When MGM decided to revive their iconic animated stars Tom and Jerry in 1961, they entrusted Rembrandt Studios, located in Prague, Czechoslovakia, with the job. Director Gene Deitch reportedly showed his animation team six T&J cartoons and then put them to work. This weekend, in 2021, when this brand new hybrid feature film Tom & […]
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REVIEW: “Croods 2: A New Age”
January 4th, 2021 
Martin Goodman Seven years following the 2013 DreamWorks movie The Croods, the sequel finally found its way to theaters and home streaming. The good news: not only is C2 a better movie than its predecessor, but it’s also a damn sight funnier, warmer, and fun to watch. While superior in its visual effects, the original film was […]
REVIEW: Pixar’s “Soul”
December 28th, 2020 Martin Goodman I had my arms and heart open. I wanted to unashamedly love this film, smother it in chocolate valentine hearts, and set my keyboard aflame in effusive praise until I wore out my supply of similes. I wanted to compare it to some of the most outstanding achievements produced under Disney/Pixar’s aegis. What I saw […]
REVIEW: Netflix “The Midnight Gospel”
April 27th, 2020 Martin Goodman If you were wondering what Pendleton Ward has been up to since his cult hit Adventure Time aired its final episode, wonder no more. Ward has teamed up with podcaster Duncan Trussel to create The Midnight Gospel, a new animated series streaming on Netflix. All eight episodes extant are currently available. This is not your […]
REVIEW: “The Willoughbys”
April 24th, 2020 Martin Goodman After placing two films in Academy Award contention last year, Netflix served notice to the major animation studios that it was going to be a player and a force to be reckoned with in future competition for audiences. Although Pixar took home the award, Disney saw Frozen 2 shut out from finalist consideration. For Netflix, […]
REVIEW: “Trolls World Tour”
April 11th, 2020 Martin Goodman I am continually amazed that recent animated films, even ones with five screenwriters (which Trolls World Tour has) continue to be so derivative, thematically redundant, and prone to replace originality with CGI eye candy. So far, in 2020, Pixar’s Onward has bucked this unfortunate trend. Now, Onward may not be a landmark film in that […]
REVIEW: Pixar’s “Onward”
March 11th, 2020 Martin Goodman Onward has the misfortune of being merely a very good film from a studio that produced the best animated films of the past two decades. This film has only a few flaws (more on that later) that are outweighed by its strengths. Still, in comparison with the best of Pixar I can only draw on […]
REVIEW: “Sonic the Hedgehog”
February 16th, 2020 Martin Goodman 2019 was not a great year for animated wide-release theatrical films. Only three of them made the list of Academy Award nominations, and two of those were franchise sequels. Toy Story 4 was the deserving winner, but no one handicapping the Awards would have bet against that film. Many of the wide-release animated films of […]
REVIEW: Blue Sky’s “Spies In Disguise”
December 30th, 2019 Martin Goodman If you have seen the trailer or commercials for Blue Sky Animation’s latest film, you know everything you need to know: A super-suave spy is turned into a pigeon by a nerdy kid who works for the same government agency. They team up to take down a bad guy and foil his nefarious plot. That’s […]
REVIEW: “Frozen 2”
December 1st, 2019 Martin Goodman With Frozen II, Disney Animation has rebounded nicely from the ill-advised remake of The Lion King, proving once again that fresh ideas trump needless ones. Of course, Frozen II is a sequel, but it doesn’t feel like one. The original characters from Frozen star in the movie, but the screenplay by Jennifer Lee is a […]
REVIEW: “Arctic Dogs”
November 6th, 2019 Martin Goodman Twenty minutes after leaving a showing of Arctic Dogs, I remained in a state of disbelief. How could any animated film in wide release this year be so unrelentingly putrid? 2019 has not been a banner year for mainstream theatrical releases, but Arctic Dogs makes any one of them look like candidates for inclusion in […]
REVIEW: “The Addams Family”
October 23rd, 2019 Martin Goodman The Addams Family, created by cartoonist Charles (Chas) Addams, have been hovering around popular culture since 1938. Perhaps the most macabre nuclear family ever created, they were appropriate to their times. The Great Depression had not yet abated. Monstrous dictators were rearing their heads in Europe and Asia. It may be hard to believe today, […]
REVIEW: Dreamworks “Abominable”
September 30th, 2019 Martin Goodman Abominable is a film certain to please middle school to younger age kids and those who love movies classified as “Family Friendly.” However, this approval is purchased at far too high a price. Adorable? Yes. Animated with technical virtuosity? Indeed. Formulaic and derivative? Unfortunately so. Abominable belongs in that category of movies that include “The […]
REVIEW: “Angry Birds 2”
August 21st, 2019 Martin Goodman Before reviewing this sequel to Angry Birds (2016), I decided to try an experiment: I would see the movie pretending that I had never seen the original film or, in fact, even seen or heard of Rovio Entertainment’s app-born avian avengers. I pretended that I never played the game (I did, but stopped after they […]
REVIEW: Disney’s “The Lion King” (2019)
July 22nd, 2019 Martin Goodman My initial dilemma was whether to review this film at all. Disney entreats us to consider this remake of the 1994 film as “live action”, since there is apparently some photography used. However, I decided to disregard the semantic arguments. This version of The Lion King is undoubtedly an animated picture, and that, indeed, is […]
