Episode Transcript
[00:00:10] Speaker A: On this week's prequel episode, we follow up on our Hellraiser listener polls and preview quest for Camelot.
Hello, and welcome back to this film is Legend Pockets, where we talk about movies that are based off books. It's another prequel episode.
Normally I rush through this because we got so much to get to, but we don't actually have all that much to get to this week.
But there's not really any reason to dilly dally, so we're gonna jump. Actually, let's. Let's do this.
You can give feedback on this. We are gonna make a post about it.
Let us know if you would at all be interested in being involved in a Facebook group for this podcast.
[00:00:55] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:00:56] Speaker A: So I realized the other day that we have never had. We had. We don't have a Facebook group for this podcast. And for some reason I've never thought about it. We just have, like, our page for the actual podcast.
For some reason I've never thought about it, which is wild because I engage. It's like the only thing I do on Facebook is engage in Facebook groups with. From, like, podcasts and stuff that I listen to. It's literally the only reason I have Facebook.
[00:01:21] Speaker B: Yeah. I really. I mean, I'm not podcast. Podcast groups because I don't really listen to podcasts, but I pretty much only groups.
[00:01:28] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:01:28] Speaker B: Is all I do on Facebook now.
[00:01:30] Speaker A: And so I don't know why we hadn't thought about it until now, but we're probably gonna make it either way. But we just wanted to gauge some interest anyways and think that we were thinking, like, that may be a better avenue for getting more feedback on episodes and stuff like that. Because then it's. Yeah. Anyways.
[00:01:44] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:01:45] Speaker A: Well.
[00:01:45] Speaker B: And for some reason with, like, the feedback posts in particular, Facebook is like, like the. The. The reach that we get on those posts specifically is such trash that I. For some reason, Facebook is like. No.
[00:02:03] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:02:03] Speaker B: Every time.
[00:02:04] Speaker A: To the point where we're not even sure how, like, how much the lack of engagement on Facebook, specifically in regards to feedback is due to people not being, you know, not just not being interested in commenting versus nobody seeing those posts and just forgetting about it.
[00:02:17] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:17] Speaker A: Or whatever. So. Yeah.
[00:02:19] Speaker B: It's just like, not coming up in people's.
[00:02:22] Speaker A: Yeah.
So anyways, we're. We're. We're gonna look into that. Let us know. Like I said, you want to comment on this post. Episode or episode post or whatever on Patreon or Facebook or wherever you follow us and let us know.
Facebook would probably be the main place where we would do that, we engage with people on Patreon and stuff like that. But Facebook has the infrastructure set up for like groups like that, so we're probably gonna do that here in the coming weeks or so. Just wanted to mention that up top. So look out for that coming soon.
But as always, it's time for our patron shout outs. I put up with you because your father and mother were our finest patrons. That's why. No new patrons this week. But we do have our Academy Award winning patrons and they are Nicole Goble, Harpo Rat, Nathan Vic Apocalypse, Mathilde Cottonwood, Steve, Teresa Schwartz, Ian from Wine Country, Kelly Napier, Gratch Justgratch. Shelby says, help me raise money for Palestine with Arctic Fox copywriting on Instagram and that darn skag. Thank you all very much for your continued support. We really appreciate it. Katie, it's time to see what the people had to say about Hellraiser.
Yeah, well, you know, that's just like your opinion, man.
[00:03:40] Speaker B: All right.
On Patreon, we had three votes for the book and zero for the movie.
We had one comment from Kelly Napier, who said, I find it interesting that Clive Barker wrote a book, decided to turn that book into a movie, decided to write and direct the movie himself so it would truly encapsulate his vision and yet changed so many things from the book.
Did he dislike what he wrote that much?
[00:04:10] Speaker A: It is interesting, considering that was the whole point.
[00:04:13] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:13] Speaker A: Of doing it. Of him directing.
[00:04:15] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:15] Speaker A: Well, to be fair, it wasn't so much that. It was. So much was changed as that was that on previous adaptations, he just didn't like how they came out, so.
[00:04:22] Speaker B: But yes, personally, I liked it better in the book that Kirsty was Rory's lover and not his daughter.
And Rory is a much better name than Larry.
Although for the first little bit of the book, I didn't realize Rory was a boy. Must be all the Gilmore Girls I've watched over the years.
[00:04:40] Speaker A: That is her name.
[00:04:41] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:04:42] Speaker A: That's funny because I always.
I. For me, Rory is a dude because of Doctor who, but.
But yeah, I forgot. Yeah. And Gilmore Girls. She is Rory.
[00:04:52] Speaker B: I like reading horror books over watching horror movies because the images in my head are always more grotesque and scary than what ends up being shown on screen.
I could really imagine Frank being stuck halfway between this world and another one and him slowly coming back into form with each murder Julia commits on his behalf.
I thought that the movie made him fully formed with too much power too soon.
[00:05:15] Speaker A: I assume the reason they did that in the movie is they got him to full walking around dude status pretty quickly so that they didn't have to keep doing a little puppet or right. Or. Or like a. I don't know how they did, like, the part where he was like a little skeleton corpse flopping around or whatever. If they had somebody who had, like, their limbs amputated, I have no idea.
But my guess would be that they. Yeah, like, for practical purposes and just for him to be more of an interesting, like, involved character in a book, it's easy. You can just, you know, he can. You can show or say, you know, describe all of that and let people imagine it, but in the movie you actually have to do it. So, yeah, I think that was probably a practical choice to make him kind of be fully formed enough to be walking around, like, almost immediately.
[00:06:06] Speaker B: I also liked in the book how we got more background about who the order of the gash is and what Rory.
Larry, I think maybe Frank was looking for when he summoned them. Initially, it felt rushed in the movie.
The one detail I did appreciate in the movie was that when Larry was Larry, his eyes were blue and when Frank was Larry, his eyes were brown. What a clever thing to include.
[00:06:33] Speaker A: I did not notice that.
[00:06:34] Speaker B: That is cool, though.
[00:06:35] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:06:37] Speaker B: They could have left everyone being British because England just naturally gives creepy horror vibes.
[00:06:43] Speaker A: Absolutely no reason to change it.
[00:06:47] Speaker B: Clive Barker has always been a favorite author of mine and this novella did not disappoint the high standard. I hold him to a plus work 9 out of 10, 2 very enthusiastic thumbs up. The book gets my vote.
[00:07:00] Speaker A: Thank you.
Kelly.
[00:07:02] Speaker B: Over on Facebook, we had three votes for the book and zero for the movie.
We had a comment from Warren who said I had to choose the book. I was super excited to see you covering Clive Barker. I've been fascinated with Hellraiser since I worked in an autograph shop that had Doug. Doug Bradley come in to do an in store signing and picked the movie up on video, vhs to find out what his role was.
[00:07:28] Speaker A: He's Pinhead.
[00:07:29] Speaker B: Mm.
[00:07:30] Speaker A: Just for people who weren't aware, Doug Bradley plays Pinhead.
[00:07:34] Speaker B: The book was.
[00:07:34] Speaker A: I love the idea, though, of an autograph shop.
[00:07:37] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:07:38] Speaker A: Not a. Not a card shop or a memorabilia shop, specifically an autograph shop maybe meant a memorabilia shop. And just. But I was like. I wanted. I'm interested to know, Warren, if there was.
If it was literally like. The point was we sell famous people's autographs or if it was a broader memorabilia shop that also had, like, autographs. You know what I mean? This is interesting. I'VE never heard of an autograph shop specifically.
[00:08:04] Speaker B: Yeah, me either.
The book was always going to win for me as Clive's writing just hits me in a special way. I can only call it art for lack of a better term.
And like you said, the film seems to misunderstand the characters. Though I don't fully blame Barker for this as it seems to be an issue with some of his other adaptations like Nightbreed too, where the money people don't understand how the monsters aren't the bad guys so they sort of get forced in that role with Barker trying to push back.
[00:08:35] Speaker A: I will say for this movie from what I have read and seemed to find is that that wasn't the case with this. That seemingly most of if not all of the changes other than like the England thing were Barker's choices or you know, not like studio led choices. I read somewhere on a Reddit post or something because somebody was asking specific I it was specifically in relation to the ending and the Cenobites becoming the final villain that that Kirsty has to defeat and somebody was talking about how it kind of undercuts the point of the movie and somebody had speculated like oh I think it that was probably like a studio change or something or something to do with them and the studio gave him more money and they came in at the end or whatever, blah blah. And somebody in that thread and now this is one comment on Reddit, so take it with as much salt as you should, but that person said that they had read an early version of the script that was written before the like prior to production that had that ending in it. And so it seemed to them potentially they were pushing back on the idea that that was a studio mandate and was in fact what Barker wanted to do.
They're saying that that was Barker's choice. Potentially. Potentially. Again, I it was one Reddit comment that I found.
[00:09:57] Speaker B: So yeah, getting back to Warren's comment, creative issues do seem to be why he hasn't directed much. I remember hearing an interview with him saying something along the lines of why bother fighting to get something made with other people who don't understand and waste two years of my life when I can just sit and write something interesting.
[00:10:19] Speaker A: I wonder if a later that experience of directing, I wonder if that came from later in life and when he had maybe directed a couple more things.
Because again, from seemingly the comments I read about him directing this movie, he had very positive things to say about the experience of directing this movie.
But it's also, who knows, maybe that those Comments were taken out of context and he did have broader negative feelings about it. And maybe there was more studio pushback or micromanagement than it seemed like, who knows.
But that was part of the whole concept. The whole idea of making this specific movie was that he could make it cheap enough that he as a first time director could make it without a ton of studio oversight and input and that sort of thing. And he could make the movie he wanted to make.
[00:11:10] Speaker B: Instead, it seems he's had better prospects just having other people make movies based off his works.
Candyman, Midnight Meat Train and Dread are three I'd recommend that hot take might be contenders for better than the book.
[00:11:25] Speaker A: Interesting. I've heard Candyman's good. I've never actually heard of the other two. Yeah, but Candyman is a. Is kind of a classic of Horse.
[00:11:33] Speaker B: Yeah, I've heard Candyman's good. I've never seen it.
[00:11:35] Speaker A: I haven't seen it.
[00:11:36] Speaker B: Midnight Meat Train is a hell of a hell of a title of a title.
As for the Hellraiser series itself, I recommend watching the first four they tell and complete a whole story together.
Sadly, Kirstie does not become one of the Cenobites, though in the comics they do run with that idea.
[00:11:56] Speaker A: Say sadly, I'm not sure.
Based on this first movie, I'm not sure I left it going. Man, I hope she becomes a Cenobite one day.
But.
[00:12:07] Speaker B: Originally at the end of Hellraiser 2, Julia was to take over as the new Pinhead, but the actress was wasn't interested, which is a shame.
[00:12:16] Speaker A: That's interesting.
[00:12:17] Speaker B: From 5 onwards, the films become standalone adventures and the Cenobites change to being figures that punish the wicked and the whole thing is more morality tales. One day I hope we get a version of the Cenobites closer to the book version. I was surprised you didn't mention much on the difference between the Cenobites from book to film.
The recent remake has versions closer to the book, but I feel they miss the beauty and the grotesque. For lack of a better term.
[00:12:44] Speaker A: I would agree with that is in particular, I remember thinking when I was reading about before having seen anything of the movie and having watched a trailer or anything, I think the only Cenobite that I was aware of was Pinhead that I had seen. I knew there were other ones, but I think the only one I had visually seen was Pinhead. And so I was reading stuff about the movie and reading about the whatever. I don't remember her name, but the female one who in the movie has like all that Metal stuff on her face, and then her neck is, like, splayed open in a way that is very reminiscent of, like, a vagina.
[00:13:25] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:13:25] Speaker A: But I was expecting her to be sexier.
Not like, you know, but just, like, based on the descriptions of the movie and stuff I was reading and about how it was like, yeah, the Cenobites were kind of these incarnations of, like, you know, like, pure, like, hedonism and stuff like that. And just my thought was, like, oh, she's gonna look like the.
The Borg Queen from. From Star Trek Insurrection or whatever.
And I was kind of surprised at how ugly they all were, other than Pinhead, who's kind of just a dude with pins in his head.
And I think this kind of speaks to what he's talking about. They don't really have, like, a hideous beauty. They're just kind of hideous in movie, at least. And from what I've seen of the remake, because I did watch that trailer because I was curious, they definitely lean more into, like, the being somewhere, but, like, this weird amalgamation of, like, hideous and beautiful and horrifying and sexy kind of thing.
There was also a bunch of.
I say, a bunch of controversy, a bunch of fake, stupid controversy when the remake came out because they cast a trans woman as, oh, Pinhead in that.
Which is interesting in a lot of different ways. But, yeah, yeah.
[00:14:47] Speaker B: Side note, the Scarlet Gospels, the sequel book is definitely more like a sequel to the movies than to the Hellbound Heart. And, yes, Poe is a big influence on Barker.
Hope that's not too long a rant. Love the show. Even if I forget to comment most episodes. All the best.
[00:15:05] Speaker A: You're not alone. A lot of people forgot this week, but thank you.
[00:15:11] Speaker B: Our other comment on Facebook was from Paige, who said, I don't have an opinion on either the book or the movie, which greatly upsets me. My to read and to watch pile is extensive, and the overwhelm is real.
However, I do have an opinion on Clive Barker. I met him one year at a horror Con, and that man was the sweetest guy I've ever met. He had a whole tent set up around him because he was selling exclusive art he made as well. And the mind on this man made me want to stay and just ask him questions. He genuinely seems so thrilled to know that people are fans of his work, whether it was his books, movies, or artwork. I'm so glad I went to that convention that year. Meeting him and Tony Todd became a core memory of mine that I'll hold dear for the rest of my life.
[00:15:58] Speaker A: That's very cool. Tony Todd is Candyman. Oh, among other things. He's been in lots of stuff over the years. You would recognize him if you don't. If the name doesn't ring a bell.
[00:16:06] Speaker B: Yeah, the name does not ring a bell.
[00:16:07] Speaker A: You would recognize. He just passed away recently. He was in the Candyman remake. I think it was like, his final role. He had, like, stomach cancer or something.
He was.
I think he was like, 70. But this guy, Tony Todd, he's in. Oh, you would recognize that guy. He's been in all kinds of movies and his small roles and stuff, but he's the. He was the Candyman. And. Yeah, I think I'm like 99. 99.
[00:16:32] Speaker B: That would be embarrassing if he never actually. Candyman at this point.
[00:16:36] Speaker A: He. He is. He's also in all the Final Destination movies, apparently, which that I was not aware of.
[00:16:41] Speaker B: I've never seen a single Final Destination movie.
[00:16:45] Speaker A: He is the Candyman. Okay. I was like, I've. Yeah, I haven't either. I've just.
[00:16:49] Speaker B: I'm aware of, like, some of the, like, memes and tropes, but I've never actually watched one.
[00:16:54] Speaker A: Yeah.
Yep. But no, that's cool to hear about. Clive Parker. I never know with these.
[00:17:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:17:02] Speaker A: Could always go one of two ways.
[00:17:06] Speaker B: Over on Instagram, we had three votes for the book, two for the movie, and one listener who couldn't decide. And we did get a message from Tim Wahoo.
[00:17:15] Speaker A: It's a real comment.
[00:17:17] Speaker B: Who said, I like Hellraiser two More fair. Did not elaborate on that, but it's fine.
[00:17:23] Speaker A: We'll take it now.
[00:17:24] Speaker B: Now we know Tim Wahoo's opinion on the Hell Raiden series.
I know we were all dying to know.
And then over on Goodreads, we had one vote for the book, zero for the movie, and Mikko said, I'm just gonna agree with everything you said and give my vote to the book.
[00:17:45] Speaker A: Love it.
[00:17:47] Speaker B: Now I'm interested to see how the rest 10 or so movies go.
I suspect that the Cenobites quickly become very generic monsters as the series progresses.
[00:17:56] Speaker A: That's what it sounded like based on. Was it Warren's comment earlier? Yeah, that. That is kind of what happens.
I actually would be inclined to at least watch the next two. Three. Whatever.
[00:18:07] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:18:08] Speaker A: To get to wherever that. That story finishes. We'll have to do that next year for Halloween, but to wherever the. Like. I think it was. Warren said the first four movies.
[00:18:16] Speaker B: Yeah, I think the first four, because.
[00:18:19] Speaker A: Yeah, I would be interested to see where that goes because it was interesting. After this. I enjoyed this movie enough to watch the sequel.
Sequels, I guess.
[00:18:30] Speaker B: So. Our winner this week was the book. And a landslide.
[00:18:33] Speaker A: Wow.
[00:18:34] Speaker B: With nine votes to the movie's two, plus our one listener who couldn't decide.
[00:18:39] Speaker A: I don't know if I would have guessed that, but that's interesting.
[00:18:41] Speaker B: I don't think I would have guessed that.
[00:18:43] Speaker A: All right, that's it for our listener feedback. Thank you all very much for all your comments. If you missed out on that, too bad. You gotta make sure you get those comments on time.
Katie. It's time now to preview the King's Damsel by Vera Chapman.
In an age of great hopes and daring dreams, one day I will be a knight like Father. Yes. When you're old enough, Kaylee.
A brave quest. Camelot is about to begin. I want to go on grand adventures. I want to go to Camelot. Warner Brothers Family Entertainment presents Quest for Camelot did you figure out how to pronounce this?
[00:19:28] Speaker B: I did not find.
So what I found was that.
So it's spelled D, A M O S E L.
And what I found was that that is an archaic spelling of damsel. Okay, so I think the damsel. So I think the play is to just pronounce it damsel, even though every time I look at it, my brain goes Damocell.
[00:19:54] Speaker A: Yeah. Damsel. The King's Damsel.
[00:19:56] Speaker B: Yeah. The King's Damsel is a 1976 fantasy novel by British author Vera Chapman.
It is part of the Three Damsels trilogy, along with her other books, the Green Knight and King Arthur's Daughter.
[00:20:12] Speaker A: And interestingly, it looked like, from what I was reading. Reading that it's.
Oh, you have this later. Well, that. It was the second one.
[00:20:19] Speaker B: Yeah. It's like the middle one.
[00:20:21] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:20:23] Speaker B: The novel is based on Arthurian legend. It follows the story of Lynette, a character who appears in multiple Arthurian tales after she saves her sister Leone from the Red Knight, covering the events of the original legends as a series of flashbacks and vastly expanding on Lynette's character.
And those were all of the book facts that I had.
But since we don't have a ton of book facts, here are a few additional fun facts about the author, which.
[00:20:52] Speaker A: There also weren't quite enough of to.
[00:20:53] Speaker B: Do a lot of.
Not quite enough of to warrant its own segment. But together, we almost have a full segment here, almost.
So Vera Chapman was a British author and founding member of the Tolkien Society.
[00:21:08] Speaker A: I saw all this on her Wikipedia. I was like, this is amazing.
[00:21:11] Speaker B: Yeah. Within which she also went by the Name. Belladonna Tuke.
[00:21:16] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:21:18] Speaker B: She was also one of the first women to graduate from Oxford University as a full member, which is cool.
She was also a member of the Neopagan group, the Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids, in which she held the title of Pendragon, whatever that means.
[00:21:36] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:21:39] Speaker B: And final fun fact. Chapman published her first book, the green knight, in 1975 at age 77.
[00:21:48] Speaker A: Oh, wow.
[00:21:49] Speaker B: Yes. And she continued to write and publish until her death in 1996 at I believe, age 98. Wow. So it is truly. It is never too late.
[00:22:00] Speaker A: It's never too late.
[00:22:01] Speaker B: Never too late.
[00:22:01] Speaker A: 77. That's impressive.
That is. That's. That's. She published her first book, Past the Age, like the average life expectancy of most.
[00:22:10] Speaker B: No kidding.
[00:22:11] Speaker A: So good for her.
All right, that was a little bit of a preview of the King's damsel. Let's learn now a little bit about the film Quest for Camelot.
A story of wizardry and wonder, rebels and romance. Danger, an enchanted dime. Excalibur has given us the strength to stand together against all injustice.
[00:22:38] Speaker B: Attack.
It's taken.
[00:22:41] Speaker A: Excalibur. Hey, who turned out the knights?
A dark knight. They should get a doorbell. No, they should get a new door. Arthur and his kingdom will be mine.
Quest for Camelot is a 1998 film directed by Frederick Duchau, known for Racing Stripes, Underdog.
It's not called Bollywood. I wrote that on there. Wrong.
It had a different name. But anyways, animator. Oh, and then he was also an animator on Tailspin, Tom and Jerry, the movie, and the Land Before Time three. I believe he was the director of animation on that one. The film was written by Frank d', Amico, known for both of the crude movies.
The Ruby Gilman, Teenage Kraken movie, which came out recently. I heard it was pretty good.
[00:23:27] Speaker B: Yeah, I heard that was good.
[00:23:28] Speaker A: And Space Chimps, among other things.
Also co written by William Shifrin, known for Tough Puppy, Shaggy and Scooby.
Shaggy and Scooby Doo. Get a Clue, which is a TV show. Most of these are TV shows. He wrote episodes of the Fairly Odd Parents. Ah, Real Monsters. And an episode of Frasier, which I thought was really interesting.
And then two more co writers.
Jacqueline Feather, who worked on wrote on the animated the King and I movie.
And then David Seidler, who wrote the King Speech, won an Oscar for the King Speech, also wrote on the Young and the Restless, the animated the King and I. And as I went through there, further back through the catalog, I realized that Seidler and Feather were co writers, like writing team, because they were married. I found out up until 2008. They literally got divorced right before David wrote the King's Speech and won his Oscar.
[00:24:22] Speaker B: No.
[00:24:22] Speaker A: So maybe she was holding him back.
[00:24:24] Speaker B: She was holding him down.
[00:24:26] Speaker A: To be fair, he didn't do anything else after that. That I really. That was like anything particularly big. And the King's Speech is kind of in movie circles, considered one of the lesser best Oscar winners.
[00:24:37] Speaker B: But you want to know something extremely unsurprising about that movie?
Your mom loves it, My mom loves it.
I love you, Mom.
[00:24:47] Speaker A: I liked it when I saw it. I saw it in theaters when it came out and I remember liking it, but I don't remember anything else about it. I remember going, oh, that was interesting. That was good. But yeah, I haven't revisited it, so. But it's one of those that has kind of like cinephiles are like, not the best Best picture winner or whatever. The film stars Jessalyn Gilsig, Carrie Ellis, Gary Oldman, Eric Idle, Don Rickles, Jane Seymour, Pierce Brosnan, Bronson Pinchot, Jaleel White, Gabriel Byrne and John Gielgood, among others.
It is a crazy cast. It is a stacked cast indeed.
It has a 43% on Rotten Tomatoes, a 50 on Metacritic, and a 6.3 out of 10 on IMDb. It made 38.1 million against a budget of 40 million.
Very big flop. It was nominated for one Oscar for Best Music Original Song for the song the Prayer, which was performed by Celine Dion. And it did win the Golden Globe for the same category.
So the Quest for Camelot was announced in May of 1995 as Warner Brothers Feature Animation's very first project.
Elizabeth Chandler, who was the co writer on A Little Princess, which we've done, was the first screenwriter attached to the project before eventually she was replaced by Kirk d', Amico, who I mentioned earlier.
The film was briefly delayed in the fall of 1995 when the animators working on the film had to be reassigned to finish Space Jam, which is another concurrent project coming out of Warner Brothers at the time.
In April of 1996, Christopher Reeve was cast as King Arthur. We'll get more to why he wasn't King Arthur eventually or later.
So the original plan for the film was a much darker in tone and much more similar to animated projects like Ralph Bakshi's Wizards. That was a specific reference that Bill and Sue, that Bill Croyer, specifically, who I'm going to talk about here in a second, was Reference wanted to reference when he was making this project. But following the success of the Disney renaissance, the studio decided, actually, we got to change this to be much more like, more kid friendly, add music to it, make it more like the successful Disney movies that are coming out during this time period.
And at that time, they also changed the object of the quest from the Holy Grail to Excalibur due to all of these changes.
Bill and Sue Croyer of FernGully fame. Bill Croyer directed and wrote FernGully and I believe Sue Croyer was a producer on it who had been attached to the film as co director and producer respectively, left to the project when Kroyer left several. Several other animators also left the project. And it's. From what I've been reading here, it was hard to tell how much of this was people quitting versus people being fired. We'll get to that here in a second with some quotes.
But Frank Gladstone, who was the film's initial producer, was also one of the people that left the project.
Effects supervisor Michael Gagne said, quote, people were giving up. The head of layout was kicked out. The head of background, executive producer, the producer, the director, the associate producer, all the heads rolled. It's kind of. It's kind of a hard environment to work in.
And so that. That was why I thought it was interesting that.
Because even within that quote, he said people were giving up, the head of layout was kicked out, the blah, blah, blah. All these people were kicked out, all the heads rolled. It's like mixed language in there of like, were people quitting or were people being.
[00:28:15] Speaker B: Probably a little bit.
[00:28:15] Speaker A: Probably both, yeah. Eventually Duxiao, who I mentioned earlier as the film's director, was promoted to be the soldier director because initially it was announced that him and Kroyer were going to co direct and Christopher Reeve was replaced by Pierce Brosnan because he was unable to re record some lines or something after some changes were made.
I thought it was related to his accident, but it wasn't because he actually got cast after his accident. So in Animation Magazine, the lead animator of the character, Garrett, who is Carrie Elwes's character in the movie Crystal, said, quote, it was top heavy. All the executives were happily running around and playing executive, getting corner offices, but very few of them had any concept about animation at all, about doing an animated film. It never occurred to anybody at the top that they had to start from the bottom and build that up. Their problems were really coming at the inexperience of everyone involved. Those were people from Disney that had the idea that you just said, do it and it gets done, it never occurred to them that it got done because Disney had an infrastructure in place working like clockwork.
We didn't have that end quote.
[00:29:20] Speaker B: Woof.
[00:29:22] Speaker A: So the movie ultimately came in way over budget, was a huge nightmare. Yeah. From everything I've read, as mentioned earlier, the song the Prayer, and this is IMDb getting into like two IMDb trivia facts before we get to some reviews. The song the Prayer was performed by Celine Dion in English, but in the Italian version, Andrea Bocelli, who was a very famous like. Like Italian tenor, performed the song. And now a duet that features both of them is probably the most well known version of the song because Celine Dion released it. Re released that version on her 1998 Christmas album, which is both her and the Italian guy singing it together.
Another random little fun fact. There's apparently a scantily clad girl who appears briefly during Devin and Cornwall's song.
And that character is Red Hot Riding Hood, who's a character from Red Hot riding hood, a 1943 Metro Gold Mayer cartoon.
[00:30:19] Speaker B: Oh, interesting.
[00:30:20] Speaker A: She's also in several other MGM cartoons from that time period. I looked at that scene to try to find, like, what they were talking about. I couldn't see it in, like on the YouTube version. Maybe it's not the whole scene or something, I don't know.
[00:30:31] Speaker B: But interesting Easter egg.
[00:30:32] Speaker A: Yeah. And apparently they just threw a cartoon character from MGM cartoons from the 40s in there. Finally getting to some reviews, Owen Gliberman for Entertainment Weekly wrote, quote, the images are playful and serviceably lush, but the story and characters might have come out of a screenwriting software program. And the so sung by Celine Dion and Steve Perry, among others, are Vegas pop wallpaper. End quote.
David Kroenke for the LA Times described the film as, quote, formulaic, saying it was a nearly perfect reflection of troubling trends in animated features.
He said that Kaylee was a standard issue, spunky female heroine, and Garrett's blindness is the one adventurous element to the film. But even it seems calculated, his lack of sight is hardly debilitating. It still provides kids a lesson in acceptance. End quote.
That's a weird review. I don't know if I agree with this guy. Seems weird. I don't know if I like him.
Seems like he was like this movie's woke.
Maybe that's kind of what it feels like without, in not so many words, I don't know for real views. James Bertinelli wrote, quote, that the film was dull uninspired and worst of all, characterized by artwork that could charitably be called unimpressive.
Stephen Holden for the New York Times said, quote, coming on the heels of 20th Century Fox's lush but silly Anastasia, a much better film than this one. That's his parenthetical quest for Camelot suggests that Disney still owns the artistic franchise on animated features. End quote.
Kevin J. Hardy in his collection of essays titled Cinema Arthuriana, which I assume is movies about King Arthur, says the film is, quote, slightly indebted to, rather than as Warner public, as Warner publicity claims, actually based on Chapman's novel.
So the film is, quote, slightly indebted to, rather than, as Warner publicity claims, actually based on Chapman's novel. So he's saying not much of a adaptation, much more of a loosely inspired.
[00:32:36] Speaker B: By I I knew it was purported to be loosely inspired.
[00:32:40] Speaker A: Okay, so for the San Francisco Chronicle, Peter Stack said that the film is, quote, a spirited adventure with generous romantic and comic charms that aims to please a range of ages, with loopy gags, corny romance in an oversized villain, and catchy tunes performed by Celine Dion and LeAnn Rimes, among others. So maybe a positive review there for Variety. Joe Lydon said that the film was, quote, a lightweight but likable fantasy that offers a playful feminist twist tar Thurian legends, and said, quote, the animation, though not quite up to Disney standards, is impressive enough on its own terms to dazzle the eye and serve the story.
And finally I had to go find Ebert's review on his website, which I and then I I should do this more often because I get to take more of the review because Wikipedia usually throws like one sentence in there. Yeah, when I go to this thing, I can actually like pull a bunch of pull quotes out.
Ebert gave the film two out of four stars, saying, quote, the animation isn't vivid, the characters aren't very interesting, and the songs are routine. Qu Quest for Camelot, like so many animated features, is a template onto which superficially new characters are plugged. I'm not putting the formula down. Done. Well, it can work, and some version of these ingredients now seems to be required in all feature length animated films. But Quest for Camelot does a fuzzy job of clearly introducing and establishing its characters and makes them types, not individuals. Will kids like it? I don't know. I saw it in a theater filled with kids and didn't hear or sense the kind of enthusiasm that good animation can inspire. The movie's underlying formula is so familiar that there's use bothering with a retread unless you have compelling characters and good songs. Enormous resources went into the making of this film. But why hasn't there. But why wasn't there more stretching and creativity at the screenplay level? Why work so hard on the animation and run the plot on autopilot? End quote. So Ebert was not largely impressed, but not not also not terrible. 22 out of 4 stars isn't the worst review in the world.
As always, you can do us a favor by heading over to Facebook, threads, Instagram, Blue Sky, Goodreads, any of those places. Interact. We'd love to hear from you. You can also check us out on Patreon.com this film is lit and drop us a nice little rating and a review on any of the platforms. You listen to us, Katie. Where can people watch Quest for Camelot?
[00:34:51] Speaker B: As always, you can check with your local library. We did procure a DVD copy.
[00:34:57] Speaker A: Sweet.
[00:34:57] Speaker B: Of this movie from our library.
[00:35:00] Speaker A: We'll see. We'll try it if it works. It was so often the DVDs we get just do not work. But.
[00:35:06] Speaker B: Or if you have a local video rental store, you can check with them.
Otherwise you can stream this for free through Hoopla. So if your library has access to Hoopla, which ours unfortunately does not, you can do that. Or you can rent it for around $4 through Amazon, YouTube, Apple TV or Fandango at home.
[00:35:30] Speaker A: Sweet.
The the Main Thing I'm excited. I normally say I'm excited. This time I don't know how I'm excited. I am. But I will say this. I'm excited to see if this is a movie. I remember.
That's my main thing. I'm so interested to see if, like, as we talked about at the end of the last episode of Like, Man, I feel like I might remember this movie. But maybe I won't. I have no idea.
[00:35:52] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm pretty sure I've never seen this movie.
I think I would remember, like something about it if I did, if I had.
But I am interested because most of what I have left, like, seen and read of it, leads me to suspect that it's not going to be very good.
[00:36:10] Speaker A: Yeah, that's what it seems.
[00:36:12] Speaker B: So I am interested to see if it's like, not good in kind of a fun way or in an interesting way, or if it's just kind of boring.
[00:36:21] Speaker A: Yeah, we shall see.
That'll be in one week's time. Come on a journey. Let us know. You know we're gonna all find out together if this movie is boring or not. But until that time, guys, gals not binary pals and everybody else keep reading books, keep watching movies and keep being awesome.
