Pippi Longstocking
Sweden/Germany/Canada 1997
Reviewed by Pamela Church Gibson
Synopsis
Our synopses give away the plot in full, including surprise twists.
The 20th century. Nine-year-old Pippi Longstocking is the strongest girl in the world. Her mother long dead, she has spent most of her life on her father's ship. When her father is swept overboard during a storm, Pippi is confident he will survive. Back in Sweden, Pippi travels to their home Villa Villekulla just outside a small country town to await his return.
With her two companions - Mr Nilsson, a monkey, and her trusty steed Horse - Pippi's menage attracts the attention of Mrs Prysselius, the local busybody. Discovering Pippi is living unsupervised, Prysselius decides she should be put in a children's home and entreats the two local policemen to take action, but they'd rather go fishing. Two criminals, Thunder-Karlsson and his sidekick Bloom, escape from jail. Having overheard Prysselius saying Pippi has a chest full of gold coins, they set off to steal them. Pippi, meanwhile, has befriended two neighbouring children, Tommy and Annika. The criminals attempt several times to steal the coins, but are always foiled. Finally, the criminals seize an opportunity but the police capture them. Pippi's father returns, so Pippi prepares to return to sea, but changes her mind after seeing tears on Annika's face.
Review
The first of Astrid Lindgren's children's stories about the tomboy Pippi Longstocking appeared in English 50 years ago. Since then, they've been translated into more than 50 languages and made into feature films in both Sweden (Lindgren's birthplace) and Germany. This latest animated version of the first book is, like so much Euro-animation, an international co-production. Canadian-based Nelvana was one of production companies responsible for the abundantly merchandised and cheaply animated The Care Bears Movie, and this is no great improvement.
Pippi is, for some feminist mothers, a positive role model for young women. The strongest girl in the world, she is resourceful and kindhearted, often throwing the adult world into chaos. Her amiable and anarchic heroics went down well with some of the little girls in the preview audience I saw the film with. Well, they were at least quiet.
But this cartoon Pippi is far less engaging than the original illustrations. Her broad grin seems horribly fixed, and more worryingly, her long legs and the constant flashes of thigh between stocking top and pelmet skirt are a paedophile's wet dream. The oversized boots that she wears simply reinforce the tomboy-Lolita look. And surrounded by adult actors with cod-Swedish accents, Pippi's voice is that of a noisy, over-confident American child. As this film is a semi-musical, like almost all animated feature films now, one would think an actress with a less strident singing voice might have been chosen.
Here, Pippi's dislike of conformity, attractive on the printed page, seems selfish and tiresome rather than spirited. Annika's mother looks genuinely distressed as Pippi wrecks the tea party she has worked all day to prepare. Other parents aren't likely to warm to this Pippi either. Indeed, both adults and children may find her cartoon incarnation annoying, her small friends saccharine and characterless, and the supposedly engaging antics of fishing-obsessed criminals and cops resolutely unfunny.
Credits
- Director
- Clive Smith
- Producers
- Waldemar Bergendahl
- Hasmi Giakoumis
- Merle-Anne Ridley
- Michael Schaack
- Screenplay
- Catharina Stackelberg
- Based on the books by
- Astrid Lindgren
- Camera Supervisor
- Graham Tiernan
- Picture Editor
- Noda Tsamardos
- Design Supervisors
- Dermot Walshe
- Paul Riley
- Music
- Anders Berglund
- ©AB Svensk Filmindustri/Iduna Produktiongesellschaft GmbH & Co/TFC
- Trickompany Filmproduktion GmbH/Nelvana Limited
- Production Companies
- A AB Svensk Filmindustri/Iduna Film/TFC Trickompany/Nelvana co-production
- Produced with the participation of Telefilm Canada
- Produced with the participation of Teletoon and with the assistance of the Government of Canada - Canadian Film or Video Production Tax Credit program
- Executive Producers
- Michael Hirsh
- Patrick Loubert
- Clive Smith
- Lennart Wiklund
- Co-executive Producer
- David Ferguson
- Supervising Producer
- Jo Hahn
- Co-ordinating Producer
- Jürgen Polaszek
- Oversea Supervisors
- Keith Bambury
- Edson Basarin
- Christoph Baum
- Andrea Czedula
- Mark Hodkinson
- Anna Jander
- Ute von Münchow-Pohl
- Graham Tiernan
- Production Co-ordinators
- Alice Hyatt
- Phetsamone Racksasouk
- Nina Peters
- Pete Turner
- Vincianne Hubert
- Belén Ramirez
- Production Managers
- Kim Thompson
- Christiane Rittner
- Director of Post-production
- Rob Kirkpatrick
- Post-production Supervisors
- Peter Bengtsson
- Tim Roberts
- Tracy Grant
- Associate Directors
- Waldemar Bergendahl
- Michael Schaak
- Catharina Stackelberg
- Casting Director/Voice Director
- Jessie Thomson
- Casting Co-ordinator
- Karyn Tester
- Storyboard Supervisors
- Clive Smith
- Frank Nissen
- Additional Dialogue
- Ken Sobol
- Frank Nissen
- Story Consultant
- Susan Snooks
- Colour Design
- Mary Bertoia
- Michelle Davis
- Annie Elvin
- Computer Animation Supervisor
- Klaus Witte
- Computer Animation
- Paulo J. Rodrigues Marques
- Jörn Radel
- Animation Directors
- Ute von Münchow-Pohl
- Edson Basarin
- Robin Budd
- Bill Giggie
- Character Design
- Frank Nissen
- Animation Design
- Paul Bolger
- Supervising Animators
- Chris Doyle
- Angel Izquierdo
- Thierry Schiel
- Animators
- Enzo Avolio
- Jan Baudouin De Courtenay
- Adrienne Bell
- Peter Bohl
- David Degrande
- Ursula Don
- Claus Dzalakowski
- Marc Fontaine
- Carlos Galatola
- Florentino J. Gopez
- Javier Granados
- Allan Jeffery
- Sophia Kolokouri
- Xavier Lamouche
- John Lee
- Nathalie Legrand
- Karen Lessmann
- Neil McNeil
- Piotr Morawski
- Robin Müller
- Ansgar Niebuhr
- Lynn Reist
- Gilles Rudziak
- Maureen Shelleau
- Hélio Takahashi
- Thierry Torres
- Carlos Varela
- Florian Wagner
- Régine Waleffe
- Steve Whitehouse
- Jamie Whitney
- Helena Wolf
- Effects Animation Supervisor
- Ian Mah
- Effects Animator
- Natalie Garceau-Turner
- Layout Supervisors
- Dermot Walshe
- John Yee
- Tobias Genkel
- Jerry Benninger
- Layout Artists
- Tobias Anker
- Glenn Chadwick
- Hans Devolder
- Robert Elliott
- Joe Gosselin
- Eddie Haan
- Chad Hicks
- Glenn Jeffs
- George Juhasz
- Kevin Q. Klis
- Mark Komza
- Adalbert Korona
- Andrej Krystoforski
- Trent Larson
- Brian Lee
- Ed Lee
- John Lei
- Nigel Lucas
- Jeffrey N. Lyons
- Eugene McDermott
- Chris Minz
- Thesa Pakarnyk
- David Pletila
- Dinah Postma
- Karin Röster
- Terry Rotsaert
- Robert Schlunze
- Birgit Schulz
- John Stuart
- Tony Tarantini
- Walter Van Gasse
- Layout/Animation Co-ordinator
- Rodica Mihailescu
- Background Supervisor
- Anna Jander
- Key Background Painters
- Monica Herman
- Stephan Köhler
- Volker Krafzel
- Tilman Seelenmeyer
- Branislav Perkovic
- Pre-production Editors
- John Dubiel
- Rick Dubiel
- Sheila Murray
- Art Directors
- Christoph Baum
- Clive Powsey
- Designers
- Robin Budd
- Ross Campbell
- Trevor Deane-Freeman
- Natalie Garceau-Turner
- Alex Gatsis
- Joe Gosselin
- Alex Hawley
- Peggy Hawley
- Neil McNeil
- Leif Norheim
- Cynthia Ward
- John Yee
- Storyboard Artists
- Robin Budd
- Rick Durante
- John Flagg
- Alex Hawley
- Peter Hudecki
- Raymond Jafelice
- Luc LaTulippe
- Frank Nissen
- Bob Smith
- Mike Smukavic
- Andrew Tan
- John Van Bruggen
- Main Title Design
- Ohlsson & Co. Reklamproduktion AB
- Music Co-ordinator
- Rossi Ayres
- Music Consultant
- Stephen Hudecki
- Soundtrack
- "What Shall I Do Today" by Carl Lenox, Tim Thorney, Tom Thorney, Brent Barkman, Erica M. Miechowsky; "Hey-Ho, I'm Pippi", "Pluttifikation" by Anders Berglund, Ture Rangström, Peter Bishop, Carl Lenox, Tim Thorney, Brent Barkman; "Recipe for Life" by Carl Lenox, Tim Thorney, Tom Thorney, Brent Barkman; "A Bowler and a New Gold Tooth" by Asher Ettinger, Tony Kosinec, Lisa Lambert, arranged by Thinkmusic (Toronto); "The Schottish" by Anders Berglund
- Dialogue Recording Engineer
- Bob Cobban
- Re-recording Engineers
- Berndt Frithiof
- Leif Westerlund
- Supervising Sound Editor
- Glen Barna
- Dialogue Editors
- Scott McCrorie
- Keith Traver
- Sound Effects Editors
- Ryan Araki
- John Baktis
- Eric Mattar-Hurlbut
- Craig Marshall
- Foley
- Artists:
- Andy Malcolm
- Goro Koyama
- Engineer:
- Tony Van Der Akker
- Voice Cast
- Catherine O'Hara
- Mrs Prysselius
- Dave Thomas
- Thunder-Karlsson
- Gordon Pinsent
- Captain Longstocking
- Wayne Robson
- Bloom
- Melissa Altro
- Pippi Longstocking
- Carole Pope
- the teacher
- Richard Binsley
- Mr Nilsson/Dog
- Rick Jones
- O'Malley
- Chris Wiggins
- Fridolf
- Rick Jones
- Kling
- Philip Williams
- Klang
- Noah Reid
- Tommy
- Olivia Garratt
- Annika
- Judy Tate
- Annika's vocals
- Karen Bernstein
- Mrs Settergren
- Martin Lavut
- Mr Settergren
- Mari Trainor
- Mrs Klang
- Elva Mai Hoover
- Mrs Kling
- Philip Williams
- Ringmaster
- Melleny Melody
- Snake Lady
- Howard Jerome
- Adolph
- Kyle Fairley
- Zachary Spider Brown Smith
- kids
- Brent Barkman
- Emily Barlow
- Marieve Herington
- Michael Hughes
- Carl Lenox
- Annick Obonsawin
- Scott Pietrangelo
- Clive Smith
- Tim Thorney
- Tom Thorney
- group singers
- Certificate
- U
- Distributor
- Optimum Releasing
- 6,991 feet
- 77 minutes 41 seconds
- Dolby
- In Colour