Pico et Columbus - Le voyage magique

This is one of those films where you just don't have any idea why it was even made. Why in the world would Germans feel drawn to a story featuring Christopher Columbus, a wood worm, a firefly princess and some sort of horribly, horribly animated swarm something-or-other? I just keep asking myself over and over again, "Why?"

The overall animation doesn't even come close to looking like anything out of the 1990's. It is very simplistic, drab and amateur-looking. Supposedly stationary objects jiggle back and forth and the mouths of characters don't match the words being spoken way too many times.

Forget about all of the important ingredients necessary to make a decent animated film. Dom DeLuise and Corey Feldman as your main voice talent? Ugh. Sheesh...and the songs in the film! You will thank me for the following advice: Do not keep any sharp objects lying around while watching this film! If you happen to find a pencil before you find the "Mute" button on the remote, well, you will probably be tempted to use it to puncture your eardrums. The sole good song is the one by Al Jarreau over the closing credits.

I don't even know where to begin as far as the story goes. Something about a wood worm who walks and talks and wears clothes. He has a carrot for a nose and tells Christopher Columbus that the world is actually round and not flat or square. The wood worm, named Pico, snags a girlfriend but she is later kidnapped by a swarm creature. Columbus convinces the Queen to give him three ships so he can sail to Asia and Pico tags along to try and find his girlfriend. They end up landing on a tropical island and find a fortune in gold. Is any of this sounding interesting to you?

This is one of those many films where you just know that the story behind the development of it is infinitely more interesting than the film itself. I don't know why the Germans didn't make something that they could relate to better. They tried to emulate an American animated film but completely and utterly failed. Even early episodes of "The Smurfs" are filled with more complex storytelling and cutting edge animation than this disaster. Bon Voyage! 1/10

I saw The Magic Voyage as a big stickler for animation. The Magic Voyage is a terrible movie and somewhat pointless as well. On the other hand to its credit, it does succeed in what it set out to do, to inform and entertain the young audience, so I can't entirely hate on it. Although I realise the movie is really poor after many years of not seeing it, I loved it as a kid, hence what I said about what the film tried to accomplish.

The animation is really quite bad. The colours are okay-ish, but the background art is lifeless and the character designs especially the noses are odd. I liked the songs as a kid, I was shocked at how forgettable the melodies were and how inane the lyrics were as a young adult(19) though, and how little they do in telling the story or moving it forward. The story is unfocused and made up of overlong and disconnected scenes, while the writing is both laughable and bizarre.

The characters are also unmemorable and unengaging. The title character sometimes doesn't even feel like a title character, while Pico is very annoying. I do like the voice cast as in actors in general, but I just found them really bland here, yes even Dom DeLuise. So all in all, terrible but because of what it aimed to do I can't be too overly hard on it. 1/10 Bethany Cox

This is without a doubt one of the stupidest films ever created. Everything from the characters to the plot to the atrocious songs is just ridiculous to a degree that is simply unfathomable. It's actually rather hard to explain because the flaws are just too numerous. Suffice to say, you will need a vomit bucket for this.

It is certainly the worst movie I've seen all the way through and I'm shocked that it didn't get a perfect 1.0 out of 10.0 for the average score. If it were up to me, I'd give this stinker a -10 or better yet, go back in time and prevent it from ever being made. Oh well, there is anime for those in search of quality animation.

This could be, by far, the worst animated foreign film ever made. Surely it's the worst I've ever seen in a long time.

Why would the Germans try to tell a story about Christopher Columbus? This is insulting to history, insulting to children's intelligence, and, worst of all, insulting to Columbus and his crewmates. This is actually so bad I can't even put it in paragraphs. How bad is this movie? How is it misguided? How is it so insulting to history? Here's a quick checklist:

01. A Talking Bookworm Named Pico (Corey Feldman, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles)

02. A Princess Firefly Named Marilyn (Irene Cara, Fame)

03. An Evil "Swarm-Lord"

04. Pico Telling Christopher Columbus (Dom DeLuise, The Secret of NIMH) That the World Is Flat When In Reality Columbus Figured It Out Himself

05. Columbus Going To The King & Queen To Tell Them His/Pico's Idea Of Finding The New World When In Real Life It Was The King & Queen Who Told Columbus To Find the New World

06.Stereotypical Crewmates

07. The Most Corny-as-Hell Dream Sequence Where Columbus Pulls A Spyglass Out of His Penis

08. The Crewmates Trying To Hang Columbus When In Reality It Never Happened

09. Talking Beavers Helping Pico and Marilyn Defeat the Swarm-Lord

10. Columbus Using A Sock-Puppet To Get The Long-Found Gold. Again, It Never Happened.

11. Stereotypical Natives In The New World

12. The Most Sugar-Coated Ending In Which the Natives Honor Columbus, Columbus, Pico and Marilyn All Heading Home Alive and Safe and Columbus Talking About How The World Will Improve Within the Next 2,000 Years. There's Not Even An Epilogue That Tells How Several Of Columbus's Crewmates Were Killed By the Natives.

See how bad this movie is? Not only that, it rips off Jim Henson's "The Dark Crystal" and "Labyrinth", as well as Don Bluth movies like "The Secret of NIMH", "All Dogs Go to Heaven" and "A Troll In Central Park" (and I thought THAT movie was bad.). The only saving graces of this movie are Dom DeLuise and Irene Cara. Other than that, it's loud, rude, and TOTALLY disrespectful to history.

** out of **********

This is a movie that is supposedly the story of how Columbus discovered America with his famous voyage across the Atlantic Ocean.

We all know the story of how Columbus discovered that the earth is round, but not many of us are stupid enough to think that a wood worm told Columbus this revolutionary idea. There's even a scene in which Columbus says to a ship crew man, "this isn't an ordinary wood worm, this is the word worm that told me the world was a'round! Did you know the world was round, amigo!"

Not only that, but there's a lot of other historically accurate characters, such as a giant swarm of bugs called "The Swarm Lord" and a fairy named Marilyn from a fairy land called "Moon Twilight".

It shouldn't surprise anyone that this movie was made by German film makers. It's unbelievable how little the makers gave a crap about history. The movie is directed by Michael Schoemann, who more then likely read the introduction on a history book about Columbus, closed the book, rolled it up into a giant cigar and smoked his brains out with marijuana and said "Hey, you know what this story needs? Swarm Lords, a talking wood worm and fairies!!!"

Like many people on IMDb, I saw this movie while I was a child and loved it. By the time Columbus and his crew get on the ocean sailing, the movie goes sugar high insane with Columbus going crazy in his dreams, singing a song and a strange climax after the arrival in America and bugs attacking. There's apparently more to fear then just the edge of the world.

I found the movie to have some pretty hilarious moments in it's idiotic premise, such as the horrible dubbing which most of the time goes along lips that aren't even moving, a few lines from crazy Columbus and an argument concerning the ship running over a fish.