Hello my friends!
First of all, I was tagged by
!
COMMENT AND I'LL REVIEW YOUR STUFF kinda!
1- Tell you something I learned about you by looking at your page for 10 seconds.
2- Tell you a color you remind me of.
3- Tell you what element I believe you belong to (water, fire, air, etc.).
4- Tell you what OC(s) of yours is/are my favorite(s).
5- Ask you a question, and you must answer.
6- Tell you something I like about you.
7- Give you a nickname.
8- Tell you what am I doing right now.
9- Tell you what food/flavor/smell you remind me of.
10- Dare you to do one of these in your journal too, if you haven't already.
These questions are directed to you guys who comment!
Okay, now that's said.... Here is my next Duckyworth's Thoughts review.
Seen as I've been reviewing TONS of animated films over January, I think I'll take a break from animated films for a while, and review some live-action films.
Last time, I reviewed Mario Puzo's The Godfather, so this time, I'll review a more light-hearted film which is not only incredibly hilarious, but is actually the FIRST full-length film directed by Tim Burton!
This is PEEWEE'S BIG ADVENTURE!!
EEEEYYYYY!
After Tim Burton directed the short films Vincent and Frankenweenie, this was the first feature length film that he had directed. While this isn't the most gothic or creepy Tim Burton film, it is still cheesy, strange and enjoyably quirky.
When you compare with some other Tim Burton live action films like Beetlejuice, Edward Scissorhands, Sweeney Todd, Sleepy Hollow and Mars Attacks!, it does stand out slightly, but it is still enjoyable and fun to watch.
Apparantly, Tim Burton wanted to make his Frankenweenie short as a stop-motion feature, but when someone suggested that he could do it live-action, Burton jumped at the offer to try out a different medium. And in an interview, Tim Burton said that it was a good move to make the short live action, as it helped him adapt to a different medium, and it made Pee Wee's Big Adventure much easier and more fun to work through.
I can best describe this film as being a Tim Burton-esque road trip film - like if he tried making his own version of 'Dude, Where's My Car?', where instead of a car... we have a lost bike.
I haven't actually seen any episodes of Pee Wee's Playhouse, but from what I can tell, this film properly captures the bizarre nature of the show...
But as I said, it's an enjoyable kind of silly – unlike The Wild and Pippi Longstocking, there is some REAL effort put into the jokes, so I did laugh quite a few times through this film..
So, let's talk about Pee Wee himself....
He's an..... interesting character, to say the least...... As he says -
'There's a lot of things about me you don't know about... Things you wouldn't understand - things you couldn't understand - things you SHOULDN'T understand...' Well, that's ONE way of putting it...
How do I describe him?
Well, he's played by Paul Reuben (who also played Lock in The Nightmare Before Christmas
), he looks a little bit like if you splice together Tintin
, Frodo Baggins
and Jonathan Harker from Bram Stoker's Dracula, and gave him Jose Carioca's
clothes if the colouring in his shirt was replaced with greyscale...
Then, give him a voice that sounds like a mix between Spongebob Squarepants
, the sounds that Alex DeLarge makes when he screams in a funny way in the aversion therapy scene in A Clockwork Orange and Petrie
, in a way that if he smoked a dozen cigarettes, he'd sound like Conker
from Conker's Bad Fur Day (I'm serious, I find their voices SO similar
). And then, give a personality similar to the OLD Spongebob.
THAT is one crazy character right there!
But as I said, Pee Wee Hermann is MUCH more likeable than Pippi Longstocking...
Now, funnily enough, even though some people find him annoying, I think Pee Wee is much more tolerable than many characters in films I've reviewed. Maybe it's because he isn't a horrible role model or constantly destroying everything (like Pippi does….
) – he's just eccentric. Even if he does spend his mornings putting tape all over his face…
In a way, he's similar to Maggie from Home on the Range… they may be slightly obnoxious, but they're much, MUCH more tolerable than that hell-spawn in odd stockings…
Speaking of comparisons to Pippi, his house may be cluttered, true, but at least he doesn't wreck the place constantly...
In fact, I can definitely see Tim Burton style designs in here… How CRAZY is Pee Wee's interior decorating?!
I mean, he has a buffalo skull in his bedroom, conflicting colours on the walls, a window that looks out to a FISH TANK, and the outside of his house looks like a mix between Little Patch of Heaven from Home on the Range and the suburban landscape from Edward Scissorhands
. In fact, his house looks crazier than many of the settings in A CLOCKWORK ORANGE!
Speaking of his house, the start of the film shows us his…. 'normal' daily routine.
In a way, it reminds me of Spongebob Squarepants – where we have a situation where it resembles children living on their own away from adult supervision – but, again – at least he isn't wrecking his house like a certain pigtailed maniac does…
But let me say this – I want his breakfast machine BADLY.
We've seen breakfast machines in Flubber, Wile E. Coyote cartoons, Wallace and Gromit, Casper, and MANY other films and shows, but I think this one is the most….. surreal – in a cool way.
I mean, who WOULDN'T want to say 'a T-Rex skeleton squeezed my orange juice for me this morning', 'the skeletal version of Petrie put my toast in the toaster this morning' or 'Abraham Lincoln flipped my pancakes for breakfast'?
I know that I wish I could say that for my breakfast…
And I couldn't help but laugh when he started 'talking' to his breakfast…
And when he seems to drown his breakfast in Mr T cereal…
And how funny is the name he has for his dog – SPECK.
Again, at least he gives a name to his pets, other than just calling his pets the animals they are (HORSE, remember?
)
As I said, the film is a little bit like a road trip film, where Pee Wee discovers that his bike has been stolen, and he tries to get it back – I can draw quite a few similarities to 'Dude, Where's My Car?' in this film – other than the two films being hilarious.
Now, I know what you're going to say to me – 'You say you disliked the fact that Legend of The Guardians: Owls of Ga'Hoole and The Wild had characters that came out of nowhere and were only there for one or two scenes – So does Pee Wee's Big Adventure! How can you still like those characters for that?
'
Well… one important thing – they're creative.
Unlike The Wild or Legend of the Guardians, the minor characters Pee Wee comes across are actually pretty funny.
We have a criminal on the run for ripping the 'do not remove by penalty of law' tag off his mattress (classic joke
), a bunch of rowdy bikers - a more likeable version of the Thug Tug thigs from the Spongebob Squarepants movie, Pee Wee's rival - a rich spoilt boy called Francis (played by Mark Holton) who wants to get Pee Wee's bike or his birthday, Chuck the bike shop owner, Pee Wee's friend Dottie (who reminds me of Foxy Loxy in Chicken Little when she gets her brain scrambled - one of the very few funny moments in that film...
), a phony fortune teller called Madame Ruby (no relation to Mz. Ruby from the Sly Cooper series...
) , and of course..... Large Marge.... Probably one of the creepiest moments in a Tim Burton film - and even though it's the ONLY scary moment in the film, it is still pretty creepy...
When the phony fortune teller tells him that his bike in the Alamo (in the basement...
), Pee Wee tries to hitchhike to get to Texas. First, he comes across Mickey (the man who cut the tag off his matress...
) and when they come across the police, they dress up as a married couple to get by....
- with Pee Wee in drag......
And then, at night, they come across some utterly confusing road signs which look like something a PSYCHO would put on the side of a road..
When he gets ditched at the side of the road by Mickey because he doesn't want Pee Wee to get in trouble, we get a funny bit when we see his eyes in the dark - I like how his eyes were animated, it reminds me of a lot of those classic Looney Tunes cartoons.
Then he puts on his goggle lights and it's like he ended up in a zoo (hopefully, like the kind in Madagascar, and NOT the one in The Wild
).
Then, he comes across Large Marge in a truck offering him a lift. And then, she tells a ghost story about someone who died in a car crash -
'And, when they pulled the driver's body from the twisted, burning wreck -it looked like THIS!
'
Yeah..... if we all start being reminded of the Creepy Red Walrus from Pingu
I think we know who to blame... True, no where near as creepy as the Vampire Cat transformation from Frankenweenie or the death of Oogie Boogie from Nightmare Before Christmas, but still pretty scary!
The stop motion there is actually pretty funny - in a creepy way, and reminded me of the Martians from Mars Attacks!, when Vincent's mouth goes huge when he screams in the short film Vincent and the Beetlejuice snake from Beetlejuice.
It at least only lasts about a second - and it's nowhere near as bad as the scare in Plague Dogs where the man gets shot in the face....
And when she says 'Tell them Large Marge sent ya!' She gives a laugh that sounds like a mini version of the laugh of the three witches from The Black Cauldron!
But then, when Pee Wee goes into an inn, and tells them Large Marge sent him... we find out... SHE was the ghost of the car crash victim...
Wow, if only the ghost of Jack from An American Werewolf in London could drive David around.. That would be a really interesting case for Most Haunted...
After he watches the sun rise with a woman who sounds suspiciously like the gay transvestite from 'Dude? Where's My Car?', he's chased by the woman's boyfriend Andy, while the woman screams even more than Willie from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom, he gets on a train where he has a strange dream about a dinosaur eating his bike - which is some pretty cheesy stop motion - I think we've met the predecessor to Shelly in Frankenweenie
! He meets a redneck who.... sings in a way that reminds me of Jack Rabbit from Home on the Range, causing Pee Wee to jump off the train because it grates on his ears (come on Pee Wee, it could be worse... you could be listening to WILMA from The Flight Before Christmas...
)
He does get to the Alamo, and I think we can see what Tim Burton thinks abouts tour guides... She's very obnoxious, similar to the one in Mars Attacks!... but unfortunately, she doesn't get melted..
I would be as bored as Pee Wee was...
And then... he finds out there's no basement in the Alamo... Causing everyone to laugh at him crazily....
He then says goodbye to the inn woman who is going to France, gets chased by Andy again, and then gets wound up in a rodeo... Because he dresses up like Patrick does in Just One Bite...
The bull seems almost as buff as Tank the Tauros...
When he goes into a biker bar, I love the way he shouts 'I'M TRYING TO USE THE PHONE!' After knocking their bikes over, they threaten to kill him, but then he asks for one last dance request... Leading to him dancing in a way that is pretty ridiculous...
But he STILL has better choreography than Kazaar and his wildebeests, even if it mainly consists of him pointing in different directions...
But still, if he tried dancing like that in Dmitri's nightclub (From the Sly Cooper series) he'd probably get kicked out by Dmitri for 'being a cracker-box'....
He befriends the bikers, drives off on a motorbike.... and crashes through a sign.
That's like a scene from a GOOFY cartoon...
He then has another crazy dream while in hospital, which looks like a Technicolor version of a scene from The Cabinet of Dr Caligari mixed with Killer Klowns from Outer Space and Haxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages...
Pee Wee's dreams may be so weird, I think even FRANCIS from Felidae would have problems making sense of them – He would probably think 'Did he eat cheese sandwiches before he went to bed?
'
Pee Wee then finds his bike in Warner Brother's Studios... and sabotages a summer movie, a Christmas movie, a Japanese monster movie, and a music video from Twisted Sister while escaping.
But he comes across a pet shop on fire, and doing something heroic (again, unlike Pippi Longstocking
) he helps all of the animals escape... but he hates snakes, so he frees the snakes last (I bet Alex DeLarge would be ashamed... let's hope Basil the snake made it out okay...
) Then, just as he's about to be arrested, a movie director says that his story will make a great film - oh, the fourth wall joke is great!
I do like the way that all of the characters throughout the film get a chance to meet up wth Pee Wee again, so they don't just appear in one scene for no reason....
I also like the bit when they dubbed Pee Wee's voice in his cameo in the film, and they show how bad Pee Wee's acting is in that film....
And we see Francis get ejected out of the seat of Pee Wees bike when he lies about being Francis' long-time friend... Francis reminds me of Gorgonzola acting like a jerk from Chowder for some reason... and of course, it's funny to see him act like a spoilt brat - so he's like a mix of Gorgonzola and Diamond Tiara from MLP:FiM.
And it ends with Pee Wee's dog Speck getting a girlfriend (It's like the end of the original Frankenweenie short!
) and he and Dottie ride off.
A bit of a weird film, but enjoyable.
Like most of Tim Burton's films.
And, also, as always, Danny Elfman's music is always nice to listen to, and this film is no exception. Manic for the most part, but I do like how I can hear hints of Beetlejuice, Nightmare Before Christmas, Frankenweenie and Corpse Bride in the music, and my fave pieces of music are probably the Breakfast Machine music, the second dream sequence music and the music when Pee Wee is escaping the Warner Bros Studio. Again, it may be crazy music, but Danny Elfman does a much better job with zany music than the music in Pippi Longstocking
, he knows which instruments to compose in and HOW to work it in, instead of random boinging and slide whistles...
Now, I've herd that the sequel to this, Big Top Pee Wee, was a huge failure... mainly because the new director butchered it...
So, Pee Wee Hermann suffered the same fate as Batman - given to a different director, and having his name tarnished (remember the flop Batman and Robin?
)
Even though many of the jokes are pretty strange and simple, they STILL work (they made Pee Wee KNOCKING ON A DOOR amusing).
The film is like 'Dude, Where's My Car?' and 'Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs' (which I may review in the future
) – even if it's meant to be taken with a pinch of salt, the films still manage to provide some clever humour, that may be strange, but they can still bring a smile to your face.
And, on top of that, these films DO have a definite plot – as crazy as the film may be, and while the film may seem to have some 'Big Lipped Alligator Moments' (A scene that comes out of nowhere, has nothing to do with the story, is even more over the top than the rest of the film, and after it's occurred, no-one ever mentions it again
) a story is visible. Even Legend of The Guardians: Owls of Ga'Hoole and A Fox's Tale, for all their flaws, did at least have a genuine plot that you could follow.
I know I keep referring back to The Wild and Pippi Longstocking in this review, but I just want to emphasise things that this film gets right where those films went wrong – in this, there is a definite story, while in The Wild and Pippi Longstocking, they just seem to make up their rubbish plots as they go along – and true, Pee Wee's Big Adventure throws in some extraneous moments – but again, at least they're funny and memorable.
The only real problems I have with the film is related to the pacing.
That may sound weird, considering the fact that this is basically a road trip movie, in my opinion, but it's like in Plague Dogs and Felidae… some of the scenes end up going by too quickly.
Some take their time, but others, like when Pee Wee is brought before the film director, seem to be much too short. I don't know, maybe some of you may disagree with this, but that's the only real flaw I picked up.
Other than that though, this is a worthy film from Tim Burton. Cooky, crazy, funny, and with a main character who sounds a bit like a human version of PINGU
, I recommend this to my friends. Even if it's even weirder than the Pink Elephants song from Dumbo…
Hopefully, you WON'T be drinking anything that will cause you to see Pink Elephants during this film…
Well, next time, I'll be continuing with live action films – But this one won't be as surreal as Pee Wee's Big Adventure – it'll be back to a more serious film.
Next time, we shall look at one of my favourite sci-fi action films of all time….
ROBOCOP!
Your move, creep...
COMING DUCKYWORTH'S THOUGHTS –
Robocop
Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas
An American Tail
Princess Mononoke
Animal Farm
Pokemon - Lucario and the Mystery Of Mew
Pokemon - The Rise of Darkrai
Brave
A Cat In Paris
Basil The Great Mouse Detective
Pokemon - Jirachi:Wishmaker
Dracula (1931)
Hellraiser
Hellbound: Hellraiser 2
The Silence of the Lambs
Zombieland
Hot Fuzz
The Cabinet of Doctor Caligari
Freaks
Fright Night
Frankenstein
Bride of Frankenstein
Casablanca
The Godfather - Part 2
The Godfather - Part 3
We're Back - A Dinosaur Story
The Cat In The Hat
The Princess and the Goblin
Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs
Twilight
Corpse Bride
Ed Wood
Help! I'm A Fish
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