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- The Emperor's New Groove
(Reviewed December 10, 2000, by James Dawson)
- Miracle! Miracle! A new Disney animated movie that does NOT fall back on the tired old 1990s Disney formula of insipid-songs-'n'-sickening-sidekicks! What's too bad is that this
Christmas treat is saddled with a thoroughly misleading title that implies the movie will be about music (it isn't--heck, it's not even a musical!) and an ad campaign that does absolutely nothing to convey
what the movie actually IS about (a smirkingly egomaniacal teenage emperor, voiced by David Spade, who goes through a series of wacky misadventures trying to regain his throne after being transformed
into a llama and exiled).
I went to this movie with low expectations (thanks to Disney's bad marketing job), but I ended up liking it more than any Disney animated movie I've seen since the studio's classic "Little Mermaid." That's
right, that means I liked it more than "Beauty and the Beast," "Aladdin," "The Lion King," "Pocahontas," "Hercules" or "Mulan" (just to name six that come immediately to mind, and not counting the
computer-animated "Toy Story" movies, which are in a category by themselves). This is kind of a "small" movie (not many characters, basically simple story), but I liked David Spade's snarky humor as the
emperor/llama, John Goodman is fine as the peasant he befriends, Eartha Kitt is A-OK as the emperor's nemesis, and Patrick Warburton ("Seinfeld"'s Puddy) is great as her IQ-challenged hunk of a
henchman. Spade's narration is funny, as are the occasions when he steps "outside the frame" (literally, at one point).
One of the main things I enjoyed about the movie is that it looks and plays more like a wacky 1950s Warner Bros. cartoon than like a safe-as-milk Disney movie, especially during the antic action scenes at
the climax.
I get the feeling that "Emperor's New Groove" won't attract much of an audience, thanks to its terrible title and advertising campaign. But if you go, I think you will be pleasantly surprised.
Back Row Grade: B
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