Yeah, "Cabin Fever" was intended as filler because they needed some stuff to happen on the voyage other than characters talking. But, in it's defense, it's a song about insanity. It's not supposed to make sense.
"Dead men tell no tales!" *BANG!!!* LOVE IT!!! XD Holy crap, I can't believe I never heard Jerry Nelson's voice coming out of Squire Trelawney's manservant before! O_O
"What's up with his falsetto voice?" Because he was cast and then during filming his voice started to go through puberty so they had to use his audition/practice/whatever you call it vocals. He sounds much younger and lighter in the songs because he WAS--better than than trying to record a cracking voice. But yeah, even as a kid I thought it felt a bit off too. I also agree with the other commenters that you might be taking the film a tad too seriously. Plot holes? Character decisions that make no sense?--It's a comedic film, and Muppets at that. It's not supposed to "make sense" when there's a frog that dates a pig and a bear that has a man living in his finger. The blind guy has two eyepatches over his eyes! Just roll with the weird. As for me, I freaking love Cabin Fever specifically because it comes out of nowhere and is way over the top. Normally I dislike musical numbers like that but it's SO over the top that they know full well it has nothing to do with anything and they've just completely embraced that and pumped it up to 11. A moment of pure madness, and I love it.
For the most part Rachel I agree with your analysis (and with your playful wit and enthusiasm how could I not? ). The Muppet Show and the first few movies were aiming for adult audiences as much as they were for kids. With Disney's acquisition of the Muppets turned their attention to children (just compare Fozzie's ridiculous Mr. Bimble living in his finger with the Harry Kristina running gag from the first movie). Like you I thought this was awesome when I first saw it. However my admiration for the film lingered due to me becoming fan of the CD-rom game. My three favorite things about this movie are the opening song, Tim Curry, and the chemistry between Gonzo and Rizzo. Oh and I almost forgot: "Big-Fat-Ugly-Bug-Face-Baby-Eating O'Brien."
The oringal Treasure Island is a good, if sort of cliche, coming of age story. I'm talking on a Disney level (Like Jim's dad DOSE just get sick and die, so Disney was ballsy to change It to a much more complex issue), but ill never forget reading the part where Jim watches a man get shot.
The warning of the Black Spot is literally supposed to make them run. The pirates are waiting, and ready and wanting to chase the victim down and let them fear before they die.
Two names comes to mind for why this movie is so good, Hans Zimmer and Tim Curry, if you don't like how it's not so close to the story with some of its crazy muppets humor, then go watch treasure Island from Walt Disney's 1950 because that movie is exactly what you want if you like it to be on point, this one is the muppets at their best.
"Logic is your friend guys. Use it." ... Did you really seem to forget that this is a muppet movie and that it shouldn't be taken seriously? You've been taking this movie seriously throughout the whole review.
This movie is my personal favorite Muppet movie. The humor, to me, is great, the action scenes, for puppets, are amazing, and Tim Curry' performance here is my favorite he's ever done, narrowly edging out Darkness, Pennywise, and Frank n' Furter. I love this movie and have the soundtrack downloaded on my ipod. I also found it very interesting that this was paired up with the Great Muppet Caper, my favorite movie of the three original Muppet movies. Was the Blu Ray made SPECIFICALLY to cater to me?
You can't really fault "Cabin Fever" for existing as filler when the film is self-aware about it not fitting in with the rest of the movie. The next scene even has Clueless Morgan asking "What was that song that just happened?" while the other characters don't know what he's talking about.
The 90s was a rough era for Piggy. This was when the backlash for her assaulting other people, and her romantic partner especially, whoever she lost her temper really hit the fan. Notice, she doesn't karate chop Kermit any more, and it started around this era.
After seeing this movie as a 6 year old I grew up thinking it was based on a childrens book. Boy was I surprised when I actually got to read it when I was around 10 years old.
It may just be me, but Blind Pew resembles Deadly so much (a blue reptilian monster performed by Jerry Nelson), I question why Deadly didn't get the role. Anyone else?
those singing skulls SCARED me as a kid... just from re-watching it i kinda see your points but i kinda enjoy it a lot. nostalgia maybe. but the muppets are still fun in this (cept miss piggy)
In Christmas Carol 1993 film is the two Bloodhound Police Peelers with the stove-pipe top hats. In the Great Muppet Caper 1981 film is a london police bobby.
A teenaged boy *was* cast in the role, but what was used for the singing voice were his vocals that were prerecorded prior to voice maturity, which took place during shooting. During the shooting, his more mature voice just wouldn't have sounded any better, so they just had his unmatured singing vocals there instead.
Addendum to my last comment - *and I know I said I wouldn't critique* Cabin Fever is perhaps one of the most inspired segments of film ever, alongside the "No, I am your father" scene with Luke and Vader (and coming from a Star Wars crazy fanatic, this isn't said lightly). For a family (read: "kids") film, right about here is where the younger ones are ready to scream and go crazy for.... something. The options are either more heavy exposition, or relieve the situation with a bit of stupid humour. Said stupid humour brought light to a dark period of the film. I love it.
The black spot bit is in the original story, there’s a bit of extra time between the paper and the attack in the book from my very old recollection of the novel. They just cut that for time. I’ll agree that Tim Curry is the Perfect Long John Silver. And Kevin Bishop (he’s still acting! By the way) just had a prepubescent voice, it’s not uncommon in boys. What I truly love about this is that this is more true to the Muppets are for Everyone not just kids ethos of Jim Hensons work.
I have to pause the review at the critique of Bishop's singing voice. That is not a falsetto. That's just what a normal boy whose singing voice hasn't completely dropped sounds like. Considering Bishop would have been filming this about age 14/15, it's nowhere out of place. Some teenage boys can continue through puberty to sing rather high. Their voice eventually drops but rather than going through a short and sudden squeak and screech stage it's instead a long and slow transition to a deeper voice (usually the speaking voice getting deeper before the singing voice does). I myself could sing alto 'till I was seventeen or so, as could another boy in my school. Around age 17 we both switched to high tenor. And come college I moved down to second tenor before settling in at baritone. This was while my speaking voice had started deepening earlier, the singing voice just took a little longer. I think my voice only cracked once throughout the entirety of puberty, while for others cracking occurred every other syllable. And there's some fully grown men who can still sing like this (and have a deeper speaking voice at the same time) they're called countertenors--and they're a prized voice type in the opera world as they then get cast in the roles that used to go to castradi in Baroque opera. Clearly Bishop's voice had yet to move out of the boy soprano/boy alto range when he filmed this movie.
actually his voice was cracking so much that he couldn't sing it luckily he had recorded months before to get used to singing it and they just used that instead because it would have taken at least a year to train it back up. this is all in the commentary if you don't believe me
Josh Gates Salamon2 : Even so, Jim Hawkins in the book is a boy at the start of puberty. In a way, he was the "Justin Bieber" of the literary world, given that all filmed versions of him depicted him as a young boy with a mop top hairdo and alto voice.
This was absolutely the most fair and concise review of a Muppet film I've seen. This is the only time I've ever seen Sam Eagle be funnier than Piggy or Fozzie, and thanks to Disney, they started dumbing down the characters "for the children." I think Muppets Tonight started shortly after this, correct? And yes, the opening song really rules! As for Frank Oz and his characters... Honestly I've never been a fan of Whitmire's Kermit, because he doesn't have the backbone that Jim's Kermit had. With that in mind, plus the writing and uncertainty of who these characters are at that time, Frank slowly pulled away. Nothing frustrated me more as a ten-year-old when seeing this in theaters than seeing Fozzie think there was someone living in his finger. That just screams studio rewriting from people who don't respect Jerry Juhl's capabilities. Also, if I may ask (and since the titles for all of the songs to Muppets Most Wanted have been released) which was your favorite song in the upcoming movie?
Lol what that intro made it into a G rated movie?? Maybe PG for talking about the devil , because PG does mean parental guidance. I think it was just so subtle and easy to miss (for a kid). The part when the viewer is seemingly shot, the hang of a gun cutting to black after saying “dead men tell no tales” is also dark, but I don’t think a lot of kids would understand what that sequence is saying, again, easy to go in one ear and out the other without a little kid being frightened, but it still deserves a PG rating either way.
How can you compare the movie as to when you saw it as a child (it's intended audience) and an adult? That makes zero sense at all. I can say this about every movie I saw as a child. You go back and watch it and you think that it is not as good as you remember it. The movie is not made for 20 to 30 year old adults. How can you apply this logic in you're reviews that is plane idiotic. You watch it now for nostalgic purpose not to trash it through the eyes of a fully developed adult. Stop trashing these movies, please stop. If you thought the movie was half decent as a child then leave it at that. As we know hindsight is always 20/20.
YOU are "plain" idiotic if you don't realize that some franchises are timeless, no matter the age. There's a reason for WHY people such as L. Frank Baum (Wizard of Oz author), Walt Disney, and Jim Henson himself have ALL shared similar philosophies, believing that both kids and adults can enjoy the SAME stuff. "Imagination has brought mankind through the Dark Ages to its present state of civilization. Imagination led Columbus to discover America. Imagination led Franklin to discover electricity. Imagination has given us the steam engine, the telephone, the talking-machine and the automobile, for these things had to be dreamed of before they became realities. So I believe that dreams - day dreams, you know, with your eyes wide open and your brain-machinery whizzing - are likely to lead to the betterment of the world. The imaginative child will become the imaginative man or woman most apt to create, to invent, and therefore to foster civilization." ~ *Lyman Frank Baum* "Why do we have to grow up? I know more adults who have the children's approach to life. They are not afraid to be delighted with simple pleasures, and they have a degree of contentment with what life has brought - sometimes it isn't much, either. Adults are interested if you don't play down to the little 2 or 3 year olds or talk down. I don't believe in talking down to children. I don't believe in talking down to any certain segment. I like to kind of just talk in a general way to the audience, for you're dead if you aim only for kids. Adults are only kids grown up, anyway." ~ *Walter Elias Disney* "The most sophisticated people I know - inside they are all children. When I was young, my ambition was to be one of the people who made a difference in this world. My hope is to leave the world a little better for having been there." ~ *James "Jim" Maury Henson*
I think before Muppet Treasure Island Disney and Jim Henson productions should make Muppet Peter Pan in 1994. Featuring Rik Mayall as Captain Hook with music and songs by Allen Menken and directed by Brian Henson and Frank Oz.
If you really didn’t like “Love Led Us Here”, you could always make a silly parody about beer of that song and sing something like “Love Gave Us Beer”.
I love how in this film You could see glimpses off Tim's other characters he's played in previous roles as there a bit and he says I'll kill you all and it reminded me of IT so much when he plays Pennywise 😂
Muppet treasure island is what I consider the best muppet movie. Honestly it is the first one I ever saw. I know there is a bit of hate for it and honestly I don't understand that. It is funny and silly but so are are the Muppets. By the way miss piggy can do no wrong
Oh come on, Brian Henson should direct more movies to keep the legend of his father alive. Like for instances here is my list of Henson movies that should have been made: 1 The Snow Queen (in 1998) 2 Animals vs Aliens (in 2000) 3 The Lion King Remake (in 2002) 4 The Happy Time Patrol (in 2004) 5 Maurice Sendak's Outside Over There (in 2005) 6 Dragon Flyz (in 2007) 7 The Night on Bald Mountain (in 2009) Which movie would you like to see if they were made?
Jason Stroman Muppet Treasure Island is a family picture. It's also the first film to show your kids if you want them to become hardline Tim Curry fans.
Jason Stroman Did you not watch this review? Tim Curry is by far the greatest thing ever to happen to the Muppets. Yeah, fack Muppets Most Wanted, that movie was crap.
That pirate captain at the end of the opening song is kind of stupid. Multiple pirates digging that hole, and those olde-tymey pistols take forever to reload. He killed two of em, and the others could beat him to death with shovels.
Yeah, the Muppets weren't exactly at their best in the nineties. Miss Piggy got annoying, Fozzie got stupid, Gonzo lost his weirdness, and Rowlf and Scooter didn't even exist anymore.
I know this didn't receive the greatest critical review, but it's still my favourite movie behind the original 1979 Muppet Movie. I'm not going to critique a critique (that's counter-intuitive, we all have our opinions), but just to comment on the Blu-ray release, all I can say is that I hope the US version (which I've ordered) HASN'T censored the word "bloody" out of the movie (unlike UK Muppets).
Interesting video! A few things to point out first Kevin Bishop's voice. The songs where pre recorded months before filming began. They where going to record the songs again, but Kevin's voice had started to change, and was cracking. So he could not hit the high notes, and thus that is why the vocals sound so off. For Fozzie during the filming of the movie Frank Oz himself told Brian that he hated the gag with the little man in the finger, but then after the premiere said it was one of his favorite gags in the film. Also for the Blu ray audio commentary, this was an old bonus feature from the 2001 release. It also included bonus behind the scenes video that would pause the movie and then show. That part of the commentary was taken out for the blu ray, but the intros for them where still a part of the commentary. It makes it very confusing when watching it Hope that helps!
I agree with you Rachel that Jim sings like Mickey Mouse and why didn't Gonzo take those starfish out of his pants earlier but it works out good. And it is just me or doesn't Long John remind me of Constintine who both steal their movies and make them great.
To be fair, Young Squire Trelawney was described as "half-wit", so... Take what you can get? 🤷🏻♂️ And the song "Cabin Fever" IS a song about being driven to the point of going crazy, so... Work with what you got, I guess. Oh, and Brian Henson performed Sweetums in this film since Richard Hunt (the original performer) died nearly two years after Jim Henson. If you felt that the voice sounded different, that's why.
Yeah, I'm not sure what the issue was there. He's described as a 'half-wit', and he works at a shipping company owned by his father. He's not there because he knows what he's doing, he's there for his father to keep an eye on (and support) his mentally disabled son.
Also while I love Frank Oz as a puppeteer I despise the fact that he distanced himself away from his characters that are what made him famous in the first place to focus on his horrible films I mean seriously he just let his characters fade away along with the franchise just because he wanted to be a movie director something he was never good at to begin with.
Umm...Eric Jacobson and David Rudman play Frank Oz's characters ever since he retired and they've done a brilliant job in the same way that Steve Whitmire and Bill Barretta had taken over for Jim Henson.
I actually really liked Little Shop of Horrors but I agree. Still, he followed his bliss. He knew he was taking a risk and seemed to accept responsibility when one of his films panned. Also much more down to earth and honest than a lot of people in his position would be.
He's not obligated to do one single thing the rest of his life just because he was good at it. Not to mention that it might have been kind of hard to stay once his comedic partner, Jim, died... things just aren't the same at that point.
I don't really find the modern-references funny, but I can forgive their presence because, well, it's the Muppets, and they've always had a tendency to break or utterly destroy the fourth wall. This can simply be viewed as a natural extension of the types of antics you'd see in their earlier works. Just, again, it's not really funny. I really love everything else about the film, though, particularly the fantastic music and the dynamic between all of the characters. Hawkins and Silver are pitch-perfect in my opinion. I love the sense of adventure and the energy of the film, and it's pretty much my favorite pirate movie. Yes, I prefer it over each and every one of the PotC movies. The star-fish in Gonzo's pants are what's called a brick joke, where you set the joke up, but leave the audience hanging and deliver the punchline much later. Not the best kind of humor in the world, but it works great for ongoing comics and tv shows, and they're largely meant for those viewers and readers who pay REALLY close attention and can remember even the most minute details.
3:39-3:43; Heck yeah it is. :) 7:55-8:00: WHAT DO YOU MEEEEEEEEEEEAN????????? ;) 9:33-9:37: No lightning effect???? Lame! ;) 18:49-18:55: Thatta girl. :) Yeah, I like this one. :) Onward! :)
It Is Not supposed to invoke the Same feelings for a Child and Adult. This reasoning is ridiculous. If that is you're purpose then label the video, Review of a Muppet movie I saw as a Child Rewatched as an Adult. I'm not saying I love the movie I'm saying that I liked it when I was 8 Not 25.
Bullocks. Some movies are timeless no matter the age. This is true of The Wizard of Oz (1939), is true of many Disney films, is true of many Muppet projects, and is true for basically any good quality family franchise.
NO, sorry, had to Dislike and stop watching when you came down hard on the movie's comedy. Don't agree with your opinions at all, and thought your delivery of them was poorly stated. This is one of the many reasons I don't subscribe.
