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Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer & the Island of Misfit Toys (V) More at IMDbPro »

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30 reviews in total

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13 out of 16 people found the following review useful:
Root Canals are less painful......., 19 November 2002

Author: bigtommyboy from Meriden, CT

I grew up watching the original 1964 Rudolph clay-mation special.......it is an almost perfect Christmas special with great voices, songs and magic.......... This 2001 version is soooooo painful I coughed up my egg nog.........the music is so sappy.........the dialogue painful.........after a few minutes you just wish the big hairy snowman would eat up the rest of the characters and call it a day........ This was just a quick money making scheme........and it probably worked........the computer graphics are awful....... STAY AWAY.........not even worth renting........it will give you nightmares..........

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12 out of 15 people found the following review useful:
Crap-tacular!, 22 June 2002
Author: Cornelus from Somewhere where it's cold & wet

You could tell this movie had it's heart in the right place, but just about everything else tells you this movie was slapped together without regard for visual appeal or even a good message for kids.

If you listen to the "director's commentary" (you'd think it would be a director's track, but instead it's only a 3-minute interview), they explain how this is the first time anyone on the team had done a computer-animated cartoon before, especially the B-movie director. And while this may have been cute as a bunch of student projects tied together, the whole mess just doesn't belong.

Can't be called a sequel if it has nothing to do with the first, can it?

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8 out of 9 people found the following review useful:
A reason to make more money, 4 February 2002

Author: Luna-tic from United States

In the last couple of years there has been a marketing bonanza on the original Rudolph the Red nose Reindeer. You can buy just about anything from the original at Christmas time (Action Figures, plush toys, Bobbleheads, Ornaments, Wrapping Paper, Tree Skirts, Magnets, etc.).

This movie just came out so that the makers could get more money off the Rudolph frenzy.

First, I would say the worst thing about this movie was the soundtrack. They were all new songs and they were all terrible. I just looked at my wife and we were both cringing. I didn't even feel like a majority of the songs were even christmasy just stupid buddy songs. Maybe I am missing something maybe they made this movie for kids because the music was like something out of a Barney episode. Terrible!

The Animation was not the same as the first. The first was puppet. This one was a rehashed computer animated flick. And the computer animation was some of the poorest computer animation I have seen.

The characters in this movie were the same as from the last Rudolph but for some reason I found them annoying in this movie as opposed to cute in the first one. There were three new characters and they were not interesting or likable. You can tell that whoever made this movie did not get what the other christmas specials were all about. A talking annoying Hippo? In the North Pole? Let me ask you does that sound like something you would see in the first movie? The makers of this just wanted to make a few bucks and do no research. Everyone of the christmas specials had a narrator. The narrator would be an animated version of the person who is providing the voice: Burl Ives as the snowman in the first Rudolph, Fred Astaire in Santa Claus is Coming to Town, Jimmy Duartee in the first Frosty, Andy Griffith in the second Frosty, others include Ethel Merman, Shirley Booth, and Red Skelton. But for this one Richard Dryfus was just a boring snowman. The snowman looked nothing like Richard. This seems minor but just goes to show that there really is no similarity to the originals except that rights to the characters were purchased by the makers of this film. The story line is not in the same vain at all.

All in all pretty poor. If you must see this do not buy it like I did. Wait for it to come on tv or if you must, rent it.

I better recommendation would be to watch little known sequels: Rudolph's Shiny New Year or Rudolph and Frosty's Christmas in July.

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8 out of 10 people found the following review useful:
When graphics engineers ..., 25 December 2002
Author: Donald Cameron from Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

take over the animation house, this is what one can expect. I'm embarrassed to say that I was in a hurry and picked this up thinking it was the original 1964 Rudolph. I had thought that the cover had changed and there were now "special features" on it. This is nothing like the original. It is actually a pointless little bit of fluff.

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9 out of 14 people found the following review useful:
Really horrible, 28 December 2003
Author: bob the moo from Birmingham, UK

Rudolph travels to the island of misfit toys to help the elf dentist treat the lion toy. As they sail back they get caught in a storm and meet the Hippo Queen who offers to fix Rudolph's nose if he wants it done. While he is away The Toy Taker raids Santa's toy warehouse and takes all the toys. Rudolph sets out to find the Toy Taker and get all the toys back in time for Christmas by using the island of misfit toys as a trap to draw him out.

Dear Lord but this is one cheap nasty little cartoon! Ignore the actors listed in the cast list - just because they managed to pay a few big names for a day and a half's voice work doesn't mean this film is any good. The plot is a reasonable attempt to draw as many films out of Rudolph as possible and, on paper, is a reasonable sting operation but the delivery is awful and ruins anything that might have been called potential.

The godawful songs are part of the problem - they seem to happen after every few lines of dialogue all the way through. It makes it impossible to bear - it really is awful stuff. The animation is also pretty bad. That might seem a bit unfair considering it looks OK and is computer animation, but it is the sort of animation you get in cut scenes on average games on your PC. The camera moves very slowly, the characters cannot move very fast and none of them are lip-synched at all!

The fancy voices do nothing at all to improve it. Dreyfuss does some rubbish Snowman narrator but Jamie Lee Curtis dons a horrible accent to do a hippo queen! (was she trying to hide her identity from shame?). Moranis has an OK character visually but he does nothing with it and the absurd songs and voice only serve to the character of any menace he had before he spoke.

Overall I can only advise that you do not make the mistake that I made by watching this. No matter how demanding your children get, don't use this film to placate them - making them sit facing the wall for an hour would be preferable.

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7 out of 11 people found the following review useful:
Horrible music, terrible animation... awful story., 12 December 2001

Author: happyotter from McKinney, Texas

I will start by saying that my 4 year old son really does like this movie... that is the only positive point.

The animation is HORRIBLE - no texturing, very poor lighting, polygon intrusions, etc. Not even 2nd rate animation.

The music and songs are atrocious - I cannot believe that the writers actually allowed them to use their real names on this. Then again, composers cannot take a Smithy.

The characters have been tarnished, stained, battered and bruised - hopefully this movie will soon be forgotten and the original Rudolph will regain its former glory.

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5 out of 8 people found the following review useful:
Special Effects ruin another classic movie, 26 November 2001

Author: guyb from Portland, Oregon

It has always amazed me that it took so long to see a sequel to the classic Rudolph animation. It took so long that the Hollywood world of 3D automated graphics took over as happens so often. This movie bore little resemblance to the original. It didn't even feel like Christmas. Seemed like they licensed the characters and just turned it over to a CGI house. Very poor. No plot, no interesting characters. What was the deal with the kite?? If I had bought this movie, I would have demanded my money back. Fortunately, we just checked it out at the library. This is the first time I've ever seen my 8 year old want to walk away from an animation!

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1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
A misfit of a movie!, 24 June 2009

Author: FredGailey from United States

This is an abomination to the entire film industry and a disgrace and insult to the original 1964 classic. The animation looks like some amateur bought a 'CGI For Dummies' book and made it on their home computer. Like other users remarked there is no texture to the images, the graphics look like something out of a cheap children's video game, in which the paper thin plot would have been more suitable for. Gosh, the 30 second AFLAC commercial that spoofed Rudolph had more production value than this 90 minutes of gutter trash! This had so much potential to be a decent sequel but greed, as always in modern movie making, killed it with a slapped together rush job all for the sake of capitalizing off the Rudolph franchise and the integrity of the original!

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1 out of 1 people found the following review useful:
I was disappointed, 30 November 2001
Author: dtzook from Mansfield, OH

I was not happy with the sequel, although I liked the concept of the movie I did not think it fit well as a sequel to the original. Rudolph and Clarice seem to have reversed the aging process by a few years, also the elf in charge who at the end of the original had a dental appointment with Hermy seems to have forgotten that and is mad and disappointed all over again. I feel the plot and story are fine I just don't think they should have tried to tie it to an almost forty year old classic.

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2 out of 3 people found the following review useful:
A Wonderful Addition to the Rudolph Story, 26 May 2007

Author: JimmyL5555 from United States

*** This review may contain spoilers ***

I picked up this DVD at a garage sale thinking it was the 1964 classic until I read the back when I came home to discover it's a sequel. I looked up the reviews here to see what everyone said about it. I read a lot of negative comments, the most common is the awful songs. I decided to watch it for myself. Regarding the songs, everyone is correct: they are horrendous (which is why it loses a point in my rating), but the cartoon, story and all, surprised the heck out of me! All the lovable characters (including Charlie-in-the-box) from the 1964 classic is brought back with a new set of vocal talents that sound so much like the original cast, it's breath-taking and a little eerie. Yes, it's computer-animated instead of the stop-action of the '64 original, but so much attention, care, and love was given to the details, it doesn't become an issue and it gives this installment its own special charm.

Even a new twist on the social issue of Rudolph wishing to be like all the other reindeers was thought-provoking, clever, and wonderfully done. The animators even gave new dimension to Rudolph's nonconformity that does not, in my opinion, ruin the charm of the original. If anything, I look at it as Rudolph's nose changing its nature as he grows older, just as children's traits grow and change and evolve as they go through life.

The writers and animators thought of everything, including Rudolph's continuing relationship with Clarisse, and even giving Hermie the elf a love interest after graduating from Dental School. There are lots of in-jokes galore, including Hermie's vehicle having a modern-day alarm remote that chirps when activated, and there's even a "borrowing" from "Indiana Jones & the Temple of Doom."

The main crux of the story is a dark character called the Toy Taker who has taken toys everywhere including all of the toys in Santa's workshop, and it's up to Rudolph and his friends to solve the mystery, catch the Toy Taker and return the toys in time for Santa's run on Christmas Eve.

With all that being said, I heartily recommend you buy or rent this wonderful movie and be in for the treat of your life ESPECIALLY if you're a fan of the 1964 original!!

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