Get Your Groove On! (The Emperor's New Groove (DVD))

Member Name: tazzywazzy

Product:	The Emperor's New Groove (DVD)
Date:	21/03/07 (124 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: mental bubblegum - just a bit of fun really

Disadvantages: hmm....not really any

Yes….I am back on the cartoons again!

The Emperors New Groove, was released in 2000, and seems to have flopped at the box office, in comparison to other Disney titles, taking a mere $80,000,000(!). I can only imagine that the reason that this film "flopped" was down to poor marketing, or the fact that the kids want to see films a la CGI, like Toy Story (1995) or Shrek (2001), anyway, enough of the criticism, let's get onto why you should watch this (whether you have kids or not!).

~Plot~

Ok, so the main guy is Kuzco, he is a young Emperor of a fictional Aztec city. Kuzco is arrogant and spoilt, it is his 18th birthday soon and the only thing on his mind is building his birthday gift to himself - a brand new water park, Kuzcotopia, & he has chosen one of the hills in his Empire to build on, the only problem is, it means demolishing a village. Enter Pacha, a good natured, hard working, family man, who quietly lives on his lovely little hill with his heavily pregnant wife, two children & his llama, Misty, unfortunately this lovely little hill is the location of Kuzcotopia.

Now to get the story going - Kuzco has fired his advisor, Yzma ("EEZ-muh"), and now she wants revenge, so she invites Kuzco for a birthday meal , where she plans to poison him, in order to take control of the Empire, with the help of her newest toy-boy Kronk. Unfortunately Kronk gets a bit distracted whilst preparing the meal and uses the wrong vial of poison - the label has become slightly unstuck and the vial with a picture of a llama on it now looks like a skull, so basically, Kuzco gets turned into a llama. Kronk is given the task of disposing of the evidence.

Cue cute little scene of Kronk hopping around humming mission impossible theme tune, he reaches the top of extremely high waterfall, and is about to dumb Kuzco (in brown sack) over the edge, unfortunately, when it comes to it, Kronk is unable to actually dispose of poor little llama and the bag ends up on the back of Pacha's cart, and the fun begins….

~My Thoughts~

This cartoon is quite different from other Disney releases, it is I think this might have been part of the attempt by Disney to become "cool", by shifting away from the traditional fairy stories. The animation style is also different to the Disney animation I am used to, the colours are bright and the animation is fairly solid and blocky - this is no dig though, it is just different.

The plot, although very simple, Emperor gets turned into llama, by evil character, gets lost, needs to get home and regain throne, is hilariously funny, but I think this is down to a very well written script, that is suitable for viewers of all ages, I can only compare this film to watching an episode of a really good cartoon series. The characters are all pretty well developed too, and it was quite fun to see a clichéd toy-boy, younger guy, built, "handsome" & of course, dumb, being featured in a Disney film (Kronk), there are not too many characters, so confusion is not a problem. The baddie (Yzma), reminds me a lot of Cruela De Ville, but hey, what-ever works.

On a more educational note, there are lessons for children to learn - co-operation, friendship, tolerance, basically your average Disney lessons, so in summary, a great comedic bit of animation that should not be taken too seriously, really do not try to find any hidden meanings or try and delve too deeply into it, take it at face value, and laugh at the dumb jokes and you'll enjoy it!

I would not say go out and buy this film at full Disney wack (£19.99), don't spend more than a fiver on this film, it's not really anything ground breaking, it's just a bit of fun!

*also on ciao*

Summary: mental bubblegum - just a bit of fun really