"Follow That Bird"

[minor muppetz]

I sometimes wonder why Miss Finch and the Dodo's were not voiced by any of the main Muppet performers (Jim Henson, Frank Oz, Jerry Nelson, Richard Hunt, Kathy Mullen, or Martin Robinson).

 

[Drtooth]

I will say The Dodo's looked pretty awkward do to their design... they didn't seem to move as smoothly as the others...

Plus I LOOOOVED seeing Big Bird in cartoon form...

But I can't say too much morwe about this movie than we already know... it's bloody brilliant and a wonderful film, right up there with the other Muppet films...

Elmo in Grouchland was pretty good too, but it can't hold a candle to this one.

 

[CensoredAlso]

Plus I LOOOOVED seeing Big Bird in cartoon form...

I know I adored that, it was so sweet! I almost felt bad that his real bird family wasn't that ideal.

 

[HeyButtahfly]

I watched this movie over and over as a kid! Some of my favorite moments:

*Bob maps out the routes everyone should take and then asks if there are any questions. Oscar says, "What is the capital of South Dakota?", and everyone groans. And when everyone is confused by a place being called "Toadstool", LOL.

*The Grouch restaurant, especially the tossed salads, and the waitress that asked Maria, "What are you, a wack-o?" Haha my friends and I walked around asking each other that for days on end at daycare.

*When Big Bird was made into the "Bluebird of Happiness". I remember being sad watching him singing that song and crying, even as a little kid... Then later the girl gets on the phone and says, "Operator, can you tell me how to get Sesame Street?" That's always tickled me.

*Big Bird sending Radar through "Bear Mail". For years I didn't get the joke, but I still thought it was funny that Big Bird just dropped the bear in the mailbox with no postage and somehow it would get back to him.

*The scenes where Big Bird stays with the kids, I think Ruthie and Lloyd were their names? (BTW, I recently found out that the actress who was Loonette on the show The Big Comfy Couch for several years, played the little girl on the farm in Follow That Bird.) I knew all the words to "Easygoing" as a kid and could probably still sing along if I heard it.

*Ernie and Bert in the plane, of course! I love Ernie and Bert, but mostly Ernie!

*I thought the scene where 2 guys that owned the fun fair got pulled over on the highway was funny: "Be a man!" (Sob) "I don't wanna be a man!"

*Cookie eating the car! I love how it's just in ruins by the end and Gordon is so distraught as Cookie is eating hubcaps and whatnot.

*The Count singing, "There ain't no road too long... and you can count the telephone poles! One telephone pole..." Also when he counted credits at the end.

I never liked the part with the Dodos as a kid, though. They were weird and I didn't like that they were trying to make Big Bird like them. Plus the annoying Dodo kids. Headache!

 

[superboober]

Still, you've got to admit, the runaway lawnmower running gag at the Dodos is a riot. One of my biggest laughs when I watched it all those times was watching them casually approaching the pool, then running away screaming as it roared into frame.

Oscar really stole the picture, as often is the case. I loved the Don't Drop Inn scenes as well (they really should have brought back the "Where's my Jello!" grouch some time later on the show itself just for the fun of it), plus his Patton-style Grouch National Anthem sets the perfect tone for the show to come. His off-road driving skills are highly amusing as well; its amazing to me that Maria didn't just bail on him at that point and find someone else to go with (then again, she just might be a glutton for punishment anyway).

 

[minor muppetz]

This movie features a rare instance of Sesame Street doing product placement advertising. When Oscar and Maria are deciding where to have supper, Oscar complains that for lunch, Maria had to go and choose a place called "Friendly's". That bit makes me laugh every time, because it's so unlike a Sesame Street character to plug anything not related to Sesame Street.

I never knew that there was a real place called "Friendly's". Does it still exist?

 

[CensoredAlso]

Yeah Friendly's a very popular restaurant.

 

[somethingofafan]

-Big Bird and Gordon's conversation when Gordon is trying to save BB from the Sleaze brothers: "You should never jump from a moving vehicle! I shouldn't even be standing up!" "You have my permission, just this once!"

And what Gordon should have said:
"You've spent the whole movie running away, hitching rides with strangers, and saying "ain't" (as part of a double negative, no less), and NOW you're giving a safety lecture?"

 

[JLG]

I LOVED this as a kid.

One thing I hate about it now though, is the Street set they built specially for the film. I find it very ugly. My problem isn't that they had to make the set more realistic for movie purposes (it would have looked absurd if they'd tried to show that semi-abstract TV setting on film and in a movie theater---what works on taped television doesn't usually translate into film), it was just that the version they came up with looked very ugly and cold to me. I was especially disappointed with how the "other side" of the steet looked, the side we never see on the show because that's where the camera always is. What an ugly building! It looked like a 200-year-old Wal-Mart on steroids! (Oscar must love the view he wakes up to every morning )

On another note, it does seem odd that no one ever seems to talk about this film. It's almost like it never happened. Even the book "Sesame Street Unpaved" didn't mention it once. It's possible that the cast and crew look back on it as an embarrassment and mistake, and try to downplay its existence. I dunno...

(Snuffy: "Hey, Bird, remember that time you went to live in Chicago with that Dodo family, and then you ran away..."

Big Bird: "Shhhhh! Snuffy, I told you, we are never to speak of that again!"

Snuffy: "Oh...sorry, Bird."

Zoe: "Where's Shikocko?")

 

[CensoredAlso]

Yeah true, it was kinda treated as separate adventure from the show. Like some kind of bizarre alternate reality!