Review of Pooh's Heffalump Movie (2005) by Vincent W — 07 Mar 2013

The newer Winnie the Pooh films tend to be weak but this one is downright flawed. There are a few good lines that got me to giggle for a bit but nowhere near enough for this movie to be dubbed a winner. I would also like to give some special recognition to the kid who played the young heffalump. I think I could listen to that young, British accent all day long. His laugh is INCREDIBLE.

PARENT ADVISORY: Having stated the good, I must say that the overall message of this movie is seriously concerning for parents. The film teaches about not fearing things that you don't understand which is ok to some contexts but the overall message of acceptance is one which I loath and despise. The film has the "can't we all just be friends" attitude. This is dangerous. I don't want to spoil anything but there are at least 2 cases where a child blatantly disregards the orders of a parent.

I would also like to point out that this film wasn't very imaginative. A lot of the animation of environments, props, and so on was blatantly understated and I feel like this film really won't inspire the same level of imagination in children as other installments of this franchise.

The real nail in the coffin is the singing. Please notice that I do not say "music" because the background music was very good for the most part. In recent years, the Winnie the Pooh universe has produced several films that involve many musical numbers. This is a crime against my childhood. Pooh's Grand Adventure was the only movie that actually pulled off the musical numbers and made them exceptionally entertaining. This film just had them in order to shorten the length of the already lacking script.

SUMMARY: This film is weak. Even a die hard fan like myself will not be coming back for a second taste of this one. Indeed, I rather regret the hour which I gave it the first time.

The good news is that there are many other adventures in the Hundred Acre Wood to choose from. Happy exploring!