When it comes to iconic cartoons of the golden age, according to Wikipedia being from 1928 until 1972, which seems way to broad because that covers the rise of theatrical animation, television animation, Computer animation and just barely reaches the release of Pong, but regardless, in the era of theatrical shorts, there were many iconic names, Walt Disney, Termite Terrace, Fleischer Studios, and probably one of the most iconic, Hanna-Barbera. Though Tom and Jerry was an MGM property, they will forever be linked to the two men who brought television animation into the mainstream. Their form of comedy was not as well written as Looney Tunes, but more cartoony than a standard Disney cartoon, making Tom and Jerry icons in animation for years to come. Like most icons in animation, it was only a matter of time before they got their own movie, but these two work best with slapstick comedy and little to no dialogue, how can a movie around these two work?
I'm actually not the biggest Tom and Jerry fan, I do enjoy the shorts but I don't really go out of my way to watch them. I think to my favourite shorts from the Looney Tunes and remember just how brilliant the writing was and how well the characters worked off each other, or Goofy cartoons and remember some of the satire on American culture, and all I can really think about Tom and Jerry is how good the slapstick is, and it is very good slapstick, but I do tend to gravitate towards the better written comedy. Then again, a movie may be what this series needed, cinematic writing could make the slapstick even funnier, so does the iconic duo work in a theatrical setting?
The plot follows Tom and Jerry as they wander the streets after being left behind as their owners move house, or is it just owner? Doesn't matter, this part of the movie is almost completely silent, has a decent background track and works alright, it's not a particularly funny segment, but once the movie gets going it should get better right? Well, then they come across a little orphaned girl who is running away from her awful Aunt, this is in a Tom and Jerry movie. Okay, giving the benefit of the doubt that this was all necessary for a Tom and Jerry movie to function, that a human character with a problem for Tom and Jerry to assist with was the only way this movie could work, a little girl trying to avoid her awful guardian and look for her lost father is probably the last thing I would think of for a Tom and Jerry movie plot, it flows alright, but the plot is just flawed from the ground level.
The biggest thing a lot of people will bring up is the fact that Tom and Jerry actually speak in this movie. This is a problem because Tom and Jerry were mostly silent characters, though Tom did have some dialogue on occasion, but when that happened it was predominately to emphasize a joke. It's not like a movie with silent characters can't be done, or even characters that speak incomprehensibly, but there is a lot of effort that needs to be put into a movie like that. On top of that I really don't think Richard Kind works as the voice of Tom, he doesn't get the screams right, and it just doesn't sound right coming out of Tom's mouth, which you think would be a problem with the fact that the characters are speaking, but Jerry's voice is a bit closer to how I would imagine Jerry would sound. This was the final film role for the late Dana Hill, and while her voice does make Jerry sound very young, it does work better than Richard King as Tom. To be fair, the rest of the voice acting is okay, my only other problem is with Tony Jay who sounds like he's doing a Vincent Price impression.
On the topic of vocal performances, this movie is also a musical. I'll be honest, the songs are not great, but they aren't the worst I've heard. A big part of that is because of the music by Henry Mancini, who also did the music for The Great Mouse Detective. While I don't really like the songs, they are memorable, and the music is well-done, it's just a shame that they aren't all sung the best, or the best written. Which is similar to what can be said about the animation, it's not the worst and does bring the classic characters into the modern age visually, it's just a shame that some of the shots look weird and the editing is not the best. On top of that, the actual slapstick in the movie just does not hit as well as it should, we never see any of the characters morph to show the impact of the hit, or the slapstick itself is just very light and basic. This movie doesn't work as a slapstick comedy, and it doesn't really work as an exciting adventure.
On some level, I can kind of respect the choices they made for this movie. I can imagine that the idea of making a movie starring Tom and Jerry was difficult from the get-go and a lot of tough choices had to be made, but on the other hand not a lot of those choices really work. It fails as a slapstick because the actual slapstick is not very good, it fails as an exciting adventure because it's Tom and Jerry these two things just should not go together. On the one hand you have Peanut Butter, the other hand has jalapeños, I mean with the right amount of each you probably could get something good, but when you throw them together without much thought as to how it would all work, you're going to get something bad, and yeah, this movie is bad, but I would not go as far as to say it's awful, it kind of harkens back to my thoughts on the Felix the Cat movie, where if you're a big fan of Tom and Jerry, you're probably going to despise this movie a lot more, but even if you aren't it still is not a good movie, stick with the classic shorts.
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