The Muppet Movie (1979)

 

Muppet går til filmen

I always loved “The Muppet Show”. It was a big thing on Danish television in my childhood and I loved watching it. A handful of years ago I discovered a box set with an entire season’s worth of episodes and bought it. I now own two seasons. Still, the magic is there, all these years later. Okay, I get impatient at times, but every episode has just enough of that anarchistic madness that makes me love the show. When “The Muppet Show” is best, it is the puppet version of Monty Python.

Sadly, “The Muppet Movie” was a disappointment.

With this movie, the decision clearly was to focus on the cuteness of the puppets, the songs and the cameos of famous actors, whereas the anarchistic madness is entirely absent. The target group seems to be 5-year-old girls and as I am not, it misses the mark for me. I tried to watch this with my family. Half an hour in my wife gave up, five minutes later my son followed suit and I was left to struggle through this on my own. When you start checking the synopsis to get an estimate on how long is left, it is not going great.

The anarchy is the heart and soul in “The Muppet Show”. Statler and Waldorf has to be immensely rude and dry, the Swedish Chef has to do some outrageous cooking, Gonzo has to do some insane stunts (hanging from balloons does not cut it) and Dr. Bunsen run some mad experiments on Beeper. Even the songs of the ordinary shows have this mad twist that keeps them from being too sweet (and boring). A good cameo feeds into the craziness, which marked a poor cameo as some famous person just trying to look good or cute. All this is absent in the movie. A few of the cameos try to do the right thing (Steve Martin’s was decent), but most are just there to, well, be there.

So, what does “The Muppet Movie” actually do? Well, Kermit lives in a swamp, singing about rainbows (?) when Dom DeLuise paddles by and suggests he goes to Hollywood to be a star. Kermit is early on hunted by Doc Hopper (Charles Durning), a fried frog leg franchise owner who wants to use him in commercials. Kermit meets Fozzie Bear in El Sleazo bar and together they drive across the country to Hollywood. Enroute they meet Gonzo, Miss Piggy and The Electric Mayhem band. There is a showdown in a ghost town with Doc Hopper where Animal saves the day by taking an enlargement potion of Dr. Bunsen’s. They make it to Hollywood where they sing a song.

The cast of puppets are there and they are cute. Not fun, but cute. Most of the dolls get a bit of screentime, but the funniest get very little time and it is very limited what they do with it. It is mostly Kermit, Fozzie, Miss Piggy and Gonzo we see. The potential is there for Miss Piggy to do her thing, but it is all pretty lame and innocent what she does and Gonzo, well, I have never seen him this boring.

There are LOTS of songs here. I am not qualified to say if they are good, but I know I was bored every time one came up. The madness that spices them up in the standard show was, well, absent.

The list of A-listers with a cameo is truly staggering, which may also be part of the problem. We just have to see James Coburn say a line, Madeleine Kahn give her persona from “Blazing Saddles” etc etc. Mel Brooks is moderately successful as Professor Krassman, and Martin as mentioned above as an insolent waiter. But none of these cameos really fit into the larger picture and it is rather a game of Guess the Star.

“The Muppet Movie” feels like a missed opportunity. As if the Second Unit crew got hold of the puppets and a large budget, but was missing the point of the show. This could have been amazing, but was just dull. The other, and likely more likely, explanation is that this was a Disney setup for small girls. I feel certain they would love this. In any case, unless you belong to that target group, this movie will only cause grief.