Smurfs Movie Info

[Yorick]

http://tvseriesfinale.com/tv-show/smurfs-movie-original-voices-13896/

 

[Drtooth]

Yeah... unless they rewrite the script to be more like the Smurfs, I've given up on this moronic train wreck all together. There should be NO reason why the film takes place in modern day. There should be NO reason they have to try to make the whole thing into the next Chipmunks movie. I liked the first one to an extent, but I curse the fact it was a surprise hit. I really do.

Ugly character designs, stunt casting... Hollywood at it's finest. I', not one of the bunch of aging 80's kids that says "This rapes my childhood," but this movie is raping the source material, and common sense. Speed Racer may not have been a great movie, but the casting was perfect, and it felt like watching an episode of the dubbed US version. If it didn't go into odd scripting and vanity project for the Matrix guys... but at LEAST they didn't try to hip it up with alien concepts.

Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if they have an all tween pop or commercial hip hop soundtrack. That's what they've done to the film so far, and Sony pictures (who gave us such animated movies as Open Season, Open Season 2- which "cleverly" used"Who let the dogs out? in the soundtrack -, Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs, and Surf's Up... yep... a CRAP factory). had Nick and Paramount still did the movie they were going to, I'd just be disappointed by the celebrity voice stunt casting. This is expected for the obnoxious tripe they're planning on that will fall flat on it's face.

At least Johnathan Winters is playing Papa Smurf... He played Grampa Smurf, after all.

 

[Yorick]

I did like "Cloudy..." and "Open Season" (and never saw OS2, Speed Racer, Alvin 2 or Surf's Up) but your point about them doing everything wrong with the upcoming Smurfs movie (other than having Jonathan Winters - the only shining light here) is 100% right, DrTooth! And on a side note, I thought there were good things about the first Alvin movie - but as a Chipmunks fan, there were many things very wrong with it, as well. It would take a whole other thread to list the pros and cons.

 

[Drtooth]

I vow never to watch "Cloudy." You know what's worse than saying "A Mad Scientist did it?" Saying "A slightly kooky scientist who has father issues and is a lovable lug did it." Even considering making a 90 minute kiddie movie based on a book with more pictures than text shows what kind of brilliant leadership you got there.

Sony pictures should be barred from making CGI kid's movies. They're part of the reason why it's an overcrowded market of junk.

It's the same as it was in the 90's when every studio thought they were Disney and made lame animated movies to try and compete with Disney. One only has to mention "Quest for Camelot," a trope filled 90 minute cliche (I did like the 2 headed dragon and the axe chicken, though) that was a huge flop and merchandising disaster. Sure, there are off brand (not Pixar or Dreamworks) CGI movies that I was pleasantly surprised with. I LOVED Igor (though I felt the sugary sweet ending ruined the delightfully dark and twisted overall theme)... but all and all, I just see "We wanna make the next Shrek" when I don't want any MORE Shreks, clones or legit. I wanna see the next Up or Monsters VS Aliens. Gimme something either so insanely wacky that only the most twisted mind of a Mad Scientist could come up with, or something that's deep and has a soul and the biggest celeb doing voice work is Ed Asner. I don't wanna see farting wisecracking animals.

That said, The First Alvin movie I'll give a C+ to. Maybe a B-... it wasn't great, but it wasn't terrible. i enjoyed it, but have no desire to buy the DVD, and I felt the project was woefully miscast. The second one I give a B for concept, and a D for execution. I sort of enjoyed it at first, but it turned into an early 00's trope. Alvin spent the entire movie quoting overused movie lines. That went out with Shrek 2. And the fact that half of the rest of the movie was an excuse for them to just run around and sing 3 seconds of random songs was pathetic. I had NO sympathy for Dave's loser slacker nephew, and it really felt like the movie was 40% him, 40% David Cross (Who I think saved the first movie, but seemed pasted in and forced) and 20% chipmunks. The editing seemed like they made a 3 hour movie that had to be paired down to 90 minutes (read BAD Pacing) and there was NO need for the "dutch oven" fart joke. Toilet humor and old movie lines. Yeay! it's 1999 again!

All and all, the fact of the matter is they want to yank the whole parallel universe Middle Ages fantasy of the Smurfs to replace it with the mundane banality of current times to force the hypocritical message to "Just be yourself" (Yeah, because they're SO letting the Smurfs be themselves here) down kids' throats... all the while making one of the Smurfs "ethnic" (George Lopez... come on! Tell me he's not going to make lame jokes about being Latino in a Belgian cartoon character) to appeal to "ethnics" (again, basically having white people write old stereotypes as a pathetic attempt at humor)... basically they want to ruin this movie the way they ruined EVERY single kinds of these movies ever... and they ALL FAIL and they never learn from them. I want to see a movie about the SMURFS. Not some little brat that doesn't fit in, even though she's Hollywood pretty anyway.

 

[Yorick]

All and all, the fact of the matter is they want to yank the whole parallel universe Middle Ages fantasy of the Smurfs to replace it with the mundane banality of current times to force the hypocritical message to "Just be yourself" (Yeah, because they're SO letting the Smurfs be themselves here) down kids' throats...basically they want to ruin this movie the way they ruined EVERY single kinds of these movies ever... and they ALL FAIL and they never learn from them. I want to see a movie about the SMURFS. Not some little brat that doesn't fit in, even though she's Hollywood pretty anyway.

Right on! Well said about letting the Smurfs be themselves - same dumb formula that really ruins things...but they keep using it. Does it make them more money than if they left things as they should be? Hard to know, since no one does that anymore. But I have a theory I will mention in my Chipmunks portion of this post - and hey, even when we disagree on the merits of a movie, I still appreciate your opinion, and that you replied to my post, DrTooth!

all the while making one of the Smurfs "ethnic" (George Lopez... come on! Tell me he's not going to make lame jokes about being Latino in a Belgian cartoon character) to appeal to "ethnics" (again, basically having white people write old stereotypes as a pathetic attempt at humor)

Yes it'd be strange if they changed the characters - and I know neither of us are saying to hold back on one's culture - just don't change a character that has been loved as they are for so long...but hey, at this point it sounds so far gone from their true style anyway, what's another big change gonna hurt lol

I think if you saw "Cloudy" you might like it. But I respect your decision, because you have your reasons, just as I have mine (the same as yours mostly) for skipping this upcoming Smurfs movie. I also will not be watching the A-Team movie, because the show was perfect - and this is wrong to make a movie now. However, when it comes to making books into movies, I loved the Grinch from 2000, so I know many people do not agree with me on that. Many went to see it in the movies (best selling of 2000 - and it came out in the last 2 months!) but no one wants to say it was good now But I will!

I also liked "Quest for Camelot" (glad you like a few characters anyway) I also loved Igor (nice Wall-E joke in the dialogue too) and I hope everyone who reads this knows Igor is totally safe for families to watch (or am I forgetting something? lol)

Shreks are pretty good but there's always room for improvement with them. "Up" was fantastic, and I loved that they got Ed Asner - again, since he was the one screen star in the film (like Jonathan Winters in the 80's Smurfs show - as said on the comments on the weblink I posted) it wasn't like they were keeping away the voice actors left and right. It was all around great - Mr. Asner rocks. I also liked Monsters VS Aliens (and the halloween TV special of it).

Chipmunks portion:

The First Alvin just didn't live up to the 80's show (which I will always love and which takes me back to carefree days) it was too modernized. I feel they could have kept true to the 80's version, (or even the 60's version) and not lost many customers. I don't think the kids really care, and more old fans might have went to see it. I know I didn't go to the movies for it. I borrowed it, otherwise I wouldn't have seen it. And again with the casting "stars" as voices - let Ross Jr (David Seville from the 80's until now, minus the new movies) do the voices of Alvin and Simon, and let his wife do the voice of Theodore and the Chippettes - like it was for years! Also Ross Jr was supposed to play Dave in the first Chipmunks film, but they said they wanted someone younger - even though he seems youthful enough in the 2005 film "Alvin and the Mini-Munks" which wasn't long before that. As for the second Alvin film, though I didn't see it, I can picture what you said - Alvin quoting overused movie lines and the characters singing random songs. I also didn't like Alvin's use of modern slang (and a lot of his dialogue in general) in the first film. I know they must update themselves, just as they did in the 80's but - the 80's updates weren't anything stupid, in my opinion.

 

[RedPiggy]

All and all, the fact of the matter is they want to yank the whole parallel universe Middle Ages fantasy of the Smurfs to replace it with the mundane banality of current times to force the hypocritical message to "Just be yourself" (Yeah, because they're SO letting the Smurfs be themselves here) down kids' throats... all the while making one of the Smurfs "ethnic" (George Lopez... come on! Tell me he's not going to make lame jokes about being Latino in a Belgian cartoon character) to appeal to "ethnics" (again, basically having white people write old stereotypes as a pathetic attempt at humor)... basically they want to ruin this movie the way they ruined EVERY single kinds of these movies ever... and they ALL FAIL and they never learn from them. I want to see a movie about the SMURFS. Not some little brat that doesn't fit in, even though she's Hollywood pretty anyway.

*Shudders to think what it would be like to have Gummi Bears found in a candy gummi bears factory, with King Gregor turned into a clueless CEO for the company and Igthorn being a disgruntled fired employee who tries to poison the product.

 

[Drtooth]

Yeah...

Now it looks like it's taking place in New York

Wow! Not even keeping it in Belgium, which at LEAST had connection to the creators. I hate this movie now. Thanks for nothing. Really. How hard can it be to make a Medieval Fantasy movie for kids to like that you had to go and make the Chipmunks movies again? I will NEVER NEVER NEVER see this piece of Smurf at all. And I was one of the ones who looked forward to it the most.

Really... I hope the Smurf's copyright holders decide to shelve the movie at the last minute. I'd rather we DIDN'T have a Smurf movie now.

 

[RedPiggy]

This smuring movie needs to go smurf itself so our smurfing eyes don't smurf.

 

[Drtooth]

This smuring movie needs to go smurf itself so our smurfing eyes don't smurf.

Hey! What do you expect? These are the same type of execs that think kids love the same idiotic talking dog movies that come out year after year after year. I just love when these execs think Kid's movie = movie for drooling slow witted 2 year olds that clap like idiots when the lights dim. You could literally take the kids that like these movies and sit them down in front of a flickering light for 90 minutes and think it should win an Oscar.

making a Smurfs movie take place in current era is akin to making a Spider-Man movie where Spider-Man is actually a fat elderly woman who has the power to make churros appear out of thin air, and it all takes place in the wilds of Australia. There is NOTHING Smurf-like about this film. You can't just take a generic "Kids! Here's a hypocritical feel good Pro-Social message we never intend to follow ourselves," slap the characters in it and call it a Smurfs movie. I bet the writers only watched 2 minutes of the All Stars to the Rescue for research, and one of the original treatments included Winnie the Pooh.

I don't care how much of a Surprise hit Chipmunks was. if you wanna copy them, make a movie about one of the other high pitched copy records like The Crickets or something. If I want to see a Smurf movie I sure as shooting do NOT want to see it take place now as much as I'd hate a Jetson's movie to take place in 1800's England! The magic of the comics wasn't that they said Smurf every 2 minutes... They weren't even called Smurfs until the US finally got wind of them 20 something years later. The magic of the franchise is it DOES take place in fantastic worlds. They didn't need to hip up Lord of the Rings, did they?

That said, I can't wait to see talking in dated 90's rap slang that 40 and 50 year old ulcerous white Holl-o-wood execs think that kids still love. I can see it now "This Summer, get funky fresh and jiggy with the Smurfs-izzle!"

 

[GonzoLeaper]

Well, I was excited for a Smurfs movie- now hearing what the direction seems to be for the movie- the excitement is waning. Nonetheless, I think I'll have to see some trailers to see what it's gonna shape up to be. I imagine I'll wind up seeing it eventually, but if it's a really stupid version I'll probably just rent it later- or better yet, get it for free at the library.
(Kinda like I might do with the Alvin and the Chipmunks movies someday...)
Both of these are great '80s cartoons that I grew up with and love watching- but most of these movie versions are just really stupid and not worth it. I think The Flintstones movies are still probably about the best movie version of a cartoon I've seen thus far. (well, as cartoon to live action transformation goes.)
But here's hoping this Smurfs movie will be smurfed more closely into the cartoon and somehow be really smurfy!