I went and saw it yesterday at
the 6:15 showing. There were only about five or six other groups of people in there, thirty people max. It was mostly couples with toddlers, but there was a group of teenagers (
the girls actually dressed up a little! One had a Piglet tail, lol).
I was a little disappointed.
The movie seemed too focused on humor. Some of
the humor was really funny - in
the right way, too. But a lot of
the time, it felt like
the writers sat around thinking of gags instead of sweet, heartfelt stories like those in
the original shorts, where
the humor doesn't feel forced at all.
The story quality was similar to
the DisneyToon features, which isn't precisely a bad thing. It's just that Walt Disney Animation Studios is supposed to do better. Of course,
the animation was better, though. It was lovely.
The characters were
the same, except for Kanga and Roo. Kanga was more modern than she used to be. Roo only had about four lines, but when he spoke, he was definitely different. I'm not sure how to describe him, though.
The newer voice actors take a couple minutes to get used to, but by
the end you should be used to all of them. Except Piglet. He's hard to get used to.
The songs were good, on
the whole. About
the same quality as
the DisneyToons features. Zooey Deschanel's version of "
Winnie the Pooh" wasn't bad at all. My favorite songs in
the movie were "It's Gonna Be Great" and
the "Everything is Honey."
The former's lyrics are probably not
the cleverest, but it is very Tigger, and that's all that matters.
"Everything is Honey" has a great lead-in scene (my favorite in
the movie), and I couldn't help thinking
the song is supposed to be
the opposite of "Heffalumps and Woozles."
So, I
did like
the movie (it's hard not to like a
Winnie the Pooh movie), but it didn't measure up to "
The Many Adventures of
Winnie the Pooh." It was more on
the level of "
The Tigger Movie," although with better animation and less heart. I won't be rushing out to buy this one, but I'll end up purchasing it sooner or later. I'll probably end up with
the soundtrack as well.
Oh! I almost forgot!
The Ballad of Nessie! I really, really liked this.
The animation is wonderfully old-fashioned,
the story's charming, and when I heard Billy Connolly's voice, I knew I was going to love it. Billy does a great job on
the narration, bringing
the non-speaking Nessie to life. I honestly liked "Nessie" better than
the main feature. If this is what their shorts are going to be like, bring them on!
