The Drink Tank
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I’ve been a huge fan of the bande dessinée style of Franco-Belgian comics since day one. “Day one” would be that afternoon in 1970 when I discovered a copy of Asterix in Britain in a public library, and eagerly took it out. Over the years, I’ve also discovered Tintin, Lucky Luke, Spirou and, yes, even The Smurfs. Most of you will know The Smurfs from an animated TV series made by Hanna-Barbera, and so will have developed an irrepressible gag reflex. In fact, the cartoon was not as bad as all that. Maybe not surprisingly, the original books by Peyo are even better. Hanna-Barbera were faithful to the original, on the whole. They were more “economical” with the back- ground and personalities, perhaps, and the result on the screen was inevitably more homogenized than the books by Peyo. Still, the studio can’t be faulted for what is, after all, material aimed at a younger audience than Asterix or even Tintin. I’ve written before about the peculiar attraction the comics have for me, and will spare the reader a re- run. The upshot of all this is that when I heard, last year, that a live-action, CGI assisted, full length feature movie was being made of The Smurfs, I was intrigued. Odds were high that it would be yet another disappointment. Look at films like Garfield, Underdog and Rocky & Bullwinkle, that translated cartoon characters into the real world. Better still, don’t look at them. They deflate the brain as quickly as a leaky football in a wine press. There was no good reason to expect better of this attempt. Yet... my eye wouldn’t ignore the images I saw online. The Smurfs in the promotional stills looked pretty slick, actually. They weren’t exactly as they looked on the comic page, but they did seem to be what a Smurf would look like if it were a living, breathing member of a little blue race of men who are only “three apples high.” (They are mostly men, too. All 99 of them.) How high is “three apples high,” anyway? Doesn’t it depend on whether we’re talking Macintoshes or Golden Delicious? Three of one might only be about 6 inches high, and three of the other more like 9 or 10... But I digress. Then there is Smurfette. Have I mentioned that I’m attracted to female cartoon characters? No doubt some readers right now are smirking to themselves, “Aha! Afraid of a real woman, huh?” I don’t know what their point is. I don’t seem to have met all that many “real” women, and those I do know are all spoken for. It’s not like I have a choice. Maybe my attitude is better summed up, “I can always dream, can’t I?” Not long ago, I obtained a previously viewed copy of The Smurfs movie. Hold on to your little white caps, but I actually enjoyed it. True, it’s about Smurfs – and many people are far too adult and therefore incapable of taking a movie about little blue people in the least bit seriously. This is hardy unexpected. A generation or two, ago most people regarded Vulcans, wizards and Hobbits as frivolous, and would have been incapable of seeing the merit of this generation’s Star Trek, Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings. Regardless of its origins in a kid’s comic book and TV cartoon show, The Smurfs is a decent 100 minutes’ worth of entertainment. It’s occasionally thought-provoking, sometimes a little over the top in sentimentally, but has enough comic moments to put a smile on the face of the most implacable realist. It demands only a little open-mindedness at the start, and then it seems quite natural to see Smurfette “high-four” her first human girl- friend. I went through many of the same mental gymnastics over being open-minded about Alvin and the Chip- munks a couple of years ago. It could easily have been a huge, steaming pile of... Eau d’Hollywood. Fortunately, it was not. Given the premise that chipmunks can sing, Alvin and the Chipmunks was, like The Smurfs, surprisingly entertaining and intelligently done. In fact, the movies are quite similar in broad outline. To begin with, the story of David Seville, down-on-his-luck songwriter, is an old one. The movie doesn’t give it much of a twist, but does at least show us a glimpse of lives of Alvin, Simon and Theodore before they become lost in Los Angeles. It begins in a forest in Northern California, where, naturally, they live in a tree. Their tree is cut down and they are transported to the unimaginable world of the big city. Eventually, they take refuge in Dave’s home... much to his disbelief and astonishment. After some resistance on the songwriter’s part, the three chipmunks slide seamlessly into his home and lifestyle. The seductive power of success, however, lures the six-inch-tall, newly minted pop stars away from Dave – and his homey sensibilities – into the clutches of a slimy record-company promoter. The movie comes to a satisfying end when the Chipmunks wise up and make good their escape from the villain. Henceforth they will be humble Chipmunks... who just happen to be the idols of millions and make seven-figure incomes. Okay, the movie has some unrealistic plot elements... How can it ever be possible to live a normal life- style in a modest four-room bungalow if you’re ‘N Sync? And would singing, dancing rodents ever be popular as anything but a novelty? Apart from that, Alvin and the Chipmunks has a small point to make, and makes it. The music is even good... mostly. While The Smurfs begins in the Smurf village – where we see them busy with day-to-day smurfing – in the Chipmunks movie we begin with Alvin, Simon, and Theodore storing nuts in a tree. In The Smurfs, disaster intervenes in the form of the wizard Gargamel finally discovering their village. Most of the Smurfs run to safety in the forest, but Clumsy – being Clumsy – goes the wrong way. He is followed by Papa Smurf, Grouchy, Brainy, Gutsy and the Smurfette. A vortex caused by “a blue moon” sucks all six into Central Park in New York City. Fearing the gigantic people around him, Clumsy hides in a cardboard box belonging to an advertising agency employee. The others arrive only in time to follow the box to the apartment home of Grace and Patrick. Understandably, their unwitting hosts are astonished and disbelieving... and, just as the Chipmunks settle into life in suburban bungalow after tussling with the kitchenware and Dave’s recording equipment, the Smurfs settle into a New York apartment only after they get the hang of the espresso maker and Patrick’s laptop. And is there music? Yes... Unfortunately. The movie itself pokes fun at the familiar Smurf theme song. To cheer Patrtick up, the Smurfs begin to sing, “La, la, la la la laaah,” and he barks “Stop that! It’s irritating!” There is also a scene where – in a less grouchy mood – Patrick introduces his guests to Guitar Hero. But at this point the Smurfs movie begins to veer off in a different direction from Alvin and the Chip- munks. There is a little music but it is only incidental. Also, instead of the obligatory villain being a venal and corrupt human the Smurfs are followed into our world by Gargamel, the evil wizard who troubles their other- wise carefree lives in the forest by chasing after them with spells and a butterfly net. Neither technique has ever been particularly successful, as Gargamel is rather a half-assed wizard. Gargamel is played by Hank Azaria with his head shaved and a putty nose. Azaria is known mainly for voicing rather broad roles in The Simpsons, so he is no stranger to thinking like a cartoon. Many of the movie’s funniest moments include Gargamel mistaking a street person for a fellow wizard, posing melodramatically in steam venting from a street grating and flying from a prison yard with the aid of a monstrous cloud of ordi- nary houseflies enlisted for the escape. There is also an underlying theme in The Smurfs that most of us are likely to have an easier time identi- fying with than “celebrity corrupts.” Grace is expect- ing, and Patrick is a nervous first-time father. He fears he won’t be up to the challenge of being a dad, and has doubts about keeping his new job as well. He discovers he isn’t alone in facing responsibility, though. In a rather heartfelt tête à tête with Papa Smurf on the apartment roof, Patrick learns that the bearded Smurf has been looking after his “family” for over 500 years! “How did you know you would be able to do it, how did you know you were ready?” Patrick asks. The answer isn’t so surprising. “You know in here,” says Papa Smurf, thumping his pancreas. (Sorry. Just kidding.) “You know it in here,” he says, indicating his heart. Most times, I would have ignored such an obvious – and anti-rational – statement. But I noticed that Patrick hadn’t shaved since leaving for work that morning, and was showing a significant stubble. It was black, of course. Not Papa Smurf’s full white beard by a long shot. But could this detail have been in the script to purposefully indicate that – in his own way – Patrick was becoming like Papa Smurf? I don’t know, but it made a potentially trite scene rather more interesting, I thought.