The Muppets

I think this new trailer for The Muppets is great. Better than the last trailer, and it has this fresh feel to it. Not in the sense that it makes the TV series and the 70's through to the early 90's films look worse. But it's like the Muppets offering their own modern look. Can't wait to see it. Glad to see the Swedish Chef.

This indeed does look good. Of course, having the amazingly beautiful Amy Adams will alone get me to go.

I am SO all over this.   Outside of Girl with a Dragon Tattoo my most looked forward film left this year.

 

http://www.deadline.com/2011/11/kermit-and-jason-segel-beg-for-amy-adams     SUPER CUTE link

 

New Trailers:

 

 

 

Thanks for sharing this new trailer for the new Muppets film. Can't wait to see the Swedish Chef and Statler and Waldorf for example. Love the Muppets.

You're welcome!

Edited by WaveCrest - 11/23/11 at 8:20am

Took my oldest (our autistic son) tonight for the midnight show.  A few comments:

 

(1) The ending to this film is maybe one of the most perfect endings I've ever seen in a film like this.

 

Warning: Spoiler! (Click to show)

 

(2) The performance of "Rainbow Connection" reminds me of one of the most beautiful songs to ever be in a film.. that didn't win "Best Song"  (Ever find yourself humming "It Goes Like it Goes" ?)

 

(3)  The musical sequence of "Man or Muppet" is BRILLIANT.   Bring the house down brilliant.  One of the best cameos, so well thought out it had several people in our audience basically scream out when it happened; riotously funny.   Though, it did make me wonder, with Jason Segel, Neil Patrick Harris

 

Warning: Spoiler! (Click to show)

 

This is 100% a film you can take your kids to and have an outright blast while you're at it.    The Pixar short (revolving around toys inserted in meal boxes) was fun and light.. but it's hard to make much of it.

My wife REALLY wants to see it, but its not at ANY of the theaters close to our house (6,7 and 16 screens).

Yeah, Twilight is sucking up all the screens. 

I can't underscore a day later how good I think this film is.   It's easily the best muppet film since the first three, and it has two numbers that should get Best Song consideration (Pictures in My Head; Muppet or Man?)    Pictures in My Head is maybe one of the most gut checking song moments in a film since "When She Loved Me" in Toy Story 2. 

 

It's a film that was obviously written by someone who really cared for the content, and any movie that comes out and says (in straight dialog of all things) that cynicism isn't what kids need wins in my book.    We'll see it again this weekend, I'm sure with our youngest in tow.   This is a great film for kids and adults, and that's a rarity.

Not the biggest fan of multiplexes. Wish there were more art/indie cinemas about.

 

Won't see The Muppets until February. Boo!

 

Matt, it's even better than The Muppet Christmas Carol (1992)?!

It's better then basically anything in my mind outside of the original and Muppets Take Manhattan.   (I don't put films like Dark Crystal, which I love into this).

 

I can't get over how good the cameo in "Man or Muppet" is.. and "Pictures in My Head" is just a gut-wrenching number about friendship; it's short but.. wow.

 

 

 

People have referred to these things as reboots; which I always look at as a crass way to make money on past good will to a franchise.   "Muppets" definitely isn't that.   This is a film that compliments the others, and was definitely done by someone who honestly loved the content.

 

It will end up in my Top10 films of the year.   Right now, it's not just "barely" in my top ten, it's easily top five.  And outside of "Tree of Life" I can't think of another film I've seen this year I'd put in it's league.

It just showed up at a local theater, so we are going today.

 

Taking son #2 and son #1 wants to go again tonight.    

 

And I will admit, I may be a wuss, but the song I quoted above.. even listening to it on the soundtrack, holy cow is that a tear jerker for me
 

 

Would you be a wuss for mentioning some of your favourite Muppets? Can't criticise the Muppets.

 

Who remembers the single Mana-manah? Been in my head recently and it's one of those pop songs which you can't get out of your head.

I think what makes the muppets work though is that they express common human problems and they do it in such a direct, straight forward way.   When Kermit sings the song above "Pictures in My Mind"  He walks down a hallway, and he tells Gary & Walter that he regrets that he lost touch with his friends.  "How did this happen", as he sings and looks at the pictures of his friends on the wall, it's one of those straight arrow moments that isn't just schmaltzy; his open regret "am I the reason I don't see my friends anymore?" 

I think every adult goes through that; friends, even close friends we had as kids/school that we've lost touch with.   I think a lot of films really lay on the subtext to get that across.   When the paintings come back to Kermit and speak the things he wishes "I can ride again", and he asks if he can rekindle the magic he had with those friends.

 

I often think when they introduce new muppets people get unhappy (it's funny seeing people missing Rizzo when people complained about them in Muppets Take Manhattan).   But I liked Walter a lot.   I liked everything about his story.

You realize that with this movie, Mickey Rooney has acted in a movie in TEN different decades.

WOW.  It was great to see him in this BTW.
 

 

After having my 6yo twins sing both Me Party and Mana-manah on the way home I invested $6.99 in the soundtrack at Amazon.  Instant gratification.  Great movie, lots of fun stuff for adults and fans and enough fun stuff to keed my kids who haven't seen the Muppets before engaged.
 

 

A pretty solid movie about the relevance of the Muppets in today's world, and growing up and moving towards one's destiny, no matter how much it shakes up the status quo, growth requires confidence and support. Enjoyed all the time capsule-worthy nods to the past, the song numbers. Jason Segel clearly loves this stuff, even if his singing and dancing are average. Amy Adams felt a little too much like an acting version of the Stepford wives (just a little too "put on" in her scenes). It was good to see many of the Muppets back on the big screen. Chris Cooper's villainous turn was a little over-the-top, though.

I give it 3 stars, or a grade of B.

P.S. The Toy Story short at the beginning was also funny and enjoyable.

I watched The Muppet movies and TV show when I was young but I haven't seen anything Muppets related in 15 years so while I have fond memories, I'm not a huge fan. That being said, I loved this movie. It was just a pleasant, fun and funny movie for kids and adults with positive message (like nearly all of Pixar's work). It's been a slow year but this movie is one of my favorites so far.

Just saw this on Thanksgiving day at the El Capitan on Hollywood Boulevard. Kinda cool to come out and be standing right where the finale was done. This movie has so much humor in it, pretty much something for everyone. Cameos great, Amy Adams perfect. Chris Cooper exactly what the role required. You have to see it more than once to catch all the jokes - some of which are in the background or said offscreen. I don't remember any Muppet movie being so laugh-out-loud funny. The spoiler cameo referred to previously was also right on the nose appropriate. Very well written. Was also fun to see Kermit and Piggy onstage before the show. Can't recommend this one enough. The album is on sale on Amazon for 6.99 at the moment. Worth it.

My partner and I saw the film today; we loved it. I laughed, I cried, I felt my faith in the future of the Muppets restored. I was cautiously optimistic about it; the way Jason Segel and Amy Adams seemed to take front and center in the trailers had me concerned, but they won me over…with the first verse of "Life's A Happy Song". And the musical numbers worked so well that I wish there had been more of them instead of the pop songs they used in some sequences (couldn't they find a better song than "We Built This City"?). The story was simple and well-told, and the references helped it instead of hindering it.

 

As for Walter, I could really identify with his story of being an outcast trying to find his own identity.

 

I can tell that Jason Segel's love for the characters is genuine. Kermit, Fozzie, Miss Piggy and the rest feel like living, breathing characters for the first time in years, and the gently subversive, anarchic, sophisticated humor is back. Even the new version of "Rainbow Connection," while it will never replace the beauty and simplicity of Kermit singing alone in a swamp in The Muppet Movie, reminded me why I love these characters. The true genius of Jim Henson was not so much his innovation in making puppets for television and film cameras but his ability to give convincingly human characteristics to puppets. Segel understands this and that's why the film works; it's in the spirit of Henson but isn't slavishly copying the originals.

 

This is a release-day Blu-Ray for me.

 

It was the most fitting cameo, considering how the film's plot is very much in the spirit of the "let's put on a show to save the farm"-type of MGM musicals he made with Judy Garland back in the day. Although some of them were odd choices (James Carville?) and some were obviously under contract to Disney and its subsidiaries (Whoopi Goldberg, Selena Gomez, Rico Rodriguez), they worked for me.

 

I also loved the Toy Story toon at the beginning; I think I was the only one in the theater who associated Condor Man with the Disney film Condorman; I was also probably the only one who had heard of it.

How do I know I love this? Because it gave me a new joke, equal or better to "Take a left at the Fork in the road" that has stuck with me since I saw the original as a kid.

 

 

Warning: Spoiler! (Click to show)

 

Joy, start to stop. Wonderfully fun. Good musical numbers. Great muppetty nonsense. Safe to take your parents to :) Recommended for adults of all ages.

 

And then ending, the denouement:

 

Warning: Spoiler! (Click to show)

 

 

Really, really liked it a lot. Definitely fits in line with the fist three films. My brother and I we're laughing incredibly hard, and we LOVED that they fit in a reference to

 

Warning: Spoiler! (Click to show)

 

Also, "Under.... Control...." might be my new favorite random saying for the next few months or so when the stress level goes up.

Very enjoyable. IMO, they got it right - any movie that respects the source material as much as this one usually does. 

 

Wasn't there some controversy from one of the original muppeteers about wanting his name off the picture because it was too unlike the original show? I think that's unfounded, if true. 

 

 

Frank Oz. I seem to recall that he'd done that pre-script/etc/etc. Since seeing it/reading it (something like that) he commented that it was fantastic and very respectful (etc).

It should be noted that Oz only does Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear and Animal every so often now. Eric Jacobson has been the primary performer for those characters since 2001, and he was the puppeteer for this movie.

I liked it a lot. The voices were a bit off on a few for me but that was expected.

More on the Frank Oz controversy:
http://www.wired.com/geekdad/2011/11/frank-oz-the-muppets/
http://blogs.indiewire.com/pressplay/a-muppet-conversation
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/disney-muppets-jason-segel-amy-adams-jim-henson-250805