Review: The Muppets

Jason Segel plays Gary, brother to a Muppet named Walter. Yes, that’s biologically impossible, but it’s a movie after all. Anyway, both brothers have been life-long Muppet fans, and so when Gary takes his girlfriend Mary (Amy Adams) on a vacation to celebrate their ten-year anniversary, Gary allows Walter to tag along so they can visit the Muppet Studios. Mary...tolerates this. But when they get there, Walter overhears some bad news. Not only has the building been long neglected, but evil tycoon Tex Richman (Chris Cooper) plans on demolishing the studio to drill for oil. The only way to stop this from happening is for the Muppets to raise $10,000. Distressed, Walter and Gary visit Kermit at his Hollywood mansion to try and convince him to ‘get the band back together’. Unfortunately, the Muppets have long gone their separate ways, but eventually Kermit is persuaded and the gang head off in search of the rest of the...er...gang. Kermit is particularly reluctant to look up Miss Piggy, because...well, you know how those two are. Fozzy has sunk to the level of cashing in on the Muppets name by fronting a third-rate covers band/lounge act called The Moopets, Scooter works for Google, Animal is sponsored by Jack Black in Anger Management therapy, Miss Piggy is now the editor of a Paris fashion magazine (Emily Blunt is her secretary), Gonzo runs a huge plumbing business, Sam the Eagle is a Conservative TV show correspondent, and so on. Rashida Jones plays a TV exec who reluctantly allows the gang to stage a telethon so long as they can get a suitable celebrity guest host. This of course involves the kidnapping of Jack Black. Meanwhile, Waldorf and Statler as usual provide derisive commentary from above, Mary feels Gary has neglected her for his Muppet friends, and Walter frets over being asked by Kermit to fill some time on stage with a talent spot.

I was worried that the wave of nostalgia was going to be too strong for me to assess this film from director James Bobin (of that “Flight of the Conchords” show I’ll never watch) on the same level as any other film. I mean, who grew up on The Muppets and didn’t love them? If so, you’re just not man or Muppet (I was only a year old when their TV show finished, and yet they and that show are still a part of my life). But the film actually rubbed me the wrong way early on, and so I felt like I wouldn’t just get caught up in the nostalgia and forget about everything else. It certainly isn’t as memorable as “The Muppet Show”, “Muppet Christmas Carol” (my favourite Muppet movie of all-time) or even “Muppet Babies”. Besides, I actually hadn’t realised that most people considered Kermit and the Gang to be yesterday’s news. That’s if they’re even old enough to have heard of them at all. Apparently a whole generation has gone without a strong connection to these characters. I guess I just assumed these characters still appeared on TV in some form or another, and it wasn’t all that long ago that even I saw them in that frankly disappointing “Muppet Wizard of Oz”thing with Quentin Tarantino (and I still haven’t sat through all of “Muppets in Space”). 2005 in fact. What? That’s like yesterday to me. I watch “Muppet Christmas Carol” every Christmas, so whilst these characters have never been absent for me, perhaps that’s not the case for everyone. Or maybe the young ‘uns of today just have a shorter frame of reference than I do. But, it does indeed appear that the young‘uns of today haven’t been weaned on The Muppets outside of “Sesame Street”perhaps (That show’s still on, right?). Maybe hand puppets don’t cut it in this era of more sophisticated CGI entertainments. Still, the nostalgia thing didn’t quite work for me early on the way it was probably meant to. I mean, how could I believe it had been so long since the gang was together that Fozzy Bear now had his own third-rate Muppets Tribute Band called The Moopets? Dude, I’ve seen you and the others every few years for decades! Besides, the whole cash-driven (in perhaps more than one sense) plot could’ve easily been solved by Gonzo and Piggy supplying the funds themselves. Oops, I guess we’re not meant to think logically in a kids movie (Why not?). I did like that the plot somewhat resembled “The Blues Brothers”, however. That was cute, though it would’ve been even cuter of Frank Oz (the former Miss Piggy and co-star of “The Blues Brothers”)was still on board.

I also wasn’t quite buying the character of Walter. I kinda gather that he was meant to be Segel’s brother and a Muppet, but the whole identity crisis thing just isn’t very well explained. Does he identify with the Muppets because he is one? The fact that there are other Muppets outside of, well, the Muppets (for instance, Fozzy’s cover band The Moopets) helped sell it a bit, but I felt it would’ve been better if Segel’s brother was just a young human boy who wanted to be a Muppet because he was a Muppet at heart. Walter actuallybeing a Muppet and no one (except maybe Amy Adams) really making a big deal out of it just didn’t work for me, at least not at first. It seemed a little odd and Walter ain’t no Kermit the Frog (He is, however, more enjoyable than that lame faux-Rastafarian who hosted the unfortunate and best forgotten “Muppets Tonight”). Walter, however, is at least far more palatable than the embarrassing performance given by Chris Cooper as the film’s villain. Whether it’s failing to produce any laughs by saying lines like ‘Maniacal laugh...maniacal laugh’ (instead of him actually laughing maniacally), or delivering a painful rap, I felt very sorry for the Oscar winner. Some people aren’t good at comedy, and some people aren’t good at interacting with Muppets. Cooper is 0-2 there. At least Walter won me over by the end when he reveals his quite lovely hidden talent (Which I won’t spoil, but it’s almost as adorable as Amy Adams. Almost).

The songs also mostly didn’t work for me and highlighted a slight irritant I had with the film. However, it should first be noted that I generally hate musicals to begin with. Not only are the original songs (produced and largely penned by a shockingly Oscar-winning Bret McKenzie, also of “Flight of the Conchords”) terrible and unmemorable, but the way Segel and Adams perform them, they seem to be somewhat condescending and they don’t fit into a Muppet movie. They seem more like “Enchanted 2”, if anything and it makes one wish Frank Oz or someone at least a little less irreverent had directed it (The Muppets themselves are irreverent enough). Segel in particular mugs mercilessly in his musical moments, and it just had me wondering if the film wasn’t slightly laughing at The Muppets and their fans whilst also laughing with them. I could never quite shake that feeling early on, and outside of Waldorf and Statler, it’s not something I especially appreciated. Maybe it’s because the human characters played by Segel and Adams take up too much time that could’ve been better spent on The Muppets. Or maybe the fact that Segel (who played a puppet enthusiast in “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”), co-scripting with Nicholas Stoller (Segel’s “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” alum) is a ‘fan’ of the Muppets rather than being a real part of the ‘family’ is the reason for the humour being a tad ‘off’. It didn’t exactly feel like a proper Muppet movie to me (And I think it’s too easy to blame Disney, who obtained the rights to the Muppet brand. Disney, whatever you might think of them, generally deliver quality entertainment).

I also lamented that several of the more beloved Muppets (Gonzo, Animal, and especially Rowlf and Rizzo the Rat) were underused. Poor Rizzo, who admittedly isn’t an original cast member, has a dialogue-free walk-on at most. I also wanted more Swedish Chef, damn it!

But y’know what? Eventually, none of these flaws really mattered (Well, I hate that ‘Mahna Mahna’ song passionately, but let’s not go there). Yes, they’re evident and the wave of nostalgia didn’t blind me to them, but at the same time, I had a big ‘ol smile on my face and good feeling in my tummy by the end of it. It may not be a great movie, but it’s ultimately a film very hard to dislike. It’s The Muppets, after all! And as much as Segel might’ve been hard to take at times (for a Muppets fanboy he came off a bit insincere and ego-driven to me), Amy Adams is still the loveliest screen presence in movies these days. She’s got ‘it’ (And has always reminded me of Prairie Dawn from “Sesame Street”. Am I alone in this?). Some of the film is downright hilarious, such as 80s Robot and his dispensing of TAB and New Coke, or the absolutely riotous version of Cee-Lo Green’s “Forget You” clucked by an all-chick (literally) group that made me happier than just about anything else this month. They sounded just like him! (And because they were just clucking, who knows which version of the song they were performing?- Subversive humour isn’t an unknown entity to the Muppets) Hell, a walk-on by the one and only Mickey Rooney is enough to make you grin from ear to ear. Who doesn’t smile when they see The Mick these days? (Especially in a film where the plot involves saving the studio by putting on a show!) And whilst I might not encourage Chris Cooper to ever work with The Muppets again (ever!), there’s fun work by the exquisite Emily Blunt (another actress who has ‘it’, whatever ‘it’ is), Rashida Jones, and a brilliant cameo by the one and only James Carville. Blunt’s role, in particular, is an amusing in-joke for anyone paying attention. Jones’s role, meanwhile, is important in getting across the idea that The Muppets might not be a right fit for our more cynical society today, in a film that is otherwise just as jocular and sunny as any other incarnation of The Muppets (Cooper doesn’t count, his villain is a buffoon). I’m still chuckling right now about the notion of Sam the Eagle as a Fox-like political news contributor. You always knew it was in the cards. And although “Man or Muppet” is one of the most undeserving Oscar-winning songs of all-time, it seemed kinda fitting to me for Jim Parsons to play the human representation of a Muppet (Irrelevant aside: Anyone else think Geraldo Rivera looks like a Muppet, by the way? No, he’s not in this, but he should be).

I also appreciated that, for perhaps the first-time ever, Miss Piggy was softened to the point of being generally pretty likeable. I usually find her funny, but frankly not terribly endearing and I don’t think the film (a nostalgic, feelgood one) needed her at her most Diva-esque. Oh, and Fozzy’s fart shoes are funny. They just are (Fozzy Moopet’s one line is even funnier, though. I think it’s the inappropriate voice the character is given). Whilst I wasn’t keen on the non-Muppet songs here, anytime the Muppets performed a song, the film was a joy to behold. In addition to the hilarious Cee-Lo cover, there’s also an amusing version of “Smells Like Teen Spirit” done in barbershop quartet-style by Rowlf, Sam the Eagle, and most hilariously of all, Beaker. Meanwhile, anyone not smiling from ear to ear and bopping along to the theme from “The Muppet Show” just doesn’t know what fun is. Most affecting of all, however, is a trip down memory lane as Kermit (and, perhaps regrettably Miss Piggy too) performs the classic “Rainbow Connection”.That was the point at which this movie had truly won me over, warts and all. I’m sorry, but if that song doesn’t make you happy and sad all at once, you simply have no heart or soul. That’s just a magical, timeless song (I was also touched by a familiar shape formed out of fireworks at the end of the film, but Muppet purists might be angered by that shameless bit of cross-promotion. It’s your loss, though, it’s a cute moment).

This isn’t the best Muppet movie out there (and occasionally has a different feel to it), but it’s the best one since “Muppet Christmas Carol”,and whilst uneven and a little sloppy, the film is still frequently funny and the title characters’ charm ultimately won me over. A good Muppet movie proves ultimately to be more enjoyable than a lot of non-Muppet movies. They never really left my consciousness, but I hope they continue to appear in movies for generations to come.

Rating: B-