them are more than mildly interesting, even with the capable voice performers behind them. Their development and motivations are quite shallow, especially the adult humans who are eventually driven by greed once a reward is offered for Robyn Starling's return. Even the quirky but friendly Captain Kiddie with his song about world travel, devolves into a greedy opportunist along with the rest. Once the main plot resolves itself, Tom and Jerry return to their traditional antics, and you wonder why they couldn't have been more like themselves in a shorter running time (as they later would be in direct-to-DVD movies). Instead they were made into supporting characters in their self titled movie, to support a musical buddy comedy, with a plot too reminiscent of a better developed plot from an older Disney title.

Tom and Jerry: The Movie has not affected the cat and mouse duo in the long run however, as their continued success on DVD and television has left the 1992 movie as more of a footnote in an otherwise dynamic career, which will likely continue for many years to come.