Re-Animated

Not going to do a full review of this movie but going to cover the basics of why this movie is horrible. One this was around the time CN was experimenting with adding live programming to the mix... this movie was a prime example of why this was bad... movie like batman are forgivable cause batman has a cartoon counterpart... this movie strives to be in the tradition of cartoon live action hybrids... but felt more like an attempt to create a satire of the concept of humor. The plot is ludicrous, boy get hit by a train needs brain surgery has pseudo-Walt Disney's brain put in his head and starts seeing things. Not ghosts like the kid in the 6th sense, but toons, not funny ones either... but barely funny dollar store mascot looking toons. Of course then the movie continues going on trying to make a story with things like a green girl, bad guys trying to get the brain back and boring to the point of absurdity action scenes... the movie feels like CN was trying to force it down viewers throats not really giving any place to offer feedback at the time... probably because they had out of jimmy's head planned... after this the Gary Coleman show and its TV movie feel like masterpieces.

Though I have the program they edited this movie on, this movie was absolutely terrible. The acting was clueless, I didn't even know when they were making a joke or when they were really acting. The director seriously needs to wake up and see what was happening. I mean, the family was odd, and the whole plot was just a waste of two hours. If you want to watch some good movies, watch HBO. Dominic Janes did a pretty swell job at some points, but the rest of the cast I can't even describe. I mean, who in the world would be in the hospital in a costume and preparing surgery on a boy. The effect of how Dominic flew in the air when the train hit him was clearly fake, even with the lines not there.

Thus, do not watch this film they say on Cartoon Network as the best movie ever. The cast will quite disappoint you.

Painfully atrocious. Reminiscent of a middle school play with flash animations. I stopped watching the first time. But I was profoundly conflicted. I really wanted to see the animated characters but I couldn't endure the unbearably awkward line deliveries.

What I feel is the worst part, you have Cartoon Network plugging the movie like it's the best thing since Roger Rabbit but they don't put the money and time necessary to make the film halfway watchable. This coming from a channel that claims to be the best place for cartoons. In all, the film is a serious let down and contrary to the expectations one would have of of major, multi-million dollar network devoted to animation.

I would, however, like to see more of just Golly and the gang. The film was a horrible misuse of the talented voice cast. I can't believe that was Ellen Greene. The animation was decent for CN's standards but more fitting for a fully animated setting rather than haphazardly layered on top of a real world setting. The plot doomed the movie from the beginning but the characters were affable enough to merit some more development, in a more suitable setting.

This is a real dark day for the old Cartoon Network. Not only do they begin to make non-animated fare for their sinking ship of a network, but it's terrible animated fare aimed at the lowest common denominator audience of shut ins and agoraphobic, obese pre-teens. Everything in this movie is so "turned up to 11" that nothing makes an impression.

One thing that did stand out was the terrible soundtrack. The music that accompanies scene changes is exactly like the music that follows the kids around on every Disney and Nick show. It's obvious that the CN is trying to catch up to them and make their own terrible garbage packages for kids.

They're the new Fox network. They cancel anything with a hope of being successful, and they greenlight stuff like this. Alternately, the Adult Swim line up apparently greenlights anything that blows in the door. It's obvious that they don't know what works in the post Aqua Teen tastescape, and they're content to flail around looking for it for as long as they need.

What happens when you combine low-budget vector animation with amateur actors? Certainly nothing comparable to "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?". That's not to say that my problems with this movie are that it doesn't measure up to a very good movie like "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?", no, it would be quite unfair to knock it just because it's no where near as good. There are plenty of OTHER problems with this "movie" to fault it on. So, the "... Roger Rabbit" comparisons stop here... for now.

The first, and most obvious problem with this movie, is the casting. Obviously they had a small budget to work with. That's the only thing that can explain why they'd choose a cast full of actors that rate mediocre, at best. These actors are almost as "good" as actors you'd expect to see on a kids' sitcom on Nickelodeon and the Disney Channel. Even the voice actors are bad, and that's amazing. Amazing because Cartoon Network normally employs some of the best voice actors in the country to work on their animated shows. So yes, the acting is bad. Quite bad. Only pre-teens could watch the movie without noticing this fault, and even so, it's insulting to make entertainment for kids and expect them to be ignorant of all its faults. The casting was terrible.

Then there's the extremely racially ignorant casting choice of selecting Eunice Cho and Micah Karns to play the role of Japanese kids whose family surname is "Yoshida." News flash: Asian ethnicities are not interchangeable. These kids don't have an ounce of Japanese heritage, and should not be cast to play Japanese characters; they don't look Japanese, not a bit. The decision to cast them borders on racism by reinforcing the stereotype that "all Asians look the same." In fact, these kids are so far from looking Japanese that you'd have to be brain dead or downright ignorant to ever mistake either of them for one. On the other hand, their grandparents ARE played by Japanese actors, and speak Japanese in their scenes. That only worsens the perceived racial stereotype here, as it paints a clear picture of what race the family is supposed to be while the kids are clearly of vastly different heritage. You really would have to be ignorant to not see the difference between them. Or a child. Great, let's help reinforce the stereotype by subjecting children to actors of mixed Asian races and telling them that they're supposed to be related somehow.

As for the animation, the other half of the "acting" in this movie, to most it will appear fairly decent. To big fans of animation, it's noticeably low-budget. They used a vector graphics animating program, i.e. Flash, for all of the animation. So, it looks very "tweeny," quite flat, often like paper cut-outs. While it's decent animation, it's still stiff and flat animation, and the characters don't move as fluidly as cartoons you'd see in a Disney film.

The plot of the movie was built around the rumor that Walt Disney's brain was put into cryogenic storage, so "Milt Appleday" represents Walt Disney and the cartoons and theme park are meant to be parodies of Disney's work. However, these Flash animated cartoons are no where near as lively as traditional cartoons like those made by Disney (or at least Walt Disney's Disney). It stands out when the characters almost "float" around, look completely superficial, when they aren't shaded to fit into the scene, when they seem like they were just slapped into the frame with little attempt to really assimilate them into the scene. I know I said I wouldn't make any more comparisons to "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?", but just watch that film and see how much more believable the animated characters are in that movie. They really do fit into the scenes shot in the real world. That's why at least one comparison must be made, as "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" was one of the best films to put animated characters into the real world with real actors. The characters in "Reanimated" stick out like sore thumbs in the real world. Sore, tween-animated Flash thumbs. That style of animation is great when it's applied to a great stylized cartoon like "Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends." But, it's a bit disappointing in its application in "Reanimated," where they stand in as parodical representations of Walt Disney's cartoons.

Overall, the movie is just barely "watchable" for younger audiences, but anyone in the teens and up will have a hard time stomaching the acting. Given the large amount of advertising and hype they've put into this movie, you'd think they'd have given it a decent budget to hire decent actors and bump the animation up from cost-effective "tweeny" computer animation to something traditionally fully-animated. There's really no excuse for the bounty of low-budget choices in the production of "Reanimated," this is Cartoon Network, a pretty big powerhouse in cable entertainment. For them to pump out and hype up such a mediocre piece of work is almost insulting to their viewers.