Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown

This is the only Charlie Brown full length motion picture I have ever watched, but I believe I have seen it at least 20 times by now. I caught it on Thanksgiving Day afternoon on channel 7 in Washington DC around 1983 or so, and have been compelled to stop and watch it every time I see it, ever since.

The plot centers around the Peanuts gang going to a summer camp, where a group of punk kids and a nasty, mangy cat are intent on humiliating the other kids, and winning the raft race. The Peanuts gang competes in the race, with the guys (Charlie Brown, Schroeder, Linus, and Franklin) sharing one raft, the girls (Lucy, Sally, Peppermint Patty, and Marcie) sharing another raft, and Snoopy and Woodstock having their own raft. Of course, mishaps ensue and the gang ends up working together to defeat the bullies.

This movie really has what a lot of real life movies don't have. Perfect comic timing. There's so many hilarious scenes... Snoopy rides in the abandoned tire, the debate over cold cereal for breakfast, Charlie Brown is promoted to leader of the gang but can't get a word in edgewise due to Peppermint Patty ("That's IT CHUCK!!! You're LEADING!!! BOY WHAT A LEADER!!!!! LEAD ON CHUCK!!!!"), Lucy's insistence on doing things democratically ("The question before the group is... Do we have the boys join us? Marcie! Prepare the secret ballots!!!").

Highly entertaining. Charles Schultz has done his characters proud.

Definitely the best Charlie Brown film ever. Chuck and the whole peanuts gang are off to summer camp. Superb animation sequence with Snoopy and Woodstock arriving by motorcycle. As usual Peppermint Patty wants to be in control of everything, but this is a movie were everyone gets to do their bit. Linus standing up to the bullies is particularly funny. ( amazing what he does with that blanket). The music is brilliant and the songs will have your kids singing along. I don't want to give to much of the plot away but suffice to say Chuck really saves the day. He's what we all know he really is "a hero". Your children, like mine, will watch this film over and over again. DELIGHTFUL. Will be buying DVD version when released.

The Peanuts gang go away for summer camp and are split into tents to compete against one another. However one tent has won every year and cheap in every event. When the raft race comes each tent is out to win no matter what.

I like Peanuts the strip even if it is more melancholy than funny at times. However the animated films often lose much of what makes Charlie Brown Charlie Brown. The plot is quite simple and doesn't matter or make sense (why does the motorised raft seem to struggle to catch the others? Where's the supervision? Etc) but that is only to be expected.

What is important is that the Peanuts characters are true to form and most are just as you imagine them to be. The humour is a little more visual and slapstick than the comic strip and this takes some of the familiarity out of the film. However the themes of Charlie Brown being forever the loser is one that's well held to. The voices are pretty much as you'd expect them to be but the animation seems very basic at times and doesn't seem too large a step away from the strip.

Laughs are few but the overall feel of the film is similar to the feel of the strip. Overall this will please kids but maybe not those who are fans of the strip. Snoopy has plenty of good bits and the characters are all there but they have nothing out of the ordinary to do.

This is a positive, enlightening film that, until recently I almost forgot about. It's significantly less static than most other Charlie Brown films and programs such as The Great Pumpkin, even though it has been edited and is less static now. Charlie Brown is actually now a kid who has a solid ego. It is after he discovers the cabin and spends the night is where he develops his most significant leadership qualities. This is not a commonly shown movie and other movies maintain the stereotype that Charlie Brown is a sorry sucker. This is a great movie for kids to watch because of it's character and originality. The movie doesn't a bad soundtrack, either. The songs are lively and pompous. In short I think this is one of the best family/kids movie I have ever seen and I'd recommend it to any fan of Charlie Brown movies.

Says, THE ENDING MAN

"Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown" is the third of four feature-length movies based on the beloved comic strip "Peanuts" by the great Charles M. Schulz. It precedes "Bon Voyage, Charlie Brown (and don't come back!!!) and follows "Snoopy, Come Home" and the marvelous, underrated classic "A Boy Named Charlie Brown." For the third film, the animation quality was taken down a notch, but the real charm of "Peanuts", the comic strip and the specials, was never in the visual look. It was all in the story, in the characters, in the gags, and dignity of everything that Schulz created. And this short and delightful little movie captures that effectively.

A common recurring theme in the "Peanuts" universe is summer camp, where Charlie Brown, Peppermint Patty, and sometimes others go to the remote woods and uncover fall into challenges, predicaments, and situations, all to the amusement of the audience. Here's a feature-length movie based on that. Charlie Brown and all of his pals are sent to summer camp and are pitted against a group of bullies and their rascally pet (I wasn't sure if it was a dog or a cat) in a river raft race. The race consumes most of the movie's running time as Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Linus, Lucy, and the others make their way through the wilderness and as usual, our round-headed protagonist, is trying to find a way to stand up for himself and prove that he's not a born loser.

The story for "Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown" could have been done effectively in a half-hour short, as it very well may have been originally intended. Even at a feature-length running time, it still comes off as very amusing. The charm of "Peanuts" was its ability to never fail at amusing you, delighting you, charming you, and making you grin positively from ear to ear. And I was grinning and laughing all the way through. The voice acting is considerably good as well. The only real complaint that I do have about the movie is that the animation quality has been taken down a notch from the previous two movies and the animated specials. It seems a little incomplete, a little sketchy to me and a little rushed. At times, for example, Linus's head would be of the appropriate proportion to his body, but at other times, it would seem to oversize itself.

From an effective opening to a most effective ending, "Race for Your Life, Charlie Brown" is another example of the countless charm that rectifies Charles M. Schulz as one of the true creative geniuses of all time. Well-directed by Bill Melendez, this is a sweet little family movie that will charm and engage adults at the same time it works its wonders on children.