Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Ethel Pochocki and Roger Essley Are Ideal Collaborators in the Exquisite Wildflower Tea

Tea is one of those beverages I have just never taken to. I feel a deeper sense of appreciation for it, however, after reading Wildflower Tea, the sensory feast of a picture book written by Ethel Pochocki and illustrated by Roger Essley. It’s hard to say whether I prefer the richly evocative narration or the soft, detailed paintings in this simple story about the changing of the seasons and the value of patience. Both are exceptionally done and complement each other perfectly.

Our protagonist is an unnamed old man. The book shows us seven individual days over the course of seven months. On all but the last day, the old man takes a walk, a bucket-style hat on his head for protection, venturing out in various types of weather and across different kinds of terrain to collect wildflowers.

The first words in the story are “One sunny Monday in May,” followed by an indented paragraph, a two-page spread and another single page wrapping up that day’s excursion. Each day follows the same format. “One (adjective) (next day of the week) in (next month of the year),” then a paragraph describing his walk, then the two-page spread in which he discovers the flowers, then a page for his return journey. The last day is slightly different in terms of content, but the basic format remains.

We don’t know a great deal about the man, but the story gives us some clues. He is elderly but industrious, a man who takes quiet pleasure in nature and looks upon the world with both wisdom and wonder. He has presumably lived in the humble cabin all his life, unless he went away and came back or used to merely visit as a child. In any case, we know that this place has always been dear to him. On the handle of his mug is a design of forget-me-nots, and each of his journeys seems to evoke a particular memory, though we can only guess at the specifics. Each excursion could spark a story. What is the old man remembering on this particular day?

The writing is richly descriptive and laden with intriguing metaphors, my favorite of which is “Blueberry blossoms bowed in the noonday breeze, like nuns in sunbonnets praying.” Adding to the appeal is the alliteration that mostly is limited to the first half of the sentence but stretches to include the “b” in “sunbonnets,” as well as the slight internal rhyme at play between “day” and “pray” and “nuns” and “sun.” The sentence just sings. I also love the personification of the plants, which we see most vividly toward the end of the book. “Here and there lingered the wild friends who had come to visit and stayed – red clover and purple catnip spires, yarrow and mallows and other stragglers who didn’t care a fig that summer was over and continued to bloom.” Wonderful.

I think my favorite illustration is the one that shows him kneeling in a bed of violets by a shady stream, my favorite body of water. Few activities bring me more pleasure than tromping through a creek, letting the murky water soak through my shoes. He stays safely ashore – I imagine those slippery rocks would pose a significant hazard to a man his age – but perhaps he used to run through those waters as a child, just as he climbed the gnarled trees out in the orchard, whose blossoms sway so delicately, like clouds caught in the branches.

All of the paintings are simply gorgeous with a fuzzy, muted quality to them that conjures a sense of both comfort and isolation. Apart from a cat we see curled up in a chair on the next-to-last page, the man seems to be all alone in the world, without even neighbors for miles around. Nonetheless, in every illustration, whenever his expression is visible, he wears a placid smile.

Wildflower tea is the result of all of the man’s scavenging, a brew half a year in the making. If the beauty of the flowers and the experiences that accompany them can somehow be distilled into that weathered cup, then that is a drink undoubtedly delicious enough to tempt even me.

Monday, June 27, 2011

A Boatload of Bakers Means Bushels of Baloney in Cheaper By the Dozen

Remakes seem to be rampant in theaters lately. One of the many to hit the big screen in the past decade was Cheaper By the Dozen, a remake of a 1950 classic that I never saw. As a fan of Steve Martin and Smallville’s Tom Welling, I’d wanted to check it out for a while, despite the high probability of cheesiness. I can’t make comparisons with the original, but now that I finally got around to seeing it, I liked it better than I expected. Is it corny? Yes. But I also found it funny and touching.

Tom Baker (Martin) is a small-time coach with a great big dream: to coach college football at his alma mater in Chicago. His wife Kate (Bonnie Hunt) has pretty big dreams too: writing and publishing a book. Both of these dreams have a shot at becoming a reality at once, which might be cause for excitement alone in an ordinary family. But this is no ordinary family. No, the Baker brood includes 12 children, 11 of whom still live at home. With Mom headed off to New York City to kick off a major book tour and Dad gearing up for what he hopes will be a winning season, who is going to keep an eye on a house full of rambunctious kids resentful that they had to leave their farmhouse home for life in the big city?

The movie does a decent job differentiating the characters, though some of them still blend together for me. In many cases, it doesn’t much matter who’s who; we just have rapid-fire chaos, some of which is funny, some of which is just cringe-inducing as one disaster follows another. Of the 12, about half are more a part of the collective than really interesting stand-alone characters. These include twins Nigel and Kyle (Brent and Shane Kinsman), the energetic youngest of the clan; Mike (Blake Woodruff), their slightly older brother; twins Kim and Jessica (Morgan York and Liliana Mumy); and their brother Jake (Jacob Smith). Generally, they just add to the cacophony of the household without standing out too much as individuals.

The rest are more well-defined. Nora (Piper Perabo), the oldest at 22, lives in Chicago with her boyfriend, a dopey, egotistical aspiring actor played by Ashton Kutcher in typical obnoxious mode. While I started out feeling sorry for him, especially after the kids play a prank on him that is both crude and dangerous, it wasn’t long before I found him as unlikable as the rest of the Bakers do. Nora herself is fairly sweet but torn between loyalty to her family and devotion to her boyfriend. I was a little disappointed not to connect much to Welling’s character, angsty senior Charlie, who spends most of his time being sulky and sarcastic, though I did feel for him as he bemoaned the fact that he and his girlfriend would now be hours away from each other.

Hillary Duff starts out in full-on bratty teenager mode as Lorraine, a fashion-conscious high schooler, but she gradually becomes more likable as she sticks up for her siblings in trying situations. Henry (Kevin G. Schmidt) is a rough-and-tumble bully type, while devious Sarah (Alyson Stoner) is smart-mouthed and always has some sort of devilish plan up her sleeve. Kate seems to have everything pretty well organized so that the kids mostly stay out of each other’s way and disasters are kept to a minimum, but Tom can’t quite hack it. I love watching Martin in goofball dad mode, though as his stress increases over the course of the movie, his parenting skills suffer greatly.

My favorite Baker is Mark (Forrest Landis), a delicate, bespectacled child who is accident-prone and lonely. Subjected to a humiliating nickname that alludes to what an oddball he is within his own family, he seeks solace in his pet toad and the gorgeous tower room he manages to snag for himself in their Victorian mansion. Of the several sub-plots running throughout the movie, I found Mark’s the most compelling as he battles his insecurities and isolation and tries to figure out just how he fits in, and I was gratified to see that his journey is ultimately what brings together several of those loose threads and takes us to the movie’s most moving moment.

Yes, some of the kids’ hijinks get a little old. I’ve never been a big fan of destroy-the-house-style comedy, and we definitely get a fair bit of that here. The running gag with a falling chandelier is pretty tired by the time it’s run its course, though I suppose there is something inherently amusing about watching Wayne Knight fall off a ladder. The Bakers’ new neighbor Tina (Paula Marshall) is pretty hard to take with her shrill over-protectiveness, though I found her easy-going husband (Alan Ruck) and son Dylan (Steven Anthony Lawrence), who is extremely sheltered and longs for some excitement, pretty likable. The movie is heavy on the slapstick and the sap, but I didn’t mind the latter and the former wasn’t enough to turn me off of the movie. On the whole, I enjoyed this chronicle of one big sometimes-happy family trying to have it all. In fact, the sequel is already in my queue.

Saturday, June 25, 2011

Pixar Meets James Bond in Cars 2

In the second season of Flight of the Conchords, the oddball HBO comedy about a pair of eccentric New Zealand folk musicians trying unsuccessfully to make it big in New York City, band manager Murray introduces New Zealand’s childlike Prime Minister, who is a little behind the times on most pop cultural matters. One of the first things he does is express his disappointment at not having seen the end of Cars, which was playing on the plane on his way over. These characters may all be hunks of metal, but you really do get invested in them. At least I do. I’ve been looking forward to Cars 2 all year.

At its heart, this sequel, like the original and like so many Pixar flicks, is primarily a buddy movie. Everything hangs on the friendship between humbled hotshot racecar Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson) and open-hearted redneck tow truck Mater (Larry the Cable Guy). Lightning is smooth and cool, while Mater is a first-class countrified goofball. He’s also my favorite character, so I was delighted to see that he is basically the central character this time around. While Lightning has more big races to win, Mater is the one who fuels the conflict and has the most exciting job to do.

The movie puts us right in the middle of the action with a car we’ve never met, sophisticated Aston Martin Finn McMissile (Michael Caine). It’s a dizzying opener indicative of many of the scenes to follow, with a lot happening at once, to the point of mild confusion. In the first movie, the racing scenes are chaotic, but they’re balanced out by the stretches of time in sleepy Radiator Springs. While we do spend a few minutes in that town and revisit the residents (with the exception of Paul Newman’s Doc Hudson, whose character died along with the actor who portrayed him), we mostly see them away from Radiator Springs, criss-crossing the globe along with their hometown hero.

Lightning’s international tour comes about because Mater locks heads with egotistical Italian speed demon Francesco Bernoulli (John Turturro) over his derisive comments about Lightning on a call-in TV show. Their on-the-air showdown prompts Lightning to intervene and pledge his intention to forego a relaxing summer vacation in favor of a jet-setting, high-pressure one. Once they arrive at the site of the first race, overwhelmed Mater can scarcely contain his excitement, especially once he believes he has scored a date with a hot car, Holley Shiftwell (Emily Mortimer). His exuberance embarrasses Lightning and causes him some serious trouble, leading to a falling-out. For most of the movie, then, Mater is off on his own, trying to find a sense of purpose in a world where he always seems to be doing the wrong thing.

Little does he realize that thanks to Holley, he has now become entangled in a web of international espionage. After mistakenly identifying him as a fellow spy, she and Finn continue to work with Mater and issue instructions to him, but the movie is half-over before Mater really begins to understand what is going on. They think his dopeyness is a cover, an act to throw people off, rather like the signature schtick of expert detective Columbo as played by the late great Peter Falk. It’s not. However, there is one thing he really knows, and that is engines. Hence, he picks up on details that others would miss, and this knowledge proves very useful even if he is in completely over his head as a spy. What’s more, even though he’s just being himself, his bumpkin mannerisms do throw most people off, and that sometimes works to his advantage as well. But can he, Finn and Holley put a stop to the dangerous shenanigans that are threatening the well-being of cars around the world?

Cars 2, directed by John Lasseter and Brad Lewis, is an entertaining and eye-popping movie. Part buddy comedy and part James Bond spoof, it revels in complex action sequences and sly visual jokes. I love the way the movie presents visions of Japan, Italy and England that are rich in recognizable detail but skewered to fit this vehicular world. The high-tech zaniness of Tokyo is discombobulating but amusing, particularly during a sequence in which Mater uses the restroom and is confronted with a trippy talking computer. I loved the sunny brilliance of the Italian cityscape, though I didn’t catch which city it was. It’s in Italy that we actually have a chance to slow down for a bit as Lightning and his friends get the royal welcome from a relative of his pit crew. Then, of course, there’s London, which has been featured in so many Disney movies. Big Ben(tley) is the starting point of a pretty thrilling sequence, and Vanessa Redgrave lends her voice to an endearing vehicular version of Queen Elizabeth II.

When I heard that Pixar was planning a sequel to Toy Story, I was skeptical, but it ended up impressing me just as much as the first movie (and the third reduced me to a blubbering puddle of goo). While I enjoyed the movie, I don’t think that Cars 2 is quite that kind of home run. The first movie is so much about hometown pride and a group of eccentric characters teaching the arrogant but lonely Lightning that there’s more to life than winning races. While Mater is even more prominent in this movie than in the first, the rest of the characters take a backseat, appearing in only a few scenes and not adding that much to the overall story. Meanwhile, aside from Finn, Holley and Francesco, I found the new characters hard to latch onto. Despite the core friendship between Lightning and Mater, the movie feels most concerned with being a send-up of spy films, and as such, it is less focused on character than on explosive displays. Some of these scenes are a lot of fun, but sometimes the movie seems to get a bit bogged down. There’s also the thread of big oil versus alternative fuel running through the sequel, and the ultimate point seems to push going green, but the message is a bit convoluted.

One thing that Pixar fans have come to depend on is end-credits fun, and Cars 2 doesn’t disappoint in that respect. While I think I laughed more at the credits for Cars, I did enjoy the flat, retro-style vignettes showing a series of postcards involving various characters. I also liked the end-credits songs, particularly Brad Paisley’s Nobody’s Fool, a touching song from the perspective of Mater as he realizes how the world perceives him and struggles to come to terms with that identity.

Meanwhile, like the other Pixar movies, this one includes a short before the main feature. While most tend to be wordless and feature characters exclusive to that short, this time around we get to check up on the Toy Story gang in the cute Hawaiian Vacation, which finds Woody, Buzz and the whole gang trying to create an idyllic beach retreat for Ken and Barbie after their plan to stow away in Bonnie’s backpack fails to land them passage on her trip to Hawaii. In just a few minutes, each character gets a moment or two in the spotlight. In fact, I would say the short does a more effective job of highlighting Woody’s posse than the feature does of highlighting most of the Radiator Springs residents. They do have their moments, but most of them end up getting a bit lost in the shuffle.

In the end, then, I like Cars 2, but it felt a little too glitzy to me and lacking just a bit in the character department. I’ve heard some comments that this one was all about the money and that it was a disgrace to the Pixar name, and I can’t agree with that. Nonetheless, after two years of sequels, I am really looking forward to the next original Pixar movie.

Jeremy and His Parents Exasperate Each Other in Zits Unzipped

If you were to ask me to identify my favorite comic strip, I would most likely tell you Peanuts. Charlie Brown, Linus Van Pelt, Snoopy and the rest of the gang have been a part of my life for as long as I can remember, always bringing a smile whether I find them on a greeting card or a Christmas ornament. But if you wanted to know which strip makes me laugh hardest on a regular basis, I would probably have to go with Zits.

I first became aware of this strip by Jerry Scott and Jim Borgman my freshman year of college, when Jeremy Duncan, the central character, reminded me of my brother Benjamin, then In high school. Nowadays, he reminds me even more of my brother Nathan, who just graduated from college. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve read the strip and felt like Scott and Borgman must have a surveillance camera trained on our house. No two teenagers are alike, but these two seem to have tapped into something fairly universal when it comes to capturing the struggle of adolescents to make sense of school, friends and parents. While Jeremy is the primary focus, we also get plenty of the other side of the coin as we get inside the heads of Jeremy’s mom and dad, Connie and Walt. While teens can laugh at all the exasperating things the adult Duncans do, parents can sympathize with them as Jeremy makes them want to tear their hair out.

In Zits Unzipped, published in 2002, we get about 120 pages of black and white comic strips featuring Jeremy, his parents, his mellow best friend Hector, his girl-next-door-type girlfriend Sara, his offbeat buddy Pierce and various other friends and acquaintances. A majority of the strips deal with Jeremy’s home life. Connie is over-involved and high-strung, while Walt is oblivious and square. Jeremy is surly and uncommunicative. He’s also a pretty good kid, though, and Connie and Walt are pretty good parents. They’re all just muddling along together. The biggest laughs tend to involve Connie’s abject horror at some aspect of Jeremy’s personality, but I love the more gentle humor of Walt’s cluelessness as he tries to grasp modern pop culture and technology.

This is a fairly early collection, and while most of the characters look pretty much the same as they do now, Jeremy looks slightly off, and Pierce, who is introduced in this book, has a significantly different appearance. He’s still very recognizable with all those piercings, however. Minor characters like attached-at-the-hip Richandamy and know-it-all Brittany don’t seem to have changed much, nor have Hector, Connie or Walt.

While the look of the strip is generally fairly realistic, it often incorporates unusual techniques to achieve a certain effect. For instance, in one strip, Connie is driving somewhere with Jeremy in the passenger seat. As she jabbers, we see Connie’s head on wheels with a bored Jeremy sitting inside. In another, Jeremy and Walt have the house to themselves, and the sight of two bears raiding the kitchen gives us an idea of the disaster they leave in their wake when they get hungry. Some such moments incorporate pop culture references as well, like the strip that alludes to Cast Away as Walt tries to converse with Jeremy. Gradually, he seems to grow masses of facial hair, while a palm tree pops up in the background and Jeremy’s head morphs into a volleyball.

The book contains a mix of individual strips and those that tell a story stretching across several pages. It’s nice to have a liberal sprinkling of both. The one-offs are great for a quick laugh, while the multi-strip stories allow greater investment. Two of my favorites in this collection involve Jeremy and Sara exchanging Christmas presents and Jeremy having an ill-advised horror movie marathon when his parents go out of town overnight.

Zits is a comic strip that continues to delight with its keen insights into the dynamics of parent-teen relationships and the pressures of contemporary high school life. If a weekly or even daily dose of Jeremy, his parents and his friends isn’t enough for you, Zits Unzipped is a wonderful book in which to immerse yourself.

Saturday, June 18, 2011

Ryan Reynolds Suits Up as the Green Lantern

I like to think of myself as being pretty geeky. Nonetheless, my knowledge of comic books remains limited, as blockbuster season often reminds me. Last night, I went into Green Lantern knowing nothing about the character aside from what my brother had told me. The main thing I knew about the movie itself was that it stars Ryan Reynolds, whose performances I have generally enjoyed, though I also heard that the critics weren’t too impressed with it. I didn’t hear why, so as I watched, I kept wondering which parts of the movie should be disappointing me. I’ve always been better at pointing out strengths than flaws in things, so maybe I just missed some glaring problems. But basically, I found Green Lantern to be quite an entertaining movie.

The film, directed by Martin Campbell, helpfully provides an expository introduction to get everyone up to speed on the rules of the Green Lantern universe. In this mythology, an ageless council of sage beings stands as guardians of the entire universe, which they have divided into 3600 sections, appointing a protector for each. These protectors wear green rings that harness the energy of will, which the guardians consider the strongest force in the universe. As the film begins, these green-garbed protectors face a grave danger from a growing threat that feeds on fear. Some of the finest of this elite group have fallen prey to the enigmatic entity; one of them needs to find a new bearer on Earth, and that’s where Reynolds’ character comes in.

While the beginning teeters on being a tedious information dump, it’s short enough and presented dynamically enough that I didn’t mind, particularly because it all felt like pretty essential background. However, it’s when Reynolds shows up that things really get cooking. He’s Hal Jordan, a flippant fighter pilot about to be late for work on the worst of all possible days. He has a big demonstration to pull off, and he manages some pretty fancy flying, but his daring feat is not exactly appreciated.

Hal is a loose cannon. I kept finding myself reminded of Maverick in Top Gun. Like Maverick, Hal is a highly skilled but reckless pilot driven to live up to his father’s legacy. Like him, Hal is romantically involved with a talented female fighter pilot. He even serenades her in a bar and uses flying lingo as a metaphor for their relationship. Later in the movie, after he has shown how irresponsible he can be, he must prove to a skeptical commander that he is up for the challenge of a lifetime. So even though I didn’t know a thing about Green Lantern, Hal’s trajectory felt very familiar to me.

That didn’t bother me. In fact, it made it easier for me to connect to Hal, as well as his rarely ruffled love interest, Carol Ferris (Blake Lively), daughter of his boss. In the beginning, Hal pilots fighter jets; by the end, he’s flying on his own through outer space. Turns out that he isn’t quite as fearless as he initially appears, but the same daring spunk he displayed in his firefight will be needed as he faces off against a grave enemy. That nemesis is the terrifying Parallax (Clancy Brown), who has harnessed the yellow power of fear and is using it to wipe out entire civilizations, growing stronger each time. He reminds me of no one so much as Hexxus, the grotesque sludge monster in the animated Ferngully who feeds off of pollution, growing stronger with each sip of smog or toxic goo. The scenes in which we see him directly are the most disturbing in the movie as he sucks the life force out of everyone who stands in his path, leaving nothing but a pile of dry bones to clatter in his wake. There’s very little blood in the movie, but these scenes could be traumatizing to sensitive young viewers.

Shortly after Hal puts on his green ring for the first time, he is whisked away to the planet where the guardians reside in order to be debriefed on his powers and his responsibilities. This is a visually dazzling sequence involving hundreds of intriguing alien life forms, a bustling intergalactic city and the dueling skills of multiple protectors as they try to break Hal in. The three major characters we meet here are Sinestro (Mark Strong), one of the most influential members of the Green Lanterns and a close friend of the protector Hal replaced; Kilowog (Michael Clarke Duncan), an imposing bestial alien who puts Hal through some intensive training; and the wise, gentle Tomar-Re, a fish-faced alien played by Geoffrey Rush. Of these, the last is my favorite, but the first is most significant to the story.

The other major character is Hector Hammond (Peter Sarsgaard), who becomes the vehicle through which Parallax plans to conquer Earth. Hector is a jittery, socially awkward biologist who looks like Sesame Street’s Mr. Noodle. He’s hunched and withdrawn much of the time, but when he is chosen to examine the deceased alien who bore the green ring before Hal, he comes alive with excitement. For the first half of the movie or so, I found him mostly sympathetic, despite some slightly creepy tendencies. This is a man with a brilliant mind who has always felt rejected by society at large and his father in particular. His self-esteem issues run deep.

He seems to have an ally in the calm Dr. Amanda Waller (Angela Bassett), who takes him to perform the autopsy, but that isn’t enough to keep him from going off the deep end once he becomes contaminated with the yellow power of Parallax. One thing the movie demonstrates very effectively is how evil can corrupt even the most well-intentioned. The yellow power made me think of Lord of the Rings, since it is a formidable force but those who use it always fall under its vile influence. When one Green Lantern forges a yellow ring meant to wield that energy, you just know that no good will come of it.

Having two competing forces allows for some pretty impressive battles as one hurls destructive forces and the other repels with creative forces. A Green Lantern has the ability to create anything imaginable, provided he is properly focused. Watching Hal experiment with these abilities is a lot of fun, as is seeing him take to the skies in his bright green suit. Despite Parallax’s all-consuming destruction and Hector’s more traditional mayhem, the movie does not feel particularly violent, especially considering the genre. I didn’t notice any profanity, and although the first time we meet Hal he’s hopping out of a bed he shared with a one-night stand, most of the romance in the film is quite chaste. Flashbacks to Hal’s childhood and the introduction of his 11-year-old nephew help bolster the interest for children. While I was hoping to see more of that nephew toward the end of the film, his tender scene with Hal early on made the hot-headed hero easier to empathize with.

The movie blatantly sets up a sequel, especially if you sit through the credits for a few minutes, so I’m sure this isn’t the last we’ll be seeing of the Green Lantern on the big screen. I have no idea how faithful the movie is to its comic book origins, but I thought it had just the right mix of elements to be a fun summer blockbuster. It didn’t make me laugh quite as much as Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides, but there was still enough humor to offset the darkest elements of the movie, and it’s effects-laden enough that the movie pops on the big screen in a way that you know it won’t quite do on all but the biggest televisions. If you like this type of movie, I’d recommend catching it in theaters. I certainly enjoyed the ride.

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Here Comes Snoopy, and Here Comes Fun

While I am fond of all the characters who populate Peanuts, the classic comic strip created by Charles Schulz, my favorite would have to be Snoopy, that cheerful, imaginative beagle with dreams of novelist glory that are frequently thwarted by unfeeling editors. Even though Snoopy didn’t become a writer until later in the series, it was a no-brainer for me to scoop up the 1950s-era collection Here Comes Snoopy when I spotted it at our local city-wide book sale. Like Here Comes Charlie Brown!, this volume is just over a hundred pages long and is drawn from a larger collection, this one called Snoopy Vol. 1. Unlike that book, it is unified by the fact that the title character appears in every single strip.

There’s actually quite a lot of overlap between the two books, with a majority of the Snoopy strips from that book showing up in this one. This is very early Snoopy, so he looks a bit more like a regular dog and a bit less than the very distinct canine found in so many Christmas ornaments, plush toys and Minnesota public art statues. Still, we definitely get the sense that Snoopy is not quite an ordinary dog. There’s something a little unusual about him, whether he’s spending his days imitating Charlie Brown and his friends or sobbing into Schroeder’s shoulder after a particularly moving piano performance.

While Here Comes Charlie Brown! is pretty much just a hodgepodge of early strips, Here Comes Snoopy most definitely belongs to the beagle. Mostly, we see him either on his own or interacting with Charlie Brown, Linus or Lucy. Other characters do make the occasional appearance; Schroeder appears in several strips, and we see Violet and Patty, though neither of them says much. Each strip contains four panels, though some are square, some are ovals and some have no outline at all.

Charlie Brown is well aware that his dog is an oddball, and sometimes that seems to frustrate him. More than once, we see him offering to teach Snoopy a simple skill, only to have him demonstrate that he is far too advanced for that sort of lesson. It annoys him that Snoopy is such a know-it-all. He also is irritated by Snoopy’s constant shedding. Nonetheless, he loves showing his dog off to everybody, and it’s apparent that Snoopy brings him just as much happiness as he does frustration.

While Linus is generally a gentle, philosophical soul, he and Snoopy have always had a somewhat antagonistic relationship because of Snoopy’s tendency to steal his security blanket. Hence, most of the encounters we see between the two are rather tense. Sometimes we see Snoopy clutching his blanket in his teeth and zooming off while Linus holds on for dear life. At other times, Snoopy tries to sneak up on Linus and give him a good scare, but Linus always seems to be one step ahead of him and retaliates with something even more ferocious that sends Snoopy streaking off in terror.

Lucy doesn’t have as much to do with Snoopy as her brother does, but generally their meetings are more cordial. While Snoopy enjoys poking fun at her, he also appreciates the affection she lavishes on him, even though he thinks a tasty treat would be a more exciting gesture than a pat on the head. Lucy, like Patty and Violet, generally approves of Snoopy, and he sometimes brings out her softer side, though she’s not afraid to confront him when she thinks he is being ridiculous.

It’s a little strange to have an entire book full of Snoopy cartoons and not see Woodstock once, but Snoopy’s feathered pal didn’t join the strip until 1967 (and didn’t get a name until 1970). Snoopy is a solitary creature here. Not only do we not see Woodstock, we don’t see his doghouse either, which makes him feel much less like the king of his domain. He’s more of a perpetual tagalong. Some days, he seems to revel in his status, but at other times, he wishes that he were human and even goes so far as to say that he would avoid dogs if he hadn’t been born one, since he finds canines fundamentally distasteful. His feelings seem to fluctuate.

Mostly, though, he appears pretty happy with his lot. He has half a dozen ready playmates, a steady supply of food and the freedom to indulge his imaginative whims. In one of the strips, Charlie Brown and Shermy walk up to Snoopy and, finding him looking despondent under a thick snowfall, tell him, “Be of good cheer.” This amuses me because my brother and I once had a conversation about the Christmas song It’s the Most Wonderful Time of the Year and how neither of us could ever remember being told, “Be of good cheer.” But Snoopy receives this very instruction. It occurs within the first few pages of the book, so if you’re reading it, you might consider it an instruction to the reader as well, but hardly a necessary one. Cheer can hardly be avoided when Snoopy is coming your way.

Monday, June 13, 2011

Trixie Trades Knuffle for Knuffels in Mo Willems' Knuffle Bunny Free

Prolific and much-lauded writer-illustrator Mo Willems has created several popular series, including the Pigeon books and the Elephant and Piggie books, but his Knuffle Bunny trilogy holds an unusual place in his canon because it is best read in order. Each book finds the main character, Trixie, at a different stage of her childhood, with her world expanding considerably each time. In the first book, she remains in her neighborhood and interacts only with her parents, and she takes her first plunge into comprehensible speech. In the second, she has mastered verbal communication and spends her days at preschool among other children her age, eventually making her first close friend outside the family. In the third book, she is a confident elementary school student off on an international voyage to see her grandparents. From a trip to the Laundromat to a trip to Holland, her adventures are steadily getting bigger.

Trixie remains just as attached to Knuffle Bunny, her dowdy stuffed rabbit, as she was in the first volume, so of course, she brings him along with her for the big trip, counting on having him to cuddle with during her very first airplane flight. Unfortunately, as anyone who has read the first two books knows, she’s not so skilled at hanging on to her treasured toy. On this occasion, she won’t be able to instantly retrieve him; she leaves him behind on the plane, and by the time she realizes what she’s done, the plane is gone, and Knuffle Bunny is off for a voyage around the world. Will she ever see him again? And how will she get along without him in the meantime?

Willems once remarked in an interview that the word Knuffle is an adaptation of Knuffel, the Dutch word for snuggle, so it seems quite fitting that the last book should find Trixie in Holland, snuggling with her Oma and Opa in her beloved bunny’s absence. Most of the book takes place there, which makes it educational for children as well as entertaining. As with the previous books, this is a mixed-media effort, with black-and-white photographs serving as backgrounds for colorful hand-drawn characters. Kids can wander the Dutch streets with Trixie as she eats at a café and poses in front of an authentic windmill, and they can gasp along with her at the garish pink Dutch-spouting robo-bunny her grandparents buy her in an effort to ease her malaise at losing Knuffle Bunny, seemingly for good this time.

Additionally, in a four-page fold-out spread, Willems offers a peek at some of the other places Knuffle Bunny might end up in his travels, showing him in eight very different locations. I wish that Willems had identified these places in a note in the back, but kids can still have fun trying to figure out what country they are seeing; it just might take a little more work for parents to confirm the accuracy of their guesses.

While all three books contain a mix of the humorous and the emotionally resonant, I would say that the first book is primarily funny, while the second is equally touching and comical. I would deem the third book the least funny of the three and the most poignant. We don’t know precisely how old Trixie is here; I would guess at least seven, and possibly as old as ten. She’s old enough to have a real awareness of how her life is changing, and that scares and saddens her. However, it also excited her, and by the end of the book, she has come to embrace the new possibilities that come with being a big kid.

Most of the pages in this book have a beige background, and while a few characters are drawn directly on the page, most are set within a photographic panel, with a majority of pages having between one and three. As always, Willems does a lot with a little. One of my favorite parts of this book is the series of panels in which Trixie, having realized that her bunny is gone, heads off to inform her father, who is busy enjoying a pleasant chat with his dad, a charming fellow with a thick gray beard, square spectacles and a bald head. In four pictures, we see him go from relaxed to on-edge to staring at Trixie to assuming a hopeless face-palm position. “Trixie didn’t tell her daddy that Knuffle Bunny was gone,” Willems writes. “She didn’t have to.” This is especially striking given that the central conflict of the first book hinges on Trixie’s inability to communicate with her dad and his obliviousness to the source of her distress. Just as Trixie is growing up, her dad is maturing as a father and learning to be more attuned to his daughter.

Like the first two books, Knuffle Bunny Free, a sweet, heart-tugging play on words, includes an epilogue, and this one drives home the fact that the Knuffle Bunny series will end with number three. I’ll admit I got a little teary as I read those last four pages, which are written directly to the real Trixie as Willems imagines what the next decade or two may hold in store for her. The book proper also ends with a letter, leaving the reader with a real sense of the power that words have to connect people. Perhaps children who read this may be inspired to begin correspondences of their own: with their grandparents, with each other, with distant pen pals they have yet to meet. They might even decide to write the author himself, which he encourages by posting his mailing address in the FAQ section of his website, www.mowillems.com.

The Knuffle Bunny trilogy is the continuing story of a pudgy plush rabbit that is always getting lost. It’s the story of two adults, especially one overwhelmed dad, learning how to be better parents. But mostly, it’s the story of Trixie, a girl who is gradually growing older and taller and wiser and kinder. The first two are pretty much unavoidable; the second two are just a shade easier to achieve when children read such edifying books as Mo Willems’ Knuffle Bunny series.

Noley Thornton Shines in Disney's 1993 TV Version of Heidi

I’ve always loved the story of Heidi, the cheerful little orphan girl who goes to live with her grandfather in the mountains and then longs to return after she is whisked away to town to serve as a companion for a girl confined to a wheelchair, but until yesterday, I had never seen the 1993 made-for-TV Disney version of the movie directed by Michael Ray Rhodes and starring Noley Thornton. My dad picked it up yesterday on the first day of my city’s annual Great American Book Sale, which also has plenty of videos, DVDs, CDs, tapes and records for sale. Last night, we sat down to watch the nearly three-hour-long movie, which was different in several ways from other versions I remember.

The story begins with the departure of Heidi’s parents from the mountain following a fight between her father and grandfather. A wicked storm is brewing, and as the infant Heidi’s parents flee, a sudden treefall dispatches them both, leaving only Heidi alive. Dete, a distant relative, takes her down to the nearest town to live with her, but eight years later, when she finds the child too much of an inconvenience, she returns her to her grandfather, whose naturally surly disposition has soured still further with the realization that he drove his son to his death. Still, it isn’t long before Heidi manages to win him over, and she thrives on the mountains, drinking in the flowers and herding her grandfather’s goats with young shepherd Peter. Then Dete returns and forces her to accompany her to Frankfurt.

In Frankfurt, Heidi finds a new best friend in Klara, a sickly 12-year-old who lives in a mansion and is doted on by kindly butler Sebastian and uptight house manager Fraulein Rottenmeier. The two girls get along well, but Klara insists that Heidi is here to stay, while all the little girl wants is to go back home to her mountain and Grandfather. The bulk of the movie revolves around the question of whether Klara will be unselfish enough to allow her new friend to return to the life that she loves so dearly. Would she be sacrificing her own happiness in order to give Heidi hers, or might they both find contentment in such an arrangement?

Thornton is adorable as Heidi, a wisp of a girl with an irrepressible grin and eyes equally capable of sparkling and looking glassy and dull. When she is on the mountain, so beautifully captured by cinematographer Dennis C. Lewiston, her exuberance is unmistakable, and we see it slowly ebb away in the city as she begins to lose hope that she will ever return. Thornton is utterly winning in the role, and it’s little wonder that she is so quickly beloved by most who meet her.

I wasn’t as impressed with the other two child actors. Ben Brazier spends most of his time looking sulky as Peter, and Lexi Randall makes Klara, who I usually find an entirely likable character, almost as obnoxious as Veruca Salt, the Roald Dahl creation who always comes to mind first when I think of spoiled brats. Of course, that’s partly because of the way the character is written. While Heidi and Klara are friends, she truly does become the central obstacle standing between Heidi and her grandfather.

Also grating is Jane Hazlegrove as Dete, who keeps yanking Heidi around whenever it’s to her monetary benefit. When they are together, Dete treats the child in a brusque, unsympathetic manner, and she seems to give very little thought to what might make her happy. First she dumps Heidi on her grandfather and doesn’t even stick around long enough to make certain that he will accept her, which he doesn’t at first. Then, just when she has grown to love her new home, she comes and takes her away, essentially selling her to Klara’s family. She really is a despicable character, and I also found myself a bit distracted by her pronounced English accent.

Sebastian has one too, but he’s a butler, so it somehow seems to fit despite the German setting. He’s also probably my favorite secondary character. Played by Basil Hoskins, he conducts himself with dignity and always treats Heidi with respect and compassion. Jane Seymour plays the much stiffer Frau Rottenmeier, who mainly seems like she needs to let her hair down once in a while. She’s snippy and high-strung, but she doesn’t come across as truly cruel, which she does in other versions. Her uptight nature generally amuses rather than intimidates Heidi.

Jason Robards plays the grandfather as snarling and standoffish, prone to walking away from his problems and then letting his anguish out in the form of primal screams to the sky. While I am a fan of Robards, I sometimes found him over the top here. Nonetheless, I mostly enjoyed his performance, particularly during the early part of the movie, when we see him gradually warming to Heidi. Meanwhile, Patricia Neal provides a wonderfully maternal presence as Peter’s grandmother, who is blind but deeply contented with her life and especially treasures visits from Heidi. Much younger and more agile is Klara’s high-society grandmother. Played with zest by Sian Phillips, she proves to be Heidi’s staunchest ally in her quest to return home.

It’s been a long time since I saw Heidi in any form, but my inclination is to say that this isn’t my favorite version, mostly because Klara’s persistently whiny, petulant behavior gets on my nerves so much and seems to do the character a disservice. While it has always been easy to compare Klara to entitled invalid Colin in The Secret Garden, I prefer it when their personalities are not so similar. Still, making Klara so self-absorbed does add a different layer to the movie, making it distinct from those that preceded it. Meanwhile, Thornton is just about perfect in the title role, and she plays especially well off of Robards, Neal and Hoskins. At nearly three hours in length, this is a bit on the long side for a family movie, but I would still recommend it as a fine adaptation of a classic for all ages.

Saturday, June 11, 2011

Relive LOST's Pilot Episode With Bif Bang Pow!'s Jack Shephard and Vincent

Back when McFarlane released its first line of LOST action figures, I bought the company’s rendition of Jack Shephard, arguably the show’s central character, for my friend Libbie for her birthday. I didn’t nab one for myself, though, partly because I figured as long as one of us had him that was enough, partly because I never really latched onto Jack until season six, and I was never more frustrated with him than I was during season three, when that figure came out. Maybe someday I’ll buy that Jack from eBay, but the Bif Bang Bow! bobblehead version is so similar that doing so would probably feel redundant. If only the bobblehead came equipped with a sound chip like the action figure, I’d be all set.

This version of Jack, like the McFarlane version, captures him in the early moments of the series premiere. Dressed in a sharp-looking black suit with black tie askew over his white button-up shirt, Jack sports a five-o’clock shadow and a bleeding wound on each cheek. He doesn’t look too concerned about that; he’s a doctor, and he’s used to ignoring his own pain as he tries to fix the injuries of others. His mouth is set in an expression of grim determination, and his eyes seem filled with steely resolve.

Like the other bobbleheads in this collection – except Hurley, who’s taller because he’s wearing a safari hat – Jack stands about seven inches tall, including the base upon which he is situated. That base is sandy-colored, as we’re supposed to be seeing Jack on the beach, and it’s circular and tall enough to leave room for “Jack Shephard” to be spelled out in large white letters on the front. Letters of that same style appear on the back as well, spelling out “LOST.” Surrounding Jack on the base are several remnants of the plane crash, and standing beside him is Vincent, the yellow lab who came on the plane with Walt, the lone kid in LOST’s first season whose disappearance from the show after that point – aside from the very occasional guest appearance – frustrated fans.

Vincent is the first survivor Jack meets after arriving on the Island, and that brief but important encounter finds an echo late in the series, giving the two characters a powerful bond. It’s nice to see the show’s Most Valuable Canine honored in this way, though the fact that his name does not appear on the base suggests that he is more of a prop than a living, breathing character, and that is definitely not the case. While he only appears in about a third of the episodes, he makes several significant contributions to the events of the Island. His likeness here is a tad generic, with fully black eyes and hindquarters that are sort of fused with the large piece of wreckage at the back of the base. Still, it’s recognizably Vincent, and no one who watched the series regularly will be in any doubt as to who the dog is and why he is there.

Jack’s head bobbles a lot or a little, depending on how forcefully his head is nudged. The mild bobble seems more suited to the personality of this emotionally guarded physician, but it can be fun to see him wobble away like a jittery sycophant. The motion is just a fun added bonus, though. While Jack is not my favorite bobblehead of the bunch, he is certainly a character that many fans would like to capture. Of course, those who are that fond of Jack will probably already have him in some form, as not only McFarlane but several other companies have come out with renditions of this leader of the ragtag band of Oceanic 815 castaways. Still, this version of Jack has about as much to recommend it as others do, and it only costs about $13, plus shipping; as far as I know, no brick-and-mortar stores stock these bobbleheads, but they are available from ABC’s online LOST store and the catalog Entertainment Earth.

It took me a long time to fully warm up to Jack, but now I consider him one of my favorite characters, and the inclusion of Vincent makes this bobblehead all the more appealing. Like Ben Linus and Daniel Faraday, the first members of my bobbly LOST menagerie, Jack plays the piano, so he’s right at home atop my weathered Lester, and when I play Michael Giacchino’s iconic Life and Death theme, it’s a pleasure to see him wobbling ever so slightly in approval. Are you suffering from LOST withdrawal? The Jack and Vincent bobblehead may be just what the doctor ordered.

Liven Up Your Computer Desk With Bif Bang Pow!'s Desmond Hume Bobblehead

Back in 2008, I heard the exciting news that McFarlane was planning a third line of LOST action figures, and it would include Desmond Hume, the frazzled Scotsman at the heart of what is widely considered to be the show’s most epic love story. That’s only one part of what makes Desmond such an appealing character, but I feel certain that the McFarlane figure would have alluded to it, either in the background of the figure’s base, the special prop included with the figure or one of the sound clips accessible at a touch of the button on the base. Unfortunately, due to lack of interest and lack of awareness – the figures received very little marketing and a lot of fans didn’t even know they existed until the fifth season, when they were featured in LOST Untangled, a series of goofy videos promoting the show – the line of action figures was cancelled after only ten figures and one play set. I never got my Desmond action figure, but thanks to Bif Bang Pow!, I do have a Desmond bobblehead.

The most disappointing thing about this Desmond right off the bat is that these bobbleheads do not have sound chips. Some of Desmond’s appeal is simply the musicality of his accent, and we get no hint of that here. The figure also fails to include any sort of reference to Penny Widmore, the love of his life. Granted, this might have been a bit complicated to incorporate, but it could have been done. Perhaps a copy of Charles Dickens’ Our Mutual Friend, the book containing the letter in which Penny reassures Desmond of her undying love, could have been resting atop the disk drive. Or we could have gotten Desmond in the penultimate scene of The Constant, with a full shaggy beard, a bright blue shirt and an enormous smile, and in the background a bright red telephone. However, the sculptor decided to focus on Desmond as we first see him, stuck in a bunker punching numbers in a computer. (Actually showing the numbers on the computer screen would have been a nice touch too, but this bobblehead doesn’t fare so well in the intimate detail department.)

Desmond stands on a neat square base. It’s flat and dark gray, the same color as the computer desk that takes up half the space upon it. The top of the desk is off-white, and the computer and disk drive are mostly off-white as well, with gray accents. The front of the base has “DESMOND HUME” in raised white letters, while the back shows the word “LOST.” The angle is such that the back of the computer desk rests between these two sides. Hence, we’re seeing Desmond at a side glance, which is a little odd, but it works.

At a quick glance, a fan would definitely be able to tell that this is supposed to be Desmond. His hands hover over the keyboard, and he stares ahead of him. He wears brown shoes and a khaki jumpsuit with a Dharma Swan station patch on his chest. On his face is a stubbly beard and mustache, and his brown hair is wavy and almost shoulder-length. His eyes are deep brown, and his mouth is set in an enigmatic smile. Frankly, he looks a little too serene to be the crazed man who introduces himself by holding a gun to John Locke’s head; the expression seems more in line with what we see from him throughout much of season six. Still, I’m sure that Desmond did have a peaceful moment or two during his time as doomsday computer attendant.

The costume and the setting make this unmistakably Desmond, but of all the bobbleheads that have been produced thus far, I think that the likeness here is the least exact. For one thing, Desmond is a swarthy guy, and here, his skin tone is much too pale. For another, his facial structure just doesn’t quite seem to capture the essence of Desmond. I don’t get a sense of his personality when I look at it, and I don’t think his face looks all that much like Henry Ian Cusick. It’s passable, but since Desmond is one of my very favorite characters, I was hoping for something a little more precise.

I still think it’s a great bobblehead, and I’m glad to have a Desmond figure of some kind to make up for the lack of one from McFarlane. With that company’s attention to detail, I suspect the action figure would have been much more exact, and being able to hear some of his famous quotes in that Scottish accent would have helped it to seem more fully Desmond. Nonetheless, this is Desmond at an important junction in the show, and because of the computer, it’s one of the largest in the collection, so it stands out and would look great on a computer desk. Whenever you are feeling frustrated with the headaches your computer is giving you, you can look up at Desmond and just be grateful that you can leave your terminal for more than 108 minutes at a time without having to worry about the world imploding. Kinda takes the pressure off, doesn’t it?

Enjoy Some Old-Fashioned Peanuts Fun with Charles Schulz's Here Comes Charlie Brown!

I’ve always loved the Peanuts characters created by Charles Schulz, and I come by that affection honestly. Charlie Brown and the gang have been popular in my family for decades, as evidenced by the collection of comic strips that my grandma gave me this week after looking through some of her old books. Here Comes Charlie Brown! was originally published in 1955. This edition dates back to 1966, but that’s still 45 years of Peanuts fandom, and I bet that the older generation of McCartys were Schulz fans long before that. Who could blame them?

This simple book is a small paperback with a bright orange cover showing a despondent Charlie Brown with a baseball cap on his head and a bat slung over his shoulder, a mitt dangling from the end. Presumably he has just lost or forfeited a game; his baseball managing woes come up frequently in this collection of about 120 black-and-white four-panel strips. This book is actually basically an abridged version of Good Ol’ Charlie Brown Vol. II, so it would probably make more sense to get that book, but since this one fell into my lap, this is what I’m reviewing.

Because my edition was published more than a decade after the first, the back cover is something of an oddity. For one thing, along with the bright orange of the front, it has a large block of green with a thin white line between the two portions of the page, reminding me of the Irish flag. For another, the language is very dated, talking about how you want to get in with “the in group,” and this is it. “Guaranteed to help you kick the blues without the aid of headshrinkers or happy pills,” the blurb promises.

But what’s most notable about the back cover is that the group includes two characters who appear nowhere within its pages since at the time of publication, they had not yet been created. These anachronistic kids are Charlie Brown’s little sister Sally, introduced in 1959, and naturally curly-haired Frieda, who didn’t show up until 1961. Don’t expect to find Snoopy’s feathered friend Woodstock, bespectacled Marcie or tomboyish Peppermint Patty in this book either. However, you will find blond-haired Patty, her best friend, dark-haired Violet, and quiet Shermy, all of whom become much less prominent in later years. The book also features Pig-Pen, who remains a fairly major character but is mostly a one-note guy, with his strips generally involving his inability to stay clean.

The characters in this book look pretty close to their final form, but they’re not quite there yet. Schulz still had a bit of perfecting to do before they reached their final iconic looks. Linus and Schroeder probably are closest to their final versions at this point. That seems fitting for Linus, since he spends so much of the book preoccupied with getting older. He takes pride in being able to tie his shoes and button his shirt, and he dreams of the freedom he will find when he finally turns six. He’s beginning to have his doubts about the existence of Santa Claus and to suspect that not everything his older sister Lucy tells him is true. However, he remains stubbornly youthful in one respect: his refusal to give up his beloved security blanket. Moreover, his innocent inexperience is apparent when he tells Lucy that he can’t imagine living to the ripe old age of 30.

Schroeder‘s preoccupations in this book are pretty typical. He spends most of his time playing the piano, showing off musical knowledge of composers such as Bach, Brahms and Chopin. Of course, he saves his most ardent admiration for Beethoven, and his hero worship not only annoys Lucy, who has raging crush on him, but Charlie Brown, who spends most of the book aggravated by one thing or another. Schroeder also plays some baseball here, or at least shows up to play, but the team is such a disaster that not much ever happens on that front, and soon he’s back to tickling the ivories and daydreaming about his favorite composer. My favorite Schroeder moment in this book comes when Charlie Brown reads a passage describing a dark period of Beethoven’s life, and Schroeder wonders, bewildered, “How could anyone be Beethoven and not be happy?”

Lucy isn’t very happy in this book, and it’s not just because Schroeder loves Beethoven more than he even tolerates her, though that doesn’t help. “Never fall in love with a musician,” she sagely advises. But she has bigger problems to worry about. One day, she takes a notion into her head that the world is literally getting smaller, and it’s because people are wearing down the ground by walking on it. She begins a one-girl campaign to stop people from shrinking the planet before it’s too late. While she eventually wearies of this activism, she spends a lot of time in the book spouting off bizarre “facts” that she merely made up, much to Charlie Brown’s consternation.

Despite his stint as spelling champ in A Boy Called Charlie Brown, I never thought of Charlie Brown as being all that studious, but that is the way he comes across here. At least, he knows enough to be very agitated with Lucy’s dissemination of false information, especially the erroneous tour of local trees that she gives Linus. He seems determined to be well-informed himself; throughout much of the book, we can see him reading, always soaking up historical and scientific tidbits to pass along to others. He reminds me of my dad, who is always running to the Internet to find some background information on various topics that we’ve been discussing. Unfortunately, no amount of written knowledge seems sufficient to improve Charlie Brown’s luck in baseball or to convince the rather mean-spirited girls who surround him that he deserves to be treated with anything other than scorn. It’s little wonder he empathizes with the overlooked sparrows, building a birdhouse exclusively for them. As he explains in a wonderfully quintessential Charlie Brown moment, “I always stick up for the underbird!”

Then, of course, we have Snoopy. While he has not yet begun to let his imagination run truly wild – he does not have a typewriter, for instance, and he doesn’t fantasize about gunning down the Red Baron – he’s well on his way at this point. He spends a good portion of this book working on his impressions, imitating animals, historical figures and neighborhood kids. This last is his favorite, though Charlie Brown warns him that he’s headed for trouble if they find out he’s doing it. Snoopy is generally a happy dog, as evidenced by the series of strips in which Lucy reprimands him for his exuberant dancing, but there are a few things that bother him. Here, his biggest vexation is weeds, and the yard full of tall, unmown vegetation sends him into a constant state of panic when he finds himself within its confines.

This is a simple collection in which the story arcs never last more than a few panels and never become very complex. They do reveal character, though, so if you love Charlie Brown, Linus, Lucy, Schroeder and Snoopy, you should be very pleased indeed at the words Here Comes Charlie Brown!

Friday, June 10, 2011

Mart Helps Trixie Solve a Hometown Mystery in The Secret of the Unseen Treasure

In January, I began reading the Trixie Belden series, written first by Julie Campbell and then by a number of ghostwriters using the pseudonym Kathryn Kenny. My library served me very well for the first fifteen volumes, but then I found I had to skip ahead until I get my hands on some of the later books myself, something I hope to do at the week-long city book sale that starts on Sunday. The first Trixie book I read out of order is the nineteenth, The Secret of the Unseen Treasure.

Fourteen-year-old sleuth Trixie Belden is an ordinary teenager, but she leads a pretty exciting life, especially in volumes 11 through 15 of the series. In each of these books, she embarks on a thrilling out-of-town adventure, along with her best friend, demure Honey Wheeler; her brothers Brian and Mart; Honey’s adopted brother Jim; and sometimes their neighbors Dan Mangan and Di Lynch. The last one I read was not only a lit geek’s delight, as they wandered through areas referenced by Mark Twain in his books, it featured perhaps the most harrowing encounter yet between the intrepid detectives and a nefarious criminal.

I took a bit of a break from the series for most of May as I poked my head in thrift shops to see if I could find any of the missing volumes, so when I returned to it, I found it rather refreshing to see Trixie and her friends enjoying some summer tranquility in their own hometown of Sleepyside. While the story lacks some of the excitement of their various vacations, they still find themselves with a puzzling situation before them, and side characters like Trixie’s parents and younger brother Bobby and Regan, who takes care of the Wheelers’ horses, have prominent roles in the story again.

In this book, summer vacation has just started, and that means having long days to spend with her friends and older brothers, who collectively refer to themselves as the Bob-Whites of the Glen. One thing they’ll be doing a lot of is exercising the Wheelers’ horses, and it’s one such trail ride that leads them directly into a mystery. As they approach the farm of elderly Mrs. Elliot, a shifty-looking man flees the scene, leaving behind the remnants of what looks like intended arson. Who would want to set fire to Mrs. Elliot’s property, and why? And could it have anything to do with the social security checks that recently failed to turn up in several Sleepyside mailboxes?

I like the fact that Unseen Treasure allows the Bob-Whites the freedom of summer vacation and the familiarity of home. Granted, the kids have responsibilities, ranging from camp counseling jobs to babysitting and household chores, but there’s still a lot of free time for fun stuff like horseback riding, picnicking and swimming. Of course, once Trixie realizes that there is a mystery afoot – and that solving it could save the livelihood of Mrs. Elliot, who is teetering dangerously close to bankruptcy – she wants to devote as much of her time to the case as possible, despite warnings from perpetually cantankerous police sergeant Molinson. She does find a more sympathetic listener in the form of Charles Hartman, a crusty retired cop who is probably my favorite new character in the book, but she and her friends have to do a lot of legwork on their own.

Trixie’s charitable intentions in this book make me smile, and it’s nice that all of the Bob-Whites have a hand in the story, though Di’s involvement is minimal. Mart, on the other hand, really has a chance to shine, showing a knack for photography and putting his botanical knowledge to work at the farm, which features a peculiar array of vegetation. He’s also his usual verbose self, and because he proves such an important member of Trixie’s sleuthing team this time around, he has even more opportunity than usual to show off his fancy vocabulary. “Indubitably,” “eschew,” “predilection,” “atrophied,” “soporific” and “syllogistics” are just a few extravagant words that he uses over the course of the book.

I’m not sure which Trixie book I will read next, but The Secret of the Unseen Treasure was an enjoyable way to dip my toes into the later portion of the series. While I’ve been warned about the inconsistent quality of the last 20-some books, I am still looking forward to finding more Trixie treasures.

Thursday, June 9, 2011

Spinelli and Dugan Make Tea Tantalizing in Tea Party Today

When Bethesdalily announced her Finer Things Write-Off, I knew I would want to participate, but I wasn’t sure what I would find to contribute. I rarely listen to audiobooks, and I’m afraid I’ve never had a taste for tea. However, I did enjoy “tea” parties when I was a child, even though the tea was actually Kool-Aid or juice, and I fondly remember my plastic Strawberry Shortcake tea set. I wonder what happened to it… Recalling my fondness for childhood tea parties made me think that the subject might have come up in picture books, and further investigation led me to several tea-related treasures. Perhaps the most charming of the bunch is Tea Party Today: Poems to Sip and Savor, a collection of poetry and tea party tips written by Eileen Spinelli and illustrated by Karen Dugan.

Spinelli opens with a page-long introduction detailing her history with tea sets and tea parties enjoyed in different setting and with company ranging from neighborhood friends to grandparents. Following that are 20 poems, each taking up one or two pages, though all of them are on the short side. Those that cover two pages do so mostly for the sake of illustration. For instance, Getting Ready is only twelve lines long, but it’s spread across two pages, a couple lines here, a couple there, interspersed with seven pictures of a cheerful Japanese girl preparing herself and her home for a tea party. The educational Tea Around the World has a single painting that stretches across two pages, featuring depictions of children from nine different countries serving tea. The longest poem in the book at 16 lines, it discusses tea traditions specific to certain nations.

Every poem ties in with a tip for children who want to host tea parties of their own. These are all simple and helpful; leafing through the book will provide plenty of good ideas. As a bookworm, I loved the suggestions of asking everyone to bring a poem to read at the tea party or having each guest say what literary character he or she would most like to invite to a tea party. One practical tip is to scour yard sales and second-hand stores for saucers and tea cups. Meanwhile, for this write-off, I thought the suggestion to forego a phone invitation and instead write one out by hand on fancy stationery and mail it was especially pertinent.

Although attending a tea party is more often seen as a feminine activity than a masculine one, Dugan takes care to include boys in her lively illustrations as often as she does girls, and the children also reflect a variety of cultures. She shows us the ill-tempered “teatime grouch” who’s building up to a terrible tantrum but also the serene lad in what is probably my favorite illustration. Accompanying the short poem Lakeside, the dark-skinned boy with glasses and short black hair sits with a mug of tea, smiling in contentment from his perch in a rowboat as a fish, two ducks and three dragonflies draw near. In addition to the children, we see quite a few animals, both real and plush, and adults sometimes join in the fun as well.

All of Spinelli’s poems rhyme and feature a simple rhythmic pattern that increases the poetic appeal for children. Her word choices are creative, but she also keeps them short, sticking almost exclusively to one- and two-syllable words. Meanwhile, most of the individual lines contain eight syllables or fewer. A parent and child might have fun reading these aloud to each other, and I think most children over seven or so would find few words to trip them up. Reading this book with another person is ideal because the tone is so interactive, and the readers can begin to make plans for a tea party together. Spinelli and Dugan demonstrate the incredible variety that tea parties have to offer, from setting and guests to theme and type of tea served. Even if you’ve never had much interest in attending a tea party, you might find your interest piqued after reading this creative and useful collection.

Kick Off the Summer with the Breezy That Thing You Do! Soundtrack

When I think of great summery bands, the Beach Boys tend to come to mind first, but not far behind them are the Wonders, the fictional quartet at the heart of the bubbly Tom Hanks film That Thing You Do! It’s not just the Wonders, actually; just about every song in that movie evokes a breezy, innocent feeling of sun-dappled days when even Erie, PA, my notoriously snowy hometown, is as bright and cheery as the California coastline. Because the Wonders are based in Erie, I can’t help feeling a surge of civic pride whenever I think of the movie, and when I hear the songs on its soundtrack, I make like Guy Patterson, the film’s central character, and start drumming on any object within my reach. That Thing You Do! inspires that kind of exuberance, and I have a feeling I’ll be listening to it a lot this summer.

Lovin’ You Lots and Lots - Performed by a phony group billed as the Norm Wooster Singers, this bouncy not-quite-two-minutes-long ditty was penned by Hanks himself. I’m especially fond of it in the movie because it accompanies the montage that introduces downtown Erie of the 1960s, but it’s a lot of fun on its own and sounds very much like an authentic song of the era. Hanks wanted to create a song that reflected the bubblegum flavor of so many early 60s hits, and from the string of cheesy metaphors and the repetitive chorus to the whistling and the innocuous instrumental accompaniment, I would say he succeeded. “You are the stars in the nighttime sky.  You are my girl, and I'm your guy.  You got me all tied up in knots, and I’m lovin’ you lots and lots, I’m just lovin’ you lots and lots, I’m lovin’ you lots and lots…”

That Thing You Do - This Adam Schlesinger-penned tune is the title song, the one that rockets the Wonders from Erie obscurity to nationwide fame as they hurtle their way to the West Coast on a tour of State Fairs. In the movie, we hear it in its original form, and it’s morose and whiny, but with the tempo dramatically sped up, it becomes an irresistible dance number. The phenomenon of depressing lyrics with a catchy beat is widespread throughout early pop-rock, so this song fits right in. The percussion makes all the difference here, and the voices scrambling to keep up with the beat can’t help catching the energy. Infectious rhymes, a snappy melody and just a twinge of lovelorn angst make this a surefire hit. “You doin’ that thing you do, breakin’ my heart into a million pieces like you always do. And you don’t mean to be cruel. You never even knew about the heartache I’ve been goin’ through…”

Little Wild One - Another very teeny-bopperish tune, this one written by David Gibbs, Steve Hurley, Phil Hurley and Fred Elringham. It’s a little funny to hear this immediately after That Thing You Do! Here, he seems to be doing the same thing that he’s accusing his girlfriend of in the previous song, and there’s certainly nothing remorseful in his tone. He just assumes that she will welcome him back with open arms when he gets tired of straying. Another song with a strong percussive base and some nice harmonies, and while the members of the Wonders are well past high school, it definitely captures the flavor of teenage melodrama. “With them, I feel like I’m wastin’ my time, while you make me feel like I’m losin’ my mind. Little wild one…”

Dance With Me Tonight - Written by Scott Rogness and Rick Elias, this song amuses me because Music and Lyrics, another fun film that pays peppy tribute to a musical era with instant retro classics, also has a song by this title. They sound completely different, of course, as that movie’s focus is the 1980s, but it makes me smile. The Wonders version is reminiscent of Twist and Shout and other songs in that vein. Pure innocuous get-your-feet-moving fun. “Tell your mama that you’re leavin’. Tell your daddy that we’re gone. Tell everyone in Philadelphia there’s a party goin’ on.”

All My Only Dreams - This mellow Wonders song, also by Rogness and Elias, is more of a solo showcase than a group effort, with the minimal harmonizing restricted mostly to the title line. The plaintive tone is just a shade shy of maudlin; this is a guy who cannot be with the woman he loves. While the precise reasons are unclear, great distances seem to separate them, judging by the imagery that reminds me of James Horner’s Somewhere Out There, the touching duet from An American Tail. A nice slow dance kind of song. “So every night I pray I’ll have you here one day. I’ll count the stars tonight and hope with all my might. And when I close my eyes, you’ll be right by my side.”

I Need You (That Thing You Do) - This mid-tempo Wonders song, written by Rogness and Elias with Linda Elias, plays over the credits and makes a nice sort of bookend to the main song. Again, there’s a bit of a pleading tone, though I’m not sure if we’re supposed to think it’s the same relationship being discussed. Either way, a nice track. “I could search around the world, only to find the only thing I need is you, right by my side.”

She Knows It - This electric-tinged song comes courtesy of The Heardsmen, the band formed by lead singer-songwriter Jimmy after the Wonders break up. I’m not sure when the song is supposed to have been released, but it sounds a bit more recent than the rest, perhaps late 1960s. Another one written by Rogness and Elias, it doesn’t appear in the movie. Enjoyable but not all that memorable. “It’s true, it might take a little while; I’ll be the one that makes her smile.”

Mr. Downtown - Sung by the invented Freddy Frederickson, a singer who is supposed to be past his prime at the time the Wonders are embarking upon their tour, this song was written by Hanks, Gary Goetzman and Mike Piccirillo. This brass-heavy song has a smarmy lounge quality to it and almost sounds like it could be the theme of a corny 50s spy show. Quite different from anything else on the soundtrack. “Under the waning moon is danger to be found for the man with the badge in the night, the man with the badge in the night. What's his name? Mr. Downtown…”

Hold My Hand, Hold My Heart - The Chantrillenes, a Supremes-like group who mingle with the Wonders during their tour, provide the only group song on the album featuring only female vocalists. This one is also written by Hanks, Goetzman and Piccirillo, and it’s my favorite of the non-Wonders songs, partly because whenever I hear it I picture the unnamed bass player, the quietest member of the Wonders, standing off to the side mimicking the ladies’ goofy hand motions. While the mental image the title line produces is a tad macabre, I find this peppy song charming. “I want you to say you’re thinkin’ of me those nights when we’re apart. I want you to know when you hold my hand, you hold my heart.”

Voyage Around the Moon - This song by the fictional band The Saturn 5 – the name of which is one of many homages in the movie to the space program, with which Hanks, fresh off of Apollo 13, was deeply preoccupied at the time – is a purely instrumental track. Written by Hanks, Goetzman and Piccirillo, it sounds to me like a cross between beach music and a James Bond theme song.

My World Is Over - Piccirillo has solo writer’s credit on my least favorite track on the album. Diane Dane, like Freddy Frederickson, is a lounge singer type teetering on obsolescence, and she has no qualms about hitting on young singers like Jimmy who are half her age. Simultaneously sultry and sulky, this brass-drenched torch song is repetitive and snoozy. Like the other songs on the album, it absolutely feels like it could have been a hit during its day, but my era is the 60s, and her style just isn’t my cup of tea. “Your love is gone, so for me, my world is over…”

Drive Faster - This is a curious song because it’s by the Vicksburgs, a band that only gets a passing mention a couple of times in the movie. Written by Rogness and Elias, it captures the fascination with fast cars that permeates so many summery songs of the 60s. Musically, the guitar-heavy song makes me think of Johnny B. Goode, while the subject matter reminds me of several Beach Boys songs. A bit of an oddity, but fun. “And let's drive drive drive til we get enough. We're gonna ride ride ride ‘til the sun comes up. Gotta feel that wind blowin' in her hair, and she's mine when I drive faster…”

Shrimp Shack - Written by Piccirillo, this song features the Wonders as Cap’n Geech and the Shrimp Shack Shooters, a ridiculous band in a cheesy Frankie and Annette-style beach movie. Pure frothy instrumental fun with percussion, keyboard and brass, it’s a get-up-and-toss-a-beach-ball-around kind of song that sounds almost as silly as it looks.

Time to Blow - Steve Tyrell and Robert F. Mann share writing credits on this jazzy piano and drums number attributed to Del Paxton, Guy’s personal hero. It’s the longest song on the album by more than a minute, which is rather funny since it’s so far removed from its predominant style. Still, it’s a nice nod to the way that musicians from different genres inspire each other. I’m not that much of a jazz aficionado, but it’s a pleasant song to listen to.

That Thing You Do! (live) - Time for the title song again, this time the version that the Wonders perform on The Hollywood Television Showcase, basically a fictionalized version of The Ed Sullivan Show that’s located in Los Angeles instead of New York. Pretty similar to the first version, but with lots of screeching from the crowds and an overall sense that everyone is overwhelmed by exuberance. The ideal way to end the album. “I know all the games you play, and I’m gonna find a way to let you know that you’ll be mine someday. ‘Cause we could be happy, can’t you see, if you’d only let me be the one to hold you and keep you here with me…”

Yes, this is an album consisting entirely of music from bands and singers who never existed. Yes, if these had been actual hits, it would have been 40-some years ago, not today. Yes, virtually every track is a sappy love song with an extra squirt of cheese. Does any of that bother me? Nope. That Thing You Do! is a perfect album to get my summer off to a chipper start, and the fact that I’m from the same city as the Wonders is just icing on the cake. Tom Hanks, I offer you my hearty thanks.

Sunday, June 5, 2011

Mo Willems Travels the World in You Can Never Find a Rickshaw When It Monsoons

“In the world of children’s books, the biggest new talent to emerge thus far in the '00s is the writer-illustrator Mo Willems.” This quote from The New York Times Book Review may seem a bit bold, but I’d have a hard time arguing with it. Willems, who has been lauded for his work on Sesame Street and his prolific output of high-quality books for the past decade or so, is a minimalistic genius with a knack for crafting stories that are at once hilarious and poignant. I’ve been consistently impressed with his abilities, so when my friend Libbie passed along the intriguing volume on which this quote functions as a back-cover blurb, I was eager to delve into the book and see what insights it might hold.

The book in question is You Can Never Find a Rickshaw When It Monsoons: The World on One Cartoon a Day. The hefty book documents the trip that Willems took in 1990, when he was a 22-year-old college graduate. With a notebook, a pen and a spare set of clothes, he set off for a year-long voyage, on the cheap and off the beaten path, a journey of self-discovery and cultural awareness. He didn’t follow a clear roadmap; his went with the flow and spent as much time sampling local flavor as he could, proudly wearing the badge of “traveler” rather than “tourist” – a distinction, he says in his introduction, made mostly by the fact that “travelers” do not buy T-shirts of the destinations they have visited.

Earlier this year, I tried to do the 365 Project, an online challenge to take and post a photo every single day for a year. I lasted little more than a month. How much more difficult would it be to manage a cartoon a day? Then again, while I am impressed with his diligence, I know that if I were to undertake such a monumental trek, I would want to have some record of it, and if you’re a skilled cartoonist, this seems like a natural way to do it. I don’t know if it ever occurred to him at the time that he might one day compile the results into a book; he describes the cartooning as “the ritual that held the trip together, gave it purpose, made it real.” Each day got one sketch and only one, and it’s funny to read his incredulous reflections on some of the cartoons, wondering why this was the moment from that day that he decided to capture. He stopped just short of 365 days, which is rather disappointing considering how close he came to a perfect year-long record, but maybe it’s fitting for a trip and a collection of cartoons that is decidedly off-beat.

Willems’ trip is an epic adventure. While I am impressed with his ritualistic discipline, what really wows me is his fearlessness in meandering from one country to the next, usually with no companions to guide him along his way. While Willems displays a talent for making new friends, and this must have made his trip considerably more pleasant than it might otherwise have been, there’s still a sense of isolation about his trek. This is his solo journey, and others just happen to come in and out of it from time to time. For me, a gal whose strongest literary identification has always been with Bilbo Baggins, the timid protagonist of J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit whose deep adventurous streak lay dormant for years before it burst forth, I found that reading this further stirred up my wild Took side, even though only a few of the stops on Willems’ itinerary are on my own must-see list.

Dave Barry provides a footnoted Foreword on the subject of travel that had me in gales of laughter as he describes the tedium of being a part of an official TWA tour and expounds upon his frustration with European toilets and tour guides who are too obsessed with flying buttresses. Willems’ introduction is quite amusing as well, though it also explains the circumstances of his trip quite effectively and includes some reflection upon how it impacted his life. He saves most of that, though, for the epilogue, in which he discusses how his trip forced him to see that the world may feel very big when he’s globe-trotting all year, but the sentiments about which the Sherman Brothers wrote have a basis in fact. People on the other side of the world are just as real as those in the United States, and he can no longer feel detached when he watches footage of disasters unfolding in some other part of the globe. The trip and his book, then, are largely lessons in empathy. While he sees the weird, the wacky, the wonderful things that make each place unique, he shows that even in the most remote locations, that shared humanity is very real.

Willems divides the book into sections of a month at a time, with each month’s entries preceded by a two-page spread of a map containing a list of countries he visited and a rough trail depicting his journey. He started and ended in the United States; in between, he visited England, Belgium, Holland, Luxembourg, France, Spain, West Germany, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Egypt, Pakistan, India, Nepal, Bangladesh, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Hong Kong, China, Macao, Japan and Canada. It seems he especially liked Thailand, as he spent well over a month there; other stops got short shrift, like Israel, which he left early after missing the bus to Jerusalem and deciding to hop a bus to Cairo instead. When he does return to America, it’s interesting to see him making his observations from an outsider’s point of view. After so much time away, it’s easy for him to look at the United States as foreign territory too, especially places he’s never been before.

Every cartoon in the book has a page to itself. Those who have come to appreciate Willems’ style from his children’s books will most likely recognize some similarities, particularly in his self-portraits, which have much in common with his illustrations of Trixie’s dad in the Knuffle Bunny books. The vast majority of the cartoons depict people, most of them random strangers doing something that struck him as unusual or funny. The drawings are full of bold lines and expressive faces, and each includes a caption noting the date, the location and the moment’s significance. Underneath most pictures is further explanation by Willems 15 years later. Some of these notes are illuminating, some poignant, and most have some element of humor to them.

For me, standouts include the following:
6-13 – “Perhaps they come standard with a third-class ticket, because never in my life have I taken a ferry trip that didn’t include at least one drunken Australian guitar player.”
7-13 – Willems marvels over the shallow chatter he overhears from a pair of American girls touring Dachau.
8-17 – A simple depiction of a raging monster with the caption “my tummy”.
9-19 – A self-portrait depicting his joy at receiving mail from his friends back home via the American Express office.
10-10 – Another self-portrait, this time showing Willems attempting to take a “shortcut” across a river in India.
11-22 – A despondent Frenchman searches for his lost puppy in Nepal.
12-24 – A description of the difficulties a traveler faces in finding decent reading material.
1-10 – A reflection on the joys of hitch-hiking in Malaysia.
2-18 – “Scarecrow traffic cops.”
3-17 – A Chinese version of Randy, the overly layered little brother in A Christmas Story.
4-18 – A kid trying really hard to get toss a ketchup packet into a bucket at a McDonald’s birthday party in New Mexico.
5-14 – The rather detailed account of Willems’ ordeal with a terrifying Canadian border guard.

This is not a children’s book. Willems depicts drugs, alcohol and various forms of debauchery. He discusses the devastating effects of wars and natural disasters. He occasionally draws people half-clothed or entirely naked. While he thanks his parents for giving him the travel bug from a young age and espouses the virtues of children exploring the world early, this volume contains his ruminations as a young adult and a more mature adult, and the intended audience is adults as well. That’s not to say that a child might not get something out of this, especially a teenager thinking of traveling abroad in the near future. However, I think most elementary-aged kids would find many of the pictures and explanations perplexing, and many parents would find them inappropriate. Because of Willems’ far-reaching popularity with youngsters and because this looks like a book that could be aimed at that age group, it’s best to be aware that this is a Willems book that deviates from the norm.

But oh, is it fascinating. I loved seeing his little slices of life and reading his observations on how the world has changed and how it hasn’t. I think the book provides great insight into how he thinks and offers hints about where he might have gotten ideas for some of his later stories. The book is witty, thought-provoking and compassionate, and in this way, it does have a great deal in common with the rest of Willems’ books. It’s an unusual exercise in immersion journalism that leaves the reader wanting to see the world but also more ready to find the remarkable in the everyday. As Willems says, “Whenever I want to roam free and experience the world again, all I have to do is open my front door and step outside. I know that the world will be there to meet me.” Wise words indeed. But I’m glad he decided to meet the world first.

Saturday, June 4, 2011

Show and Tell Causes a Crisis in Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity

In the thoroughly charming mixed-media Caldecott Honor picture book Knuffle Bunny, Mo Willems introduces readers to a fictionalized version of his family, at the heart of which is Trixie, a little blond-haired girl with a beloved stuffed bunny. In that book, she is a mere toddler too young to form thoughts into coherent words, which drives the minor disaster around which the plot revolves. In Knuffle Bunny Too: A Case of Mistaken Identity, Trixie is older and fully capable of comprehensible speech. She’s old enough to attend preschool, where a new Knuffle kerfuffle is about to unfold…

Trixie loves her Knuffle Bunny as much as she ever did. She is exceedingly proud of this well-worn toy that is beginning to look a bit like the Velveteen Rabbit. When she is allowed to bring him to school for Show and Tell, she can scarcely contain her excitement. Then disaster strikes. A classmate arrives with the exact same bunny! This is grounds for instant hatred. And you thought it was bad when two seniors wore the same dress to the prom! Trixie and Sonja are so incensed with each other that their teacher confiscates both bunnies, returning them later. The feud dissipates. But later that night, when Trixie is alone in her bed trying to snuggle her way into dreamland, she makes a traumatic discovery. She has the wrong bunny.

While accidental toy-switching is not something I have experienced, it seems like a very believable scenario, as does the fierce sense of jealousy and hurt pride that set up the circumstances under which the switch took place. Trixie is our protagonist, and most kids reading this book will probably have read the first installment already, so we see Sonja largely through her eyes. This means that initially, she doesn’t come across so well. In fact, she looks downright mean as she argues with Trixie about the correct pronunciation of “Knuffle” – perhaps a sly nod to existing debate by readers on this very topic.

As before, the backgrounds in the book are black-and-white photographs with occasional hand-drawn elements and color highlights. Set against a pale blue backdrop, the boxes pop on the pages, sometimes one large illustration, sometimes as many as three. They are populated with figures that have a flat look to them but nonetheless feel vibrant and full of personality. This is especially true of Knuffle Bunny himself, with his big black nose, buggy eyes and rotund middle, as well as Trixie and Sonja and their frazzled fathers.

In both books, we get a scene of Trixie’s dad frantically running somewhere to save the day for his darling daughter; in this book, it may be even funnier because Sonja and Trixie have more than just a bunny in common. Each girl has a dad who is willing to go above and beyond the call of duty to restore tranquility to his daughter. That’s not to say they rush into superhero mode without some grumbling, but the realization that both dads are undergoing major inconvenience only makes their actions more endearing.

One defining trait of Willems’ work is his minimalism. While the illustrations here are busier than in some of his books, capturing the hustle and bustle of New York City life, the story remains very simple, and he uses as few words as possible to tell it. Sometimes the picture does the talking all by itself, rendering the narration scarcely necessary, as when we first see Sonja with her bunny in a series of panels that zoom further in on him each time. As I look at these pages, I imagine a series of suspenseful violin shrieks such as one might find in a thriller. Meanwhile, placing Trixie directly upon the blue page instead of inside an illustration box accentuates the way her world has just been shaken.

As wonderful as the original book is, I would argue that Knuffle Bunny Too is even funnier and sweeter than the first, and while it’s loaded with kid appeal, much of the humor will probably resonate most strongly with parents. While a child might take away from the book a desire to use commonalities as a way to build friendships instead of rivalries, adults will also see it as a tribute to the crazy things parents will do for their kids – sacrifices that, in many cases, will sail right over the kids’ heads.

It’s odd to think of a book of this length having an epilogue, but setting the final two-page spread slightly apart from the rest just increases the impact of what’s probably my favorite bit of the story. It’s one of the parts that adults will probably appreciate most. They may also be quicker to pick up on Willems’ references to his own work throughout the book, including nods to Pigeon, star of several acclaimed tales, and Leonardo the Terrible Monster. But children who loved Knuffle Bunny will definitely want to pick up Knuffle Bunny Too, which is probably the most relatable of the trilogy, since the protagonist is old enough to be a peer this time and since it occurs under much more normal circumstances than the third book, which is equally entrancing. The presence of two Knuffle Bunnies may be problematic for Trixie and Sonja, but it sure is a treat for us.

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Eustace Joins His Cousins for High Seas Adventure in Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Back in 2005, Walden Media released The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, the first in a series of adaptations of C. S. Lewis’s classic seven-book fantasy series. Last year saw the release of the third installment, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which takes place roughly 1300 years Narnia time after the first installment and just a few short years after the second.

Lucy Pevensie (Georgie Henley), who was the first of her siblings to discover the magical world of Narnia and whose connection remains the strongest, returns with her brother Edmund (Skandar Keynes), this time via a painting instead of a wardrobe. The painting of a magnificent ship on the high seas hangs on the wall in the bedroom of their younger cousin Eustace Clarence Scrubb (Will Poulter), an insufferable prat who finds his cousins’ tales of Narnia tedious. While Lucy and Edmund are overjoyed to be whisked away to Narnia and revel in the reunion with several old friends, particularly the youthful King Caspian (Ben Barnes) and the valiant mouse Reepicheep (Simon Pegg), Eustace, swept up along with them, feels he has wandered into a nightmare from which he simply cannot awaken.

Michael Apted, new to the Narnia helm, directs this film, which has a rather episodic feel to it. While I’ve read Dawn Treader a couple of times, it’s been nearly a decade since the last time, and I decided to keep my memory fuzzy in order to avoid purist irritation as much as possible. The movie certainly does deviate from the book in several significant ways, but since there were several parts I didn’t remember too clearly, I wasn’t that focused on what was changed.

The movie does put added emphasis on Lucy’s awakening adolescence – mostly, it seems, for the purpose of incorporating Anna Popplewell as her older sister Susan. The film also adds a young stowaway who looks up to Lucy. There’s a decent message in there about being your own person and not living in the shadow of an older sibling; Edmund mirrors Lucy’s struggles to a lesser degree with Peter (William Moseley), who, like Susan, is not involved in the adventure but appears in a dream sequence.

Another prominent addition is a creepy green mist that follows Caspian and his crew everywhere. It reminds me of the Nothing in The Never-Ending Story, an evil force that sucks the life and joy out of everything it touches, but its effects are specific to each person, presenting dark temptations to otherwise virtuous characters. Its presence adds a prevalent sense of danger and, along with the search for the seven swords of the seven lords who sailed away from Narnia years earlier, serves as a glue holding the separate adventures together, but I’m not entirely sold on it.

What’s especially disappointing about the movie is how little involvement Aslan (Liam Neeson) has. Granted, the great lion always spends a majority of each novel out of sight, but his presence, or at least his absence, is always deeply felt. Here, one almost forgets about him for long stretches of time. When he appears, he makes an impression, but he does so very seldom, and a particularly powerful scene from the book gets such short shrift that you might almost blink and miss it in the midst of the epic sea battle with which the event alternates. While I was pleased with Aslan’s final appearance in the film and how much of his dialogue from the end of the book remained intact, I did not like how that crucial earlier scene played out.

The scene involves Eustace, who, despite all the movie’s special effects and rollicking adventure, is really the best thing the movie has going for it. Poulter is deliciously irritating as this stiff, disagreeable child who has petulance down to a fine art. Yet in the midst of his obnoxious behavior, one also can’t help feeling sorry for him. Practical Eustace, an intelligent young man with a mind for science, can’t wrap his head around the wonders before him. But does anybody bother to bring him up to speed? Not really. They make gentle jabs at his confusion and cowardice instead of taking the time to help him make the transition. Even Lucy, who I adore for her compassionate spirit, does little to put him at ease. He’s a sheltered, wimpy boy who’s been thrust into a world that doesn’t make sense full of people and creatures who don’t much like him. In the movie, he feels more like a vulnerable victim, and his lashing out feels more understandable.

One of my favorite elements of the movie is the use of Eustace’s diary as both narrative device and character exploration. We really get into his head here through his funny, eloquent journal entries, which Poulter reads with such fervor in voiceovers. I also loved the slow development of his relationship with Reepicheep, a character who is at once noble and comical. Eustace despises the sword-wielding rodent from the first, but the persistent Reepicheep gradually earns his respect and even friendship. Pegg brings the perfect balance of humor and depth to the voice work, and the mouse is well animated so that he seems very realistic.

The only trouble is that while Eustace’s transformation is as central to the film as to the book, in the movie it seems to come about mostly as a result of Reepicheep’s mentorship rather than Aslan. For the third time, the most compelling relationship in the movie is with one of the children and an unusual Narnian being – not with the lion who is central to the series and the only character to appear in all seven novels. First Tumnus, then Trumpkin and now Reepicheep steal the show. Moreover, while he does display annoying behavior, Eustace’s journey seems to be less one of letting go of self-centeredness and more one of embracing self-confidence. It changes the dynamic of his character and, again, lessens the emphasis on Aslan’s transformative power.

As with the previous installments, those who have read the books will find plenty to grumble about but also a lot to celebrate. While I don’t agree with all of the decisions made by Apted and screenwriters Christopher Markus, Stephen McFeely and Michael Petroni, I still found it an engaging adventure and was encouraged by the fact that the final moments foreshadow not one but two sequels. That those sequels will be made is not set in stone, but if the opportunity arises to visit Narnia on the big screen once again, you can bet I’ll be on board for the voyage.