Dr. Seuss' The Lorax

Dr. Seuss' The Lorax - Dirs. Chris Renaud & Kyle Balda (2012)

"I am the Lorax, I speak for the trees. I speak for the trees, for the trees have no tongues."

The work of Dr. Seuss has captured the imaginations of countless children and will continue to do so for generations to come. The same cannot be said for the cinematic adaptations. Universal's live-action versions of The Grinch Who Stole Christmas and The Cat in the Hat are glaring blemishes to the legacy of the good doctor. The early cartoon versions had it right, keep things short and sweet. Seuss only needed ten or fifteen pages and a few sentences (in rhyme) to engage the reader. The filmmakers inject all the usual tropes like romantic subplots to pad the story out to feature length. This leads us to Dr. Seuss' The Lorax, the second of Seuss's creations to be adapted into a computer animated film. Fox's Blue Sky Studios previously released Horton Hears a Who! in 2008, but Universal and Illumination Entertainment are ones behind Lorax. Illumination debuted with Despicable Me, one of the best animated films of 2010. They stumbled with the live-action Hop, but don't get all the way back on track here.

The Lorax begins in Thneed-Ville, a walled community where the citizens live in the lap of luxury and prize their elaborate automobiles and parking lots. Everything is artificial in Thneed-Ville, the trees are battery operated and the flora is inflatable. The Mayor of Thneed-ville, Aloysius O'Hare (Rob Riggle) has become an extremely wealthy man by selling the townsfolk purified air delivered to their homes in bottles ala Arrowhead. Young Ted (Zac Efron) has a crush on the lovely Audrey (Taylor Swift), who yearns for the day when she might see a real, honest-to-goodness tree. Following the advice of his Grammy Norma (Betty White), Ted sneaks outside the walls of Thneed-ville and finds a barren and blackened wasteland. The only person living in the desolation is a strange hermit named the Once-Ler (Ed Helms), who relates his story to Ted.

Looking to make his fortune, the Once-Ler traveled to the lush valley that was teeming with swomee-swans, bar-ba-loots, and humming fish. What really catches the Once-Ler's eye are the truffula trees, topped with brightly colored tuffs of fur, which he needs to knit Thneeds, a multi-purpose sweater that everyone will need. Felling the first tree summons the Lorax (voiced perfectly by Danny DeVito), a diminutive orange creature with a bushy mustache. Serving as the protector of the forest, the Lorax pleads with the Once-Ler to leave the valley be. The Lorax's appeal for sanity falls on deaf ears as the Once-Ler builds an ominous factory to mass manufacture Thneeds and chops down every tree. Without trees, he can no longer produce Thneeds and his whole operation shuts down. Worse yet, the land has been rendered uninhabitable by the smog and pollution from the factory. The Once-Ler entrusts the last truffula seed to Ted in the hopes he can return the valley to its former glory. However, O'Hare will do anything to stop Ted from planting something that will give his customers air for free.

Conservative pundits have singled out The Lorax as part of a nebulous left-wing conspiracy to brainwash children into hating corporations and hugging trees. I'm speaking of pundits, specifically from Fox News, which is ironic considering Fox produced In Time, a movie with an overt pro-socialist message. Anyone capable of an iota of rational thought will see The Lorax as a film railing against unchecked excess. It's not subtle about it either. Not when the Once-Ler has a huge poster of himself emblazoned with the phrase, "Too big to fail." An opening musical number introduces life in Thneed-ville as the citizens laud their consumerist culture and blissful ignorance. Another number, "How Bad Can I Be?", sees the Once-Ler justifying his rampant greed and willful disdain of the environment as simple free market Darwinism. The songs themselves were composed by John Powell and co-writer Cinco Paul. They aren't memorable, but they are catchy and innocuous in a Disney Radio sort of way.

All this talk about liberal agendas overlooks the fact that The Lorax was produced by a major corporation in the most corporate of ways. The script rings hollow and feels like it was run through a wringer of focus groups right down to the casting of Teen Choice Award winners Zac Efron and Taylor Swift, plus Betty White as the sassy, snowboarding octogenarian. Also, I highly doubt Dr. Seuss ever envisioned the Lorax as a shill for General Electric, Mazda SUVs, and IHOP pancake combos.

"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better…it's not."

Dr. Seuss' The Lorax doesn't come close to competing with Pixar. It's more diverting than thought provoking. The movie may not convince kids to plant a tree, but it will entertain them long enough with loud noises and bright shiny things.

Rating: ** (*****)

When in Rome

When in Rome - Dir. Mark Steven Johnson (2010)


Was it too much to hope that When in Rome would bring something new to the table to the stagnant romantic comedy genre? Considering the film was written by the team behind Old Dogs, David Diamond and David Weissman, the answer is an emphatic yes.

Kristen Bell is the archetypal female lead, a Type-A career woman. In this case, she’s Beth Harper, a curator for the Guggenheim. Sadly, no twenty minute shootouts ala The International occur in this film. She flies off to Rome to attend her younger sister’s wedding. Beth is a cynic about love and doesn’t give much of a chance to her sibling’s impending nuptials. However, Beth hits it off with Nick Beamon (Josh Duhamel), a dashing sports writer whose football career was cut short after being struck by lightning. No, really…

When Beth sees Nick kissing another woman, she gets drunk and stumbles into a fountain and pulls out four coins and a poker chop, believing she is liberating those wishes. Instead, the men (glorified cartoon characters) who tossed them in originally fall madly in love with Beth due to the magic of the fountain. They include Dax Shephard as a narcissistic male model, Jon Heder as a Criss Angel-looking street magician, Will Arnett as an Italian artist, and Danny DeVito as a sausage magnate. Hmm…I wonder if he knows Abe Froman, the Sausage King of Chicago.

These suitors stalk Beth all the way back to New York City. Nick is also making an attempt to woo Beth, but the question remains whether or not his love is real. As if you didn’t already know the answer.

I’ll give When in Rome a single shred of credit for not following the paint-by-numbers formula that all rom-coms do nowadays. No, Rome is a screwball comedy all the day and I doubt anyone has been clamoring for its return. I loved the classics like His Girl Friday, but the genre was laid to rest by Peter Bogdanovich’s homage, What’s Up, Doc?, and, aside from perhaps A Fish Called Wanda, the genre has been flatlining ever since. Not even the Coens could resuscitate it with Intolerable Cruelty and its star George Clooney failed as well with Leatherheads.

When in Rome won’t be heading up a revival anytime soon. The film uses only the broadest strokes in its lame attempts at slapstick humor. Nick falls down holes and bumps into things. Not for any reason, he just bumps into things because that’s supposed to be funny. You know your movie is in trouble when the best gag you can come up with is having your lead characters drive around town in a ludicrously tiny car. Another scene finds Beth and Nick dining at a restaurant where the lights are turned out and the wait staff wears night vision goggles. I’m sure it sounded funnier on paper (actually, it doesn’t), but the sequence is such a mess that you wish they had just shot the whole damn movie in the dark. One of the staples of the screwball comedy was witty, rapid-fire dialogue. There is none of that in When in Rome. Nope, we get characters who say, “My bad,” which got annoying two seconds after the first time it was ever said.

Kristen Bell, who was so good in Forgetting Sarah Marshall, doesn’t have much of a presence in the lead role. Duhamel is so bland as the romantic interest, you probably could have stuck any generic pretty boy (Paul Walker, I’m looking at you) into the role and it wouldn’t have made any difference. Jon Heder is the saddest of the bunch, still desperately trying to milk whatever is left of his Napoleon Dynamite fame.

When in Rome was directed by Mark Steven Johnson who also helmed Daredevil and Ghost Rider. Let’s just say, his contributions here won’t ever be compared to Howard Hawks or Preston Sturges. I do hope Johnson makes more films like this. If he keeps making crappy romantic comedies, he won’t be able to make anymore crappy comic book movies.

Rating: * ½