The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle (2000) Universal/Comedy-Adventure RT: 92 minutes Rated PG (brief mild language) Director: Des McAnuff Screenplay: Kenneth Lonergan Music: Mark Mothersbaugh Cinematography: Thomas E. Ackerman Release date: June 30, 2000 (US) Cast: Rene Russo, Jason Alexander, Robert De Niro, Piper Perabo, Randy Quaid, June Foray (voice), Keith Scott (voice), Kenan Thompson, Kel Mitchell, Rod Bierman, Janeane Garofalo, Carl Reiner, Jonathan Winters, John Goodman, James Rebhorn, David Alan Grier, Norman Lloyd, Jon Polito, Don Novello, Ed Gale, Billy Crystal, Whoopi Goldberg. Box Office: $26M (US)/$35.1M (World)
Rating: ***
For the life of me, I cannot remember why I hated The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle so much when it was first released 20 years ago. It’s really not that bad of a picture. In fact, it’s pretty good. It’s certainly better than a lot of the live-action adaptations of cartoons we’ve been subjected to- e.g. The Flintstones, Mr. Magoo and Dudley Do-Right. It successfully captures the zany spirit of its source which originally ran from 1959 to 1964. Like a lot of people my age, I watched it in reruns on UHF channels during summer breaks from school. I LOVED it. I enjoyed the mix of painful puns, silly sight gags and sly in-jokes. It’s the perfect mix of stupidity and sophistication. The movie version of Rocky & Bullwinkle gets it mostly right. What’s not to like about it?
Directed by Des McAnuff (Cousin Bette), The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle is extremely good-natured; it doesn’t have a mean bone in its entire goofball body. It starts off by explaining what happened to our heroes, spunky flying squirrel Rocket J. “Rocky” Squirrel and thick-headed Bullwinkle J. Moose, since their show was cancelled in ’64. Life hasn’t been easy. Their once-beautiful hometown of Frostbite Falls has fallen victim to deforestation. Rocky can’t fly anymore. Bullwinkle is pretty much the same old moose. The never-seen Narrator (Scott) has had to move in with his mother where he narrates the mundane everyday events of his own life.
Meanwhile in Pottsylvania, the heroic duo’s archnemeses- Boris Badenov, Natasha Fatale and their boss Fearless Leader- haven’t been the same since the Cold War ended. They see an opportunity to regain their power when they manage to escape from TV into the real world with the help of a Hollywood studio executive, Minnie Mogul (Garofalo, Mystery Men), who wants the rights to their old show. Now flesh and blood baddies played respectively by Jason Alexander (Seinfeld), Rene Russo (Lethal Weapon 3 & 4) and Robert De Niro (Midnight Run), Fearless Leader devises a plan to take over the world by transforming the public into mindless zombies through really bad television aired on his own cable channel RBTV (Really Bad TV, get it?).
The FBI sends Agent Karen Sympathy (Perabo, Coyote Ugly) to bring Rocky and Bullwinkle into the real world to help stop Fearless Leader and his two comrades from carrying out his evil scheme. This is where The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle shifts into road trip mode with a cross-country journey to New York that includes a stopover at Bullwinkle’s alma mater Wossamotta U. She’s a complicated one, this Agent Karen Sympathy. She’s constantly struggling not to let her inner child interfere with her being a tough, no-nonsense agent interested only in results. When Fearless Leader learns his old adversaries are out to thwart another one of his nefarious plans, he sends Boris and Natasha to destroy them. In keeping with Y2K technology, they’re given a device called a CDI (Computer Degenerating Imagery) that will banish them to the Internet. In keeping with their old ways, they bring along a truckload of weapons, explosives and other devices of mass trickery. Their attempts to deal with “moose and squirrel” play out pretty much the same in the real world as they do in the animated one.
Although suitable for all audiences, The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle is clearly aimed at older viewers with its sly jokes and references that will fly right over the heads of the little ones watching with their parents. Take an early scene where Fearless Leader points out there’s “never been a way to actually destroy a cartoon character until now”. An underling immediately asks, “What about that movie Roger Rabbit?” to which FL replies “Shut up. This is totally different.” Then, of course, there’s the scene where De Niro spoofs his famous “Are you talking to me?” monologue from Taxi Driver. I got a nice laugh from both scenes. Sure, the humor in The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle is extremely corny, but so was the original show.
In her first major role, Perabo is a real find. She’s cute, charming and funny. Her interaction with her animated co-stars is a nice mix of awkward and adoring. De Niro, who admits to doing The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle for the money only, looks ridiculous with hair that looks like a leather toupee. He seems to be having fun though, so why knock him too much. The same can be said of Alexander and Russo who camp it up nicely as Boris and Natasha; they nail down the exaggerated Russian accents perfectly. The movie is wall-to-wall cameos with famous faces like Carl Reiner, Whoopi Goldberg and Billy Crystal popping up. Jonathan Winters shows up three different times.
The blend of live-action and animation isn’t quite as seamless as Roger Rabbit, but it’s good enough to pass muster. Let’s face it, the original cartoon wasn’t exactly the height of animation. It was rather crudely draw, but it worked. I feel the same about The Adventures of Rocky & Bullwinkle. It just wouldn’t have been the same with Pixar-level CA. Not all of it works, but enough does to make it worth the 92-minute time investment. It’s fun and it’ll make you feel happy. Thanks for 51 years worth of laughs, moose and squirrel.
