TOM AND JERRY DVD/VHS

Tom & Jerry - The Fast & The Furry

Available on: DVD
Availabity: In Stores
Release Date: 2005
Release Location: US

Contents:

75 Minutes

Sound Effects Featurette
Race to the Finish Set-Top Game
Trailers

My Opinion:

Okay first off, can I say that it's awesome that Joseph Barbera wrote the story and executive produced...but some how that can't save this cartoon...sigh

This starts off with the usual cat and mouse chase...no real reason behind it, but the mass destruction and mindless mayhem brought out some good laughs from me. After the extended chase sequence that resulted in the TOTAL annihilation of the human lady's home Tom and Jerry are living in, the duo gets kicked out. As Tom and Jerry leave the smoldering premises, they both catch a commercial for the The Fabulous Super Race show with a richly grand prize. Both cat and mouse race (ha ha) to the junkyard and piece together their race cars to be contestants. Once completed they make their way to the studio to enter the contest, via a few nods to Pee Wee's Big Adventure's studio end scenes.

Next up, we are introduced to the racers, a madcap group of wacky racers...you see what I did there. So anyway, this is pretty much an updated sort of wacky racers that just happen to have Tom and Jerry. The race starts in Hollywood with the race supposedly ending in Mexico. However, with Tom and Jerry's constantly trying to kill each other, the race's TV ratings are through the roof so the Powers That Be decide to extend the race into different stages around the world. So with each "stage" of the race we start losing racers which is good because with the 6 total racers at the start there really wasn't much screen time for our favorite duo. So finally half way through the movie, in the Antarctic stage we are down to just Tom and Jerry and the next stage is in Australia.

As Tom and Jerry race start up the next stage Australia another racer manages to catch up, and the next stage is run where the other racer manages to die (yes, you read that correctly) so now we are back with just Tom and Jerry. The producer/director of this race tells his assistant that the public is getting bored with the race and will soon tune out so the race must be sped up. So it is decided that once this leg of the race is complete that Tom and Jerry must make it to the finish line in 5 minutes. So into jets they go and fly across the globe destroying everything in their path. The duo manage to cross the finish line at the same time winning the million dollar prize.

Hurray! Tom and Jerry win, but it's short lived as the lady from the beginning of the movie barges in to mansion that Tom and Jerry live in now and demands that it's hers since Tom and Jerry destroyed her other one. So the chase is on again and more destruction as the credits roll.

The Good:
There a some pretty good laugh out loud moments, but they are few and far between. The most laughs, for me are in the first seven minutes and that's about it.

The Bad:
This is like a 7 minute cartoon stretched to 75 minutes. The cars are almost magic as it seems because they can be modified at any given moment depending on the stage. Now I know this is a cartoon, but it goes beyond ridiculous. The violence...let's talk about this for a moment. I know Tom and Jerry are violent, I get that, but everybody and everything is beating something or someone up. Tom is a homicidal maniac in this. I've never seen him this maniacally vicious and who leaves a path of destruction wherever he goes. Brutal, just brutal for a Tom and Jerry cartoon.

The Ugly:
The animation is horrendous, it's stiff and feels really cheap. The show drags on and on with each stage, and finally towards the end of the movie it is decided that the race needs to end in 5 minutes. The race should have ending after 15 minutes instead of in 75 minutes; it needed to be very short. Surprisingly, Tom and Jerry had very little screen time, there where a lot of time spent on the announcers of the race and the other racers. Often I'd be wondering where Tom and Jerry were as they were the only non-annoying characters in the whole show.

I hate this cartoon! Everything about this movie was horrible, the dialog, premise, animation, and character interactions. I hope to never see The Fast and the Furry again, which is sad since Joseph Barbera produced this and was given story credit.

Bonus Review:

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Review By Jeremy G. Butler from CHUD.com

The Pitch

"It's Tom & Jerry meets Around the World in 80 Days. And it's named after The Fast & The Furious. Yeah -- it's as crappy and cheap as it sounds."

The Humans

Most notably, Tom (Spongebob) Kenny, John (Futurama) Dimaggio, Tress (The Simpsons) MacNeill, Billy (Futurama) West

The Nutshell

Tom & Jerry get kicked out of their house and enter a reality/game show that requires them to race around the world to win a new one. No, seriously.

The Package

Cover art is well made, with our two leads behind the wheels of their respective racers. The artwork is original, which always scores points with me as a lot of these cheap DTV animation releases just use screen grabs from the movie. A/V is nothing major. Fullscreen presentation with a Dolby 5.1 track, but I don't really see the need for a surround track as there's nothing really special here to warrant it. Extras are nice with a Sound Effects featurette that's pretty informative but not too "techy" for the kids to understand. There's also a somewhat nifty little set-top game that gives the kids' knowledge of geography a little workout.

The Lowdown

Remember the old Tom & Jerry shorts? F****** brilliant. I've loved them since I first saw them and watch them whenever I can on Boomerang. I introduced my daughter to them and she loves them as well. This is why I hate this DVD.

In and of itself, The Fast & the Furry isn't horrible. It's not good, but it's not horrible. The first act tries to appeal to fans of the originals but fails. Miserably. The middle seems to forget who the main characters even are, and the last few scenes try to take the old Tom & Jerry formula and apply it to different locations and situations, but again -- fails miserably. If you look at The Fast & The Furry as a cheap, no-name, watered-down knock-off of Tom & Jerry, it's not that terrible. What makes it so insulting is the fact that it IS Tom & Jerry.

William Hanna and Joseph Barbera would weep.

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