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The Last Unicorn (1982)
The Beauty of the Unicorn
The Unicorn lives in her forest, unaware of the goings-on outside her little world,until one day, two men give her cause to worry about the other Unicorns. Is she the Last? Following the advice of a butterfly, she sets off on her adventure, to find the other Unicorns, or to discover what happened to them.
Like the appeal of the Unicorn, this film is timeless. Forget computerized special effects, the animation of this film is completely pure. It has an anime-like quality to it, which is pretty amazing, considering this would have been one of the first films to come to Britain in that sort of Genre.
The voice-acting is excellent - Mia Farrow as the Unicorn has a beautiful appeal in her voice that perfectly matches the magic of the Unicorn, and also suits the beauty of Almethea.
Chistopher Lee, is, as ever, fantastic as the bad guy. He plays King Haggard at exactly the right timbre to make you wonder about him all through the film.
Schmendrik is fantastic - not only as comic relief with all his failed spells, but as a true friend.
Should you see it? The simple answer to that is yes. Not only for the beautiful animation and the superb voice acting skills, but for the story - a passionate tale of courage, good over-coming evil, self-belief, self-discovery, innocence, love - everything a classic tale like this needs.
Rating? 10/10.
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (1988)
A King of Films
I grew up on this series. Yes, I was one of those children, who, every Sunday afternoon would sit down with the parents and even the elder brother, with scones, teacakes, crumpets and sandwiches, all laid out on the small brass-topped table we kept for special occasions, in the lounge and watch the Chronicles of Narnia. It was the only time we were ever allowed to eat in front of the TV, and certainly the only time we were allowed to eat in the lounge! I would follow the adventures of Lucy, Susan, Peter and Edmund, and I fell under the spell of Narnia and the Great Lion, Aslan. I was captivated by the magic, and am still held captive today.
There's a lot of comments about the FX, but everyone seems to forget that this was made in the 80s - it was the Lord of the Rings of its day. If you're a modern kid, all into computer FX, and scorning at the hand-drawn elements, then yeah, you'll laugh at it, but for the older (and perhaps not so old) of us, it's a trip down memory lane. Watching it now, it always conjures up images of those Sunday afternoons - it's nostalgic, and that adds to the magic.
So open the door, step into the wardrobe, and let this classic draw you into a world where animals talk, the White Witch reigns, and the King, the Great Lion, Aslan himself is 'on the move'.
This is a king of films, and in the words of Aslan himself - "Once a king in Narnia, always a king in Narnia".
Red Dwarf (1992)
Terrible.
This has to be one of the worst adaptations of any program I have ever seen. The acting is wooden, there's no spark between the characters, and the jokes are purely recycled.
The pilot episode takes jokes from across the range of the BBC series, and tries to compress them into one episode, failing miserably.
The actors who play Lister, Rimmer and the Cat try hard, but they just cannot achieve the same level that the original actors had. Kryten looks purely uncomfortable acting with them, and the whole cast lack the camaraderie that the original crew have.
If you're new to Red Dwarf, watch the original. If you're a die-hard fan, don't even bother with this version.