Thumbelina (1994)

Thumbelina is a 1994 American animated movie based on the Hans Christian Anderson book of the same name, it was directed by Gary Oldman and Don Bluth, originally distributed by Warner Bros, but later 20th Century Fox got the rights.

Plot
Thumbelina, a thumb-sized girl, yearns for the company of someone her own size. Her life is changed forever after she meets and falls in love with Cornelius, a fairy prince. But along the way, she encounters lovesick toads, beetles and moles whom are attracted to her as well as a romantic French swallow and a bunch of jitterbugs before reuniting with her true love.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Annoying voice acting, especially from Gilbert Gottfried, who voices Berkelley Beetle, and even Jodi Benson as the titular character, who was best known for her role as Ariel in Disney's The Little Mermaid.
 * 2) There are so many problems with the characters, as most of them are either total dim-wits or utterly pointless:
 * 3) *Thumbelina is a very weak, whiny and unlikable female protagonist in this movie, as she is too much of a dumb, passive damsel-in-distress whom is far too weak to stand up for herself and often gets easily demotivated when something goes wrong in her life, and has no personality other than to be with her love interest Prince Cornelius.
 * 4) * Speaking of which, Prince Cornelius, is nothing more than a bland "prince charming" archetype love interest.
 * 5) *Jacquimo, the bird who helps Thumbelina, is an extremely annoying and unlikable comic relief sidekick, and comes of as pointless for the most part.
 * 6) *The jitterbugs are very bland and saccharinely cutesy, and serve no purpose in the film other than being "stereotypical cute animal sidekicks" for Thumbelina. In addition, they way they're designed which is very reminiscent to early-1930s "rubberhose"-style animated Disney cartoons in contrast to the rest of the characters which are drawn in Don Bluth's 1937-1959 Disney-inspired art style, makes them look out of place in this film.
 * 7) *Most of the film's male antagonists such as Grundel Toad, Berkelley Beetle and Mr. Mole have very flat characterizations as they all come off as nothing more than sleazy, lustful perverts whom are attracted to Thumbelina for only either her attractive looks and her beautiful singing voice and not her personality, and aren't that interesting in the slightest either.
 * 8) *Speaking of Grundel Toad, in addition to his lustful characterization as mentioned above, he often speaks in broken English, with half of his dialogue being basically "I love (Thumbelina)" and "I marry (Thumbelina)", which makes him not only an ineffective villain, but also an offensive racial stereotype towards Mexicans.
 * 9) *Thumbelina's mother is pointless as she's barely in the film; she even gave up on trying to find her daughter Thumbelina once winter comes.
 * 10) *Mr. Mole and Ms. Fieldmouse both have potential to become effective antagonists unlike both Grundel Toad and Berkelley Beetle, but unfortunately this opportunity is sorely missed due to them appearing way too late into the film, as both of them only appeared about three quarters into the film.
 * 11) Some screen-testing showed the Disney logo despite being a Warner Bros. film (at the time) and not a Disney film.
 * 12) While the animation is good, sometimes the animation is reused in some of the scenes, and the CGI transition scenes are poor.
 * 13) Forgettable songs, especially: Thumbelina, You're Beautiful Baby, in which the beetle's voices are extremely annoying and ear-grating, and Marry The Mole which caused this movie to be the first animated movie to be nominated for Razzies in any category.
 * 14) Some scenes mention Romeo & Juliet which may be creepy for younger viewers, since the Romeo & Juliet story is basically about two young star-crossed lovers whose strong mutual romantic attraction towards each other ultimately results to their deaths.
 * 15) The film doesn't follow the book correctly.
 * 16) *Thumbelina was born in a tulip in the book, while in here she was born in a different flower.
 * 17) * Mama Toad has three sons while in the book she had only one.
 * 18) *The bumble that the prince has wasn't in the book.
 * 19) *The prince didn't meet Thumbelina until at the end in the book.
 * 20) *Like the prince, the swallow didn't meet Thumbelina until near the end in the book.
 * 21) *The book outright forgets about Thumbelina's mother at the ending, unlike the film where she at least receives a brief cameo at the end during Thumbelina's wedding.
 * 22) The movie was released around the same time as other better animated movies like: The Lion King, Batman: Mask Of The Phantasm and Street Fighter II The Animated Movie, which is a big reason why this movie bombed at the box office.
 * 23) Heaps of plot holes, brought in as the result of bad writing. Among of them include:
 * 24) *BIGGEST PLOT HOLE: Why doesn't Jacquimo even attempt to fly Thumbelina back to her home until at least near the end of the film? He even claims that he's physically unable to fly Thumbelina home on his back, which turns out to be untrue near the end of the film.
 * 25) *Why does Thumbelina cheerfully dance to all the villain songs (On the Road, You're Beautiful Baby, Marry the Mole) along with her respective captors (Grundel Toad and his family, Berkelley Beetle and the beetles, Ms Fieldmouse) despite the fact that all the respective villains in question (Grundel Toad, Berkelley Beetle, Mr. Mole) all attempting to force her to marry them against her will?
 * 26) *Why would Berkelley Beetle, who at first thinks that Thumbelina is beautiful, suddenly changes his mind and says that she's ugly once her butterfly disguise falls off all because of pressure from the Beetle Ballroom insect audience, even though he's the one who found Thumbelina to be beautiful even without her butterfly disguise?
 * 27) *Why doesn't Thumbelina's mother even attempt to look for her lost daughter once winter comes?
 * 28) * How does Thumbelina's beautiful singing voice has the ability melt the ice and frost covering the Vale Of The Fairies near the end of the film?
 * 29) *The film never even explains on how Thumbelina gets her own fairy wings at the end of the film once she agrees to marry Prince Cornelius.
 * 30) The film's pacing is very slow and poor, with loads of filler.
 * 31) Mrs. Toad looks more like her voice actress (Charo) than a toad. In addition, her oversized breasts makes her character design inappropriate for a family film.
 * 32) While unintentional, there are numerous instances where Thumbelina's skirt goes up and down from above her waist and therefore exposing her bare legs in the process many times, which could be a bit risque from for a family film.
 * 33) * Speaking of which, near the end of the musical number You're Beautiful Baby, there is a disgustingly embarrassing scene where Thumbelina's butterfly disguise falls off when she dances with Berkelley Beetle, exposing her in her underwear in the process. What's even worse that she still proceeds to dance on stage in her underwear until the beetle dumps her for being ugly!
 * 34) At times, it feels like a rip-off of various Disney movies (eg. a book opening intro at the beginning). In addition, the film's overall narrative tries too hard to be like the early Disney animated feature films of the 1930s-1950s but fails miserably.
 * 35) The scene where the camera is zoomed in Thumbelina's face holds on for too long for no reason looks blurred and ugly.
 * 36) The story is very confusing and you will never know who the main villain is. For example it may be Mrs. Toad because she kidnapped Thumbelina, or her eldest son Grundel Toad who has the largest role of all the antagonists, or maybe Beetle, or the mole, the movie doesn't give you any proper explanation.
 * 37) Lame and unfunny attempts at humor.
 * 38) The film can't decide if it wants to be the same or different from the books.
 * 39) Since most of the film is entirely focused on Thumbelina becoming miserable over getting lost far from home and being unable to be with her love interest Prince Cornelius, it can get too dark and depressing for younger children, despite being rated G. Not helping is the fact that Thumbelina's constant whining and crying over her predicaments throughout the film makes things even worse.
 * 40) Poor dialogue.
 * 41) The wedding dress Thumbelina wears to marry Mr. Mole near the ending looks very laughable.
 * 42) The scene where Thumbelina and Prince Cornelius fly with the bumble to show her the world, rips off the scene from Aladdin.
 * 43) Two particular characters from this film, Mr. Mole and Ms. Fieldmouse, are named after the animals that they resemble to, which is utterly lazy.

Good Qualities

 * 1) The animation (despite being re-used at times) is a great step up from previous Don Bluth animated movies despite the ugly CGI effects.
 * 2) The voice acting is good at times, even if it can be annoying.
 * 3) There are some decent songs like: Soon, Follow Your Heart and Let Me Be Your Wings, the most iconic song in the film.
 * 4) While annoying, Jacquimo does help Thumbelina at one point.
 * 5) For the most part, it does follow the book right and stays true to the source material, except for a few modifications (as mentioned in BQ #7)
 * 6) The ending was very nice.
 * 7) It's can be considered one of those so bad it's good films.
 * 8) At least it tried to give characters like Prince Cornelius and Thumbelina's mother bigger roles.

Reception
The movie was both a critical and commercial failure. The film currently holds a 30% "rotten" rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Although it did slightly better than other Don Bluth movies at the time, like Rock-a-Doodle and A Troll In Central Park.

Awards and nominations
The song Marry The Mole won a Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Original Song making it the first animated film to be nominated for a Razzie in any category as well as the only one at the time until Eight Crazy Nights was released in 2002.

Trivia

 * There is a Thumbelina film from Soviet/Russian animation studio Soyuzmultfilm. It is from 1964, and is way better than this version.
 * Mrs. Toad is voiced and based on the famous Spanish singer: Charo.

The Movie
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Reviews of the film
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6vZvFJMt5P8&t=1205s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wp4WZl6wlAw&t=1201s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RKfyV3iJZh0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c88UY2OglbY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZfzkRksMmY&t=1774s https://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5CZrmGC-8Q https://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nRuxI6bm6RI&t=453s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eO6LYF24Gsk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vh_2YVhBbOc