ptsj-music

The creators of the first animation film about Knutsen&Ludvigsen has fallen for the temptation of remaking them into a half way copy of Toy Story mixed with some confusing kind of Grimmish fairytale, but sadly this way they lose too much of the essense from the original figures. Although the main characters are based on Gustav Lorentzen's fabulous drawings it's very easy to see the inspiration from Pixar. However some of the other characters are less credible and not fully developed. Still, the digital animation quality is basically good, but even if the main characters have kept their dialect and much of their original naive sillyness, much of the strange and childishly absurd humor gets lost in translation and feels a bit too strained as the story develops.

Of the two main charcters Knutsen's voice actor succeeds better than the actor behind Ludvigsen, which perhaps spoils some of the balance between the two tunnel residents. And why doesn't the badger speak the same dialect? The casting and development of the badgers voice is probably the least lucky. Stylistically the animation also lacks a bit of roughness and edge, and together with the musical production it's just too slick and lacks "hair". Somehow the nemisis character Rasputin seems like a compulsive invention who might have been fun early in the writing prosess, but he doesn't fit well into the universe, and he is basically annoying, lacking intention. This sadly also happens to some of the brilliant songs from Dolmen&Lorentzen, as they struggle to fit in to the plot, or vice versa. The film's funniest scene appears when we leave their tunnel home, with a simple gag that not even the original creators did think of. Apart from that, it's not as hilarious as it could have been.

This is the best British crime series I have seen since I really can't recall. The plot is genius, the writers have simply done a perfect job, the camera work is brilliant, and it all just oozes of a director, cast and crew having a hell of a time. The main actors are basically fantastic, with main character actor Nabhaan Rizwan making a highly believable portray of a young English Pakistani, who develops from an ordinary youngster into a very life experienced man. Rizwan is utterly outstanding with his interpretation and must have made quite a breakthrough with this role. The only reasons for not giving top score to this production are sadly and only a few some less credible acting performances.

After seeing the old animation style films fail to meet my expectations, and the live human actor versions even more so, the digital animated version of Asterix is far more amusing than the filmatic precursors. This may of course have much to do with the genius of the original cartoon series, which is damn hard to recreate anyhow.

There's no doubt that the Pixar style has been not only an inspiration but a basis for the creative idea building, but since it has been kept in an allegiance to the originality of the creators, Uderzo and Goscinny, the result is very pleasing.

I have been watching the Norwegian version and was afraid that the voice jobs once again were delivered by the same old actors that have made so many Disney animation films unnecessary dull. Sadly some of them are still present, but the basic reason for not giving another star or two is the lack of creativity when it comes to use of different dialects to substantiate the characters. In this fashion originals are traditionally far better than many Norwegian versions. They could definitely have been a lot more creative also in this Asterix film, like by giving the Gauls a different and more provincial dialect, which again would make more distance to the Romans. There were some sociolectic differences and they had basically found the right voices to the characters, but in my opinion this could have been brought a lot further. So let's just say - not too bad from Mæle, Hatlo&co.

However, in addition to superb animation the perhaps most pleasing aspect is the choice of music from the creators. When the romans are flying senselessly high in slow motion accompanied by a Vienna Waltz, the combination is simply hilarious and it reflects true humoristic creativity.