Home on the Range

Ignore the hate if you fell in love with this film. I just watched it and I thought it was fine. Yes, it has it's issues, but I wouldn't consider it as a terrible film from Disney.

Home on the Range was kinda unique. It had nice animation and the characters like Maggie, Mrs. Calloway, Grace and Lucky Jack are pretty good.

The villain, Alameda Slim was pretty weak. He's so dang goofy it's hard to take him seriously.

Here are some things I would change about Home on the Range:

1. Have the characters be more interesting. Don't make them flat.

2. Delate some of the cow jokes. There are too many of them.

3. Make Slim a better villain.

4. The yodeling song could use some work with lyrics.

Overall, this is an okay Disney film. I wouldn't say it's bad, but it's okay.

So, it wasn't too bad. The kids, 4, 7 and 11, loved it. It was a bit jumpy and confusing, but we got some laughs out of it and the kids left smiling. That's pretty much the goal of going to a Disney film anyhow, even though it reminded me more of Warner Bros. and Looney Toons. And its not so terrible for Disney to try something different. It just takes some getting used to. Frankly, I just forgot that it was Disney and watched the show.

But nobody has mentioned the violence. Just like Looney Toons cartoons that we grew up on, this movie was so full of violent acts that I lost count early on. It disturbs me to see cartoon characters suffer such debilitating injuries and the next thing you see they have completely recovered and carry on. What kind of message does this send the kids? "Go ahead and jump off that cliff, you'll walk away"....."Isn't it funny how that man's teeth are falling out of his mouth....."

But if you don't mind Looney Toon violence, the rest of the movie is OK. Hokey, but it's supposed to be. We, the adults, did wish there had been a bit more character development, especially around Pearl, the owner of Little Patch of Heaven, and Buck, the ridiculously macho horse. Loved the voice of the Buffalo and agree that the horse that Buck encouraged to run away was also a great voice. Liked the music too, although it was a bit overwhelming at times.

So enjoy, and remember: its for the kids, not you.

While the film wasn't a total dud a la "Treasure Planet," it's certainly no "Little Mermaid," or even "Emperor's New Groove," which I consider the best of the latest crop of cartoons for its hip sensibility. "Home on the Range" suffers from an unoriginal and unfunny script, although it is not tediously poor or Saturday-morning-cartoon simple. To begin, there is an overabundance of plastic-playset ready characters (literally a whole farm full): the trio of bounty-hunting heifers played by Roseanne Barr, Judi Dench, and Jennifer Tilly; the yodeling cattle rustler Alameda Slim (Randy Quaid) and his three bumbling nephews; the wannabe-hero steed Buck (Cuba Gooding Jr-- who ok'ed that name?); two lascivious bulls; a buffalo bouncer; a peg-legged jackrabbit; and a whole farmyard of pigs, chickens, a goose, and a surly goat. Oh, and Steve Buscemi shows up too, as a caricature of himself in a purple suit and a pencil moustache. Estelle Harris and Patrick Warburton (so memorable in "Toy Story 2" and "Groove," respectively), had brief cameos as well. There's no time for any kind of character development (not even with a sacred Disney "I Want" song), and the thinnest of premises has the cows hunting for Slim in time to get the reward money to save their farm. I was surprised not by the simplicity but by the unnecessary, unfunny bawdiness of the script (the movie opens with a shot of the Barr cow's ample udders, with her voiceover dryly remarking "Yep, they're real. Quit staring." Crossdressing, pee, and fat man jokes follow.) Alan Menken wrote a few snappy but unmemorable tunes (none of which are sung by the characters, but by the likes of Bonnie Raitt and k.d. lang) and a Coplandesque score. The film redeems itself in its art direction, which bursts with Disney color and retro UPA-style angularity. Especially in the opening scenes, a multiplane effect is used to further flatten, rather than deepen, this storybook world. It's an interesting and visually engaging concept that works well for the story. Backgrounds are intricately detailed with drybrush effects that call to mind "Sleeping Beauty;" if that film's art director, Eyvind Earle, had been called upon to paint the rocks and buttes of the American desert, it would have looked very much like this. It's quite stunning, actually, and the best art direction since 1996's "The Hunchback of Notre Dame." I especially appreciated a background detail in the town scene: one of the buildings was actually only a facade, held up by supports like on a backlot Western set. Similarly, sooner or later, not just critics but parents too will demand the Disney animated features to show that they have something behind that venerable name. "Home on the Range" will tide us over for now, but a renaissance of Disney is getting to be overdue. The Disney animation department (what's left of it), like it or not, needs to take a cue from Pixar and strive for family-friendly originality if they hope to maintain the integrity of the brand. ***

It has been nearly five years since the release of this recent traditionally animated Disney flick, made in a CGI-dominated time, and I definitely didn't even hear about it at the time of its release. It clearly didn't turn out to be a box office smash, which is probably why I never heard about it (unlike "The Incredibles", the hugely successful CGI-animated feature released the same year), and I don't think I knew about it until I saw it mentioned in a book about animated films a couple years ago. After seeing "Home on the Range", I can definitely see why it tanked.

In the old west, Maggie, Mrs. Calloway, and Grace are three cows, all with very different traits, who live on a dairy farm in Nebraska called Patch of Heaven, owned by an elderly widow named Pearl Gesner. Pearl owes a lot of money, which she unfortunately can't pay, so it appears she will soon lose her farm, and it will be auctioned off! So, the three cows decide to set out to try and save their home. They must track down an outlaw, a cattle rustler named Alameda Slim, who uses a false identity to claim many properties in the state, and hypnotizes cows with his yodeling! On their adventure, they meet others on the same mission, to try and stop Alameda Slim, and due to the different traits of the three cows, they don't always get along, with conflict between Maggie and Mrs. Calloway, which obviously won't make it easier!

Others have already mentioned the lacklustre plot of this film, and I'm going to have to agree wholeheartedly. The plot pretty much completely failed to interest me, since it's very simple and forgettable, and the real lack of humour doesn't help. I only rarely found amusing moments, and kept a straight face for almost the entire thing. For example, there's some weak slapstick, which may appeal to kids, but probably not many others. I found that the funniest parts involved Alameda Slim's dimwitted nephews, parts such as them not being able to recognise their uncle after they've seen him put his simple disguise on, but they are very minor characters. Not only is the plot forgettable, so are the gags and most of the characters. Basically, the film was put together fairly simply, and probably could have been more focused. I found myself indifferent to pretty much everything about it, and I'm sure I'm not alone.

It looks like this film marked the end of a very long era, the era of traditionally animated theatrical Disney movies, which began in 1937 with "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" and went on with the company long after Walt Disney's death in 1966. Through those decades, so many classics were made in the franchise, so it's unfortunate that they couldn't finish with a much more noteworthy picture. Instead, they finished with a dull one, one which is probably much more appealing to kids than adults, unlike probably most of them, which can be fun for all ages. "Home on the Range" reminds me a lot of "Rock-A-Doodle", a 1991 animated film from Don Bluth, and not one of his more popular efforts. Both are lacklustre animated films with anthropomorphic animals, ones which are basically for the kids, and I've personally found to be very unmemorable.

Disney's animation studio, immediately after 'Lilo & Stitch', experienced a major financial loss. Competitors such as the soon to be acquired Pixar, DreamWorks and even Blue Sky Studios were dominating the earlier part of the twenty first century. Disney's features, the once leading studio, were broken. Productions enduring extensive lengths, costly visualised conversions and downsizing of employees. Home on the Range, rather unfortunately, was a misfired product from a studio encountering corporate instability. A western styled tale involving three mismatched dairy cows attempting to capture an infamous cattle rustler to receive a generous bounty that will pay off their farm from foreclosure.

Finn and Sanford's hearts were in the right place, just bordering the rustic picket fences of Patch of Heaven. The trio of dairy protagonists, comprising of brash show-cow Maggie, sophisticated Mrs. Caloway and the stupendously ditzy Grace, garnered sufficient interactions with each other that prolonged their brief characterisations. The rivalry between Maggie and Mrs. Caloway was earnest and provided moo-ments (I promise, no more cow puns...) of friendship during times of great need. The plot itself was punctual and cohesive, with functional albeit predictable beats found in any other Disney animation. Voice acting was solid for the most part, particularly Dench, Tilly and Gooding Jr., whom all suited their characters. Barr was too bullish, and lacked the subtlety required to tenderise Maggie's emotional conflicts. However, the biggest asset Home on the Range withholds, is the throwback to the classic cartoon style. The humour is refreshingly slapstick and acquitted itself with nothing more than a fun adventure. It'll keep children entertained, adults not so much.

As I said previously, this feature was produced during a rough period of time for the studio, and consequently resulted in a functional yet unmemorable tale. Despite the modesty of the leading "three maids are milking", their journey is hugely unmemorable, lacking the originality and timelessness of previous productions. Yes, questing across the dusty Grand Canyon, encountering perilous flash floods and traversing exhilarating mines, should've made for an exciting comedic adventure. Alas, the milk in these cows had expired. The narrative lacked innovation, the dialogue lacked energy and the animation itself lacked charm. Even Menken's original composition, featuring "all-time favourites" including *cough* "Will the Sun Ever Shine Again" and the painful antagonist's theme tune "Yodel-Adle-Eedle-Idle-Oo" resembled outdated traits that Disney failed to avoid. Hypnotising cows into an LSD trip by expressively yodeling at them, should've been one of the most unforgettable scenes the studio had pumped out. Sadly, not the case. Everything was shoved into a minuscule runtime, and the breezy pace emphasised the one-dimensional aesthetic.

Home on the Range is, undoubtedly, formulaic. Whether the formula for this dairy goodness is to your taste, is clearly down to personal preference. Undeniably though, the sour aftertaste of a studio no longer caring was beginning to present itself. A feature with the consistency of semi-skimmed milk, avoiding the delectability of full fat wholesomeness. Udderly disappointing.