Despite its heart-warming message, the story is also an indictment of the entertainment industry’s excesses
By Bob Brown
THIS latest feature from Disney Studios is a satisfying entertainment that should have legs well into the holiday season. Just about every age group will find something to like in this family-friendly film. Although it’s no Wizard of Oz, it has some of the same moral messages about the virtues of loyalty and courage.
Despite its heart-warming message, the story is also an indictment of excesses in the entertainment industry that erode these very virtues. The villains, it happens, are all creatures of the studio and its commercial demands. The good guys are just regular folks who want to live a “normal” life — to the extent that can happen when you’re in the biz.
Unlike the spectacular but over-weighted WALL-E, this movie pares down the cast of characters to a few essentials and the theme to a classic one: home is where the heart is. Thanks to directors Byron Howard and Chris Williams, who contributed to the script with Dan Fogelman, the story is simple and direct.
The title character, Bolt (John Travolta), an American White Shepherd, has been in the TV business with his owner, Penny (Miley Cyrus), since he was a pup. He lives in a studio trailer on the lot of Sovereign Entertainment (which looks an awful lot like the old Paramount Pictures on Melrose Avenue in Hollywood). By day he acts in cliffhangers as the star of a weekly series, “Bolt.” By night he is confined to his trailer while Penny goes home. Bolt has no idea that his TV superpowers (laser-vision, Superbark, etc.), which always save Penny from disaster, are mere technical effects, and that Penny is just an actress.
Teased by two studio cats who take advantage of his ignorance, Bolt escapes from his trailer to save Penny from what he thinks is a kidnapping. Instead, he accidentally winds up packed in Styrofoam pellets and shipped to New York City. There he meets some pigeons who direct him to an alley cat, Mittens (Susie Essman), the bane of their lives.
Thinking Mittens is the creature of an evil scientist who has captured Penny, Bolt forces her to lead him to Penny. Although Mittens thinks Bolt is nuts, she is literally on a short leash and has no choice. Along the way in their misadventure, the two meet Rhino (Mark Walton), a hamster who happens to be a Bolt fanboy. He is only too eager to help the dog find Penny, while keeping the “evil” Mittens in check.
Every time Bolt tries to draw on his superpowers, however, they fail him, much to his puzzlement. He figures Styrofoam is a sort of Kryptonite that has weakened him. Eventually, with Mittens as a streetwise reality-check, Bolt realizes that he is just an “ordinary” dog with a painted-on bolt-mark. He has to learn the tricks and the joys of normal dog-dom, with the alley cat as his tutor.
Rhino is a sort of manic counterweight to the depressing reality. And although Rhino’s hero-worship is as over the top as his courage, those qualities are just what Bolt needs to believe in his own inner powers. Each of the three is an accidental gift to the other, supplying what has been missing in their lives, and allowing them as a team to go forward.
The voice casting is just about perfect for these well-defined roles. Walton, who is primarily an animator, has done some voice roles in the past. His Rhino is inspired clowning (along with the brilliant animation). Also fiendishly clever is Penny’s agent (Greg Germann), who keeps sidetracking her questions by treating them as thought-objects that can be “pinned to the wall” and taken down later.
Besides voice casting, the animators deserve special mention for creating digitized animals that, although anthropomorphized, sound and move as naturally as the creatures they portray. The pigeons’ jerky neck motions and head cocking are hilarious, especially when matched with their dialogue. You may never look at a real pigeon the same way again. And Bolt’s attempts to beg for food, using Mittens’ acting instructions, along with his newfound love of hanging his head out the window of a moving vehicle, are too funny.
Although this isn’t a musical picture, there is one song, and the score by animation veteran John Powell (Kung Fu Panda) is exhilarating. For extra dimension, you can see this in 3-D at the Hamilton AMC 24 and some other theaters. Unlike recent 3-D films that hang mainly on special effects of the medium and little else (Journey to the Center of the Earth, for example), Bolt is merely enhanced by them. In short, the 3-D tail doesn’t wag this dog.
Rated PG for some mild action and peril.