Kermit: Les années Têtard

Oddly, "The Swamp Years" is about Kermit's adventures away from the swamp. The plot takes its good-hearted turns rather abruptly, without much signalling in advance. There are some in-jokes like Kermit's first encounter with a pig-- the sort of joke more likely to inspire a knowing nod than a guffaw. There are some poop jokes, which I don't think Jim Henson would have put up with. Kermit's voice is pretty good, except for an occasional underpronounced vowel. The music is well chosen, but there isn't enough of it and some of the lyrics are lame. I think my favorite character was Kermit's mother, who is more obviously a human hand than today's Muppets usually are. For some reason, I found it rather touching that when you go back in Kermit's ancestry you find the human creator more thinly disguised.

stars: Steve Whittemire as Kermit and other. Bill Barretta as Croaker and D'fly. John Kennedy as Arnie the alligator and others. Dave Goelz as Waldorf. Jerry Nelson as Statler.

Interesting little movie about Kermit when he was little. The good things about it were the great look the movie had due to the cameras they used to film it. It had funny references to the Muppets as they are today, including Kermit mentioning that he doesn't like pigs, an appearance by young men Statler and Waldorf and Arnie the alligator which was a character that appeared on the show and was in the Muppet Movie. The plot was that Kermit and Croaker the frogs are going to be dissected for a school project, but escape. Meant for little kids, but adults will enjoy it too.

My rating: B minus. 81 mins.

This recent Muppet film has been greeted with accusations of cynical "cashing-in" on the part of the producers. These can be easily batted away, however, when one comes to personally experience this re-imagining of Kermit's origins.

With a batch of new, but undeniably 'muppet' friends, Kermit begins life as just another ordinary frog - but it is the fact that he could love and can dream that sets him apart and on the road to fame.

I was reminded of the opening scenes of 'The Muppet Movie', when 'Rainbow Connection', and the spindly-legged creature singing it, stole my infant heart and replaced it with a font of dreams and wandering imagination. At that age I wondered what Kermit was doing on the swamp planet of Dagobah,not recognising the Florida everglades. In a way, I feel that this was a correct, spiritual link to make - between Henson's musical amphibian and Oz's diminutive sage the common truth that it is "not easy being green" is shared.

With Kermit's name in the title, the film is a must for fans, or rather, kin of the muppets. The 'Disney's franchise' years are behind it, unsavoury memories of the corporate-flavoured 'Muppets in Disneyworld' TV special are expunged from the memory and the renaissance engendered by 'Muppets in Space' continues apace.

The original muppet-makers' hands are less in evidence on this film, but don't let that turn you away. In many ways this is the spiritual cousin, and, oddly, natural accompaniment to the Star Wars prequels.

It has been many years since Kermit has been home so he gets on his scooter and heads back to the swamp. Driving down the road to the swamp Kermit reminisces about the first time he saw that road. He was only a small frog when he and his friends ventured out onto it for the first time – only for two of them to get picked up by a driver in a red truck. Kermit and his other friend were forced to set out after the truck to try and rescue their friends from the terrors of the outside world.

Using the hook of the famous Muppet character in his early years, this film delivers a version of Toy Story where Kermit is forced out into the unfamiliar world to rescue his friends (although where this leaves Muppet Babies in the Muppet universe is beyond me). The plot is basic though and lacks any real emotion or intelligence in the way that Toy Story was and the total film is pretty basic. It has a few laughs along the way for adults but mainly this will appeal to younger children who will be amused by the puppets and engaged by the bad guy of Dr Krassman. I doubt very much though that such basic antics will appeal to older viewers – certainly not to adult viewers who have fond memories of the wit and energy of the Muppet Show.

The voice work is all fine, with Whitmire doing a good job as Kermit, while Barretta, Goelz, Mazzarino and others all fill in well enough. The human cast are so-so; Haggard's not great and try as he might, Hostetter isn't that great a bad guy and can't pull of genuine menace and comedy – so he ends up doing neither particularly well. The tone of the film is overly comic and it does prevent it do anything of significance. Overall a so-so film that will please young children but doesn't do anything else well enough to be of greater value.

Just for the record, I am a big fan of the Muppets, The Muppet Show and Muppet Babies were part of my childhoods, and I love all their specials and movies, excepting Letters to Santa, Muppet Wizard of Oz and this. Kermit's Swamp Years is not terrible, it's just that I had a very lukewarm reception towards it. The costume and set design are splendid, the voice work is great especially from Steve Whitmire and Dave Goelz and there are some cute moments such as the outtakes. However, the songs are mediocre, especially the uninspired lyrics, the script and jokes fall flat due to a lack of comic timing with the human cast with little of the material coming across as memorable or quotable, the story is dull and very basic with too much emphasis on the comic elements consequently the wit and heart is gone and the human cast range from so-so(Drew Haggard) to quite bad(John Hostetter). All in all, didn't do much for me, as much as I do love the Muppets. 4/10 Bethany Cox