The Tigger Movie
Director: Jun Falkenstein. Animated. Voice Cast: Jim Cummings, Nikita Hopkins, John Fiedler, John Hurt, Ken Sansom, Peter Cullen, Kath Soucie. Screenplay: Jun Falkenstein (based on characters by A.A. Milne and a story by Eddie Guzelian).
You know, there is nothing really wrong with this picture, just as, strictly speaking, there is nothing wrong with calling a movie about Tigger The Tigger Movie. All the same, both movie and title evince the same basic lack of imagination, as well as the same difficulty in presenting a completely likeable character in a particularly engaging way. The plot is your standard cartoon-movie piffle wherein Tigger gets lonely—the other residents of the Hundred Acre Wood are all too busy to Bounce with him—and so, he goes in search of the family of Tiggers with whom to giggle and cavort. Bear in mind that this expedition runs in the face of every Bit of Knowledge About Tiggers that the devoted reader has ever heard—which, to be concise, guarantee that there can only be one Tigger. Though it is logical to assume, as Tigger does in this film, that he must have come from somewhere, this variety of "logical" thinking is not the kind that either the characters or the audiences of these kiddie films are generally expected to perform. It's okay for Tigger to hop along on an impossible enterprise, but for the film itself to appear so desperate in its search for a plot . . . well, that's less becoming.
I suppose one's reaction to The Tigger Movie depends a great deal on one's interest in and affection for the characters. I generally try to disclose as little about myself in these reviews as possible, but here I'll make an exception. I own five Pooh Bears, no kidding. (And let's just say I am no longer of typical Pooh-buying age.) So I entered the theater with a whole heaping pile of goodwill toward this movie, even though I'm more of a Pooh person than a Tigger fan. I'm not sure if my fondness for these characters and their stories made me like the film more or less. I was certainly willing to indulge the lame humor and the general aimlessness, though both A.A. Milne and his Disney inheritors have generally found a little more for Pooh and his pals to do, and a little more wit with which to do it. There's also the fact that Tigger is one cute little fella, and I'm a sucker for any musical montage in which hundreds of Tiggers Through Time—pirate Tigger, Elizabethan Tigger, caveman Tigger, you get the point—bounce around the screen.
So, I put up with and at times even enjoyed this movie though I realized with increasing certainty that the picture itself is no great shakes. (It's also a singularly ugly bit of animation, all olive greens, sickly yellows, and dismal browns.) You probably know when buying your ticket whether or not you're a person who's going to feel rewarded or ripped off by this feature. Don't expect Babe, and don't feel bad about waiting for the video—but, if you're enough of a softie to stand in line to begin with, I'm sure you'll have an okay time. Grade: C