Yesterday was a dark and stormy night (metaphorically speaking), and when it happens there’s nothing like take-away, beer and a good cartoon. And The Peanuts, regardless of what has been said, is a damn good cartoon for a whole bunch of reasons. Spoiler alert: as usual, spoilers are in white: highlight them if you want to read them. If you read via feed, it’s either you jump on the blog or you stop reading right now.
1st Reason is Technical
I’m not saying that The Peanuts is a good movie mainly for technical reasons, and yet the technical aspect played a chief role in my appreciation. And not just because I’m a geek and I’m interested in all things concerning drawing, animation, CGI. The main reason I was so struck by the animations in this movie is – and I’ll whisper it – that I hate nowadays CGI in cartoons. I hate it. I was bitten by Toy Stories while I was little and I couldn’t stand it ever since. I can’t stand things like Up, Inside Out, and even Frozen disturbs me. I do love traditional cartoons. Or, to put it better, I do love animation with personality: I adore Aardman’s work, for instance, both on things like Shaun the Sheep (or Wallace & Gromit) and Pirates which had a rather different approach.
In that sense, I was thunderstruck by a couple of technical choices in this movie.
The way backgrounds are treated, for instance, with different layers overlapping. Take for instance the picture below: you have Snoopy on the foreground (but more on characters later), the tree is the first layer in the background and has a distinctive three-dimensionality. Then you have the low wall. And behind it, a blurred very traditionally painted picture. And I must admit that maybe, just maybe, this would have been worth seeing in 3d.
Treatment of characters was also amazing. A mixture of amazing textures almost coming out of the screen, mainly for hair and furs, come together with very smooth shaded colours and sharp black ink signs where it matters.
2nd Reason is Storytelling
It wasn’t easy to make a movie out of storylines that usually last from 4 to 16 scenes. It wasn’t easy, at least, without going into that dark tangle of stories that span on more of one strip, such as Snoopy’s wedding, or Linus’ troubled love towards his teacher. You couldn’t go there, mainly because you would loose corality: those are stories mainly centered on one or two characters, and authors wanted to bring everyone together. So, they did the only thing they could do: they used Snoopy and his double-lives, mixing the author and the World War I Flying Ace, the dancer and Joe cool. The Flying Ace story, in particular, creates something like a second parallel layer alongside Charlie Brown’s love story, and while the trick is crystal-clear, you have to admit the movie wouldn’t stand on its feet without it.
3rd Reason is Music
Not that I’m a fan of what has been used as a soundtrack. Still, alongside the traditional Charlie Brown medley you can find original scores that sound like oldies (trailer’s That’s What I Like is a good example). It was fitting, never disturbing, and cleverly used where words wouldn’t have been as effective.
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4th Reason is Respect
Yes, I know, I know. We were all scared by the fact that Charlie Brown would get the girl. And he does get the girl. Still, I have to say I wasn’t bothered by the red-haired girl. Maybe it’s because I already knew that the cartoons broke the taboo and showed her face. It’s pretty much the only Peanuts rule that got broken in this movie, alongside with showing (for symmetry) Snoopy’s semi-fictional fiancee. You still can’t see nor hear adults and to me that was the main rule not to break. Voices also are amazing: Snoopy doesn’t speak and yet is acting is wonderful. I wouldn’t have minded Woodstock to be a little more |||||||||||||| but you can’t have everything and I thought it was genious to give Lucy’s the storytelling of Snoopy’s fantasies before revealing she’s reading the manuscript. And it’s funny to imagine Kristin Chenoweth “voicing” Fifi.
Besides that, I’m sure it was tempting to do something new with this movie, something radically different from the comic books. Something to give that sense of closure you were never allowed to have with Schultz. And I admire the authors for not giving in to temptation too much. Still, this is the fourth and less compelling reason because I admit I would have loved this movie even more if it was just a little bit more cynical and cruel, in the way comics were.
5th Reason is Football
Because it’s not in the movie, but it’s in the bonus scene.
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