Review of The Muppet Movie (1979) by Chris W — 05 Sep 2011

I really think that this should be retitled "Breaking the Fourth Wall Jokes and Self Referentialness to the Nth Degree: The Movie". Seriously. That's actually not a problem at all though. This film within a film tells the story of how the Muppets got their start in Hollywood.

The Muppets have always been cool in my book, and I love how humans are just so accepting of them without a second thought. This is just a sweet, funny, and charming movie about following your dreams and not giving up hope.

This film would be just fine if it only featured the Muppets, but what really makes it even mroe fun and entertaining is the plethora of amazing cameos and some terrific performances (human and otherwise alike). I also noticed that Charles Durning's character here is pretty much a slightly less dark precursor to the one he played in First Blood, and there's nothing wrong with that.

I loved how this was all done, and, though it did cross my mind, I prefered not to obsess about how they pulled some of this off, and decided to be less callous and instead just think of the characters as really being alive and doing the things they do.

I hadn't seen this in years, and it isn't quite as brilliant as I once thought, but it is still a consistently witty, hilarious, and entertaining piece of entertainment. The biggest disappointent I have is that this sort of thing isn't really done any more. Here's to hoping the new upcoming film rectifies this.