Home on the Range (2004)

User Rating:

5.4/10   

Directors:

Will Finn
John Sanford

Writers:

Will Finn (written by) and
John Sanford (written by) ...

Release Date:

2 April 2004 (USA)

Genre:

Animation | Family | Music | Western

Tagline:

Bust a Moo.

Plot:

To save their farm, the resident animals go bounty hunting for a notorious outlaw.

Plot Keywords:

Farm | Cow | Cattle Rustler | Horse | Rabbit

Awards:

5 nominations

Cast

G.W. Bailey	...	Rusty, the Dog (voice)
Roseanne	...	Maggie (voice) (as Roseanne Barr)
Bobby Block	...	Piggy (voice)
Steve Buscemi	...	Wesley (voice)
Carole Cook	...	Pearl Gesner (voice)
Charlie Dell	...	Ollie, the Pig (voice)
Judi Dench	...	Mrs. Caloway (voice)
Charles Dennis	...	Rico (voice)
Marshall Efron	...	Larry, the Duck (voice)
Joe Flaherty	...	Jeb, the Goat (voice)
Cuba Gooding Jr.	...	Buck (voice)
Charles Haid	...	Lucky Jack (voice)
Estelle Harris	...	Audrey, the Chicken (voice)
Lance LeGault	...	Junior, the Buffalo (voice)
Sam J. Levine	...	The Willie Brothers (voice)

Also Known As:

Sweating Bullets (USA) (working title)

MPAA:

Rated PG for brief mild rude humor.

Runtime:

76 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

DTS | Dolby Digital | SDDS

Certification:

USA:PG (certificate #40071) | South Korea:All | Argentina:Atp | Australia:G | Brazil:Livre | Finland:S | Germany:o.Al. | Netherlands:AL | Norway:7 | Peru:PT | Philippines:G | Singapore:G | Sweden:7 | Switzerland:0 (canton of Geneva) | Switzerland:7 (canton of Vaud) | UK:U | Greece:K

Company:

Walt Disney Pictures

Trivia:

The two vultures who appear near the beginning of the movie are animated in exactly the same way as the vultures in Disney's The Jungle Book (1967).

Goofs:

Continuity: After the cattle rustling, and Rico switches horses, the cattle drivers grab Buck's reins and break them. For the rest of the movie, they are whole.

Quotes:

Grace: [to a bull] Let me guess, you're a Taurus?

Movie Connections:

Spoofs Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron (2002)

Soundtrack:

(You Ain't) Home On The Range

Nice visuals, otherwise unexceptional

While the film wasn't a total dud a la "Treasure Planet," it's certainly no "Little Mermaid," or even "Emperor's New Groove," which I consider the best of the latest crop of cartoons for its hip sensibility. "Home on the Range" suffers from an unoriginal and unfunny script, although it is not tediously poor or Saturday-morning-cartoon simple. To begin, there is an overabundance of plastic-playset ready characters (literally a whole farm full): the trio of bounty-hunting heifers played by Roseanne Barr, Judi Dench, and Jennifer Tilly; the yodeling cattle rustler Alameda Slim (Randy Quaid) and his three bumbling nephews; the wannabe-hero steed Buck (Cuba Gooding Jr-- who ok'ed that name?); two lascivious bulls; a buffalo bouncer; a peg-legged jackrabbit; and a whole farmyard of pigs, chickens, a goose, and a surly goat. Oh, and Steve Buscemi shows up too, as a caricature of himself in a purple suit and a pencil moustache. Estelle Harris and Patrick Warburton (so memorable in "Toy Story 2" and "Groove," respectively), had brief cameos as well. There's no time for any kind of character development (not even with a sacred Disney "I Want" song), and the thinnest of premises has the cows hunting for Slim in time to get the reward money to save their farm. I was surprised not by the simplicity but by the unnecessary, unfunny bawdiness of the script (the movie opens with a shot of the Barr cow's ample udders, with her voiceover dryly remarking "Yep, they're real. Quit staring." Crossdressing, pee, and fat man jokes follow.) Alan Menken wrote a few snappy but unmemorable tunes (none of which are sung by the characters, but by the likes of Bonnie Raitt and k.d. lang) and a Coplandesque score. The film redeems itself in its art direction, which bursts with Disney color and retro UPA-style angularity. Especially in the opening scenes, a multiplane effect is used to further flatten, rather than deepen, this storybook world. It's an interesting and visually engaging concept that works well for the story. Backgrounds are intricately detailed with drybrush effects that call to mind "Sleeping Beauty;" if that film's art director, Eyvind Earle, had been called upon to paint the rocks and buttes of the American desert, it would have looked very much like this. It's quite stunning, actually, and the best art direction since 1996's "The Hunchback of Notre Dame." I especially appreciated a background detail in the town scene: one of the buildings was actually only a facade, held up by supports like on a backlot Western set. Similarly, sooner or later, not just critics but parents too will demand the Disney animated features to show that they have something behind that venerable name. "Home on the Range" will tide us over for now, but a renaissance of Disney is getting to be overdue. The Disney animation department (what's left of it), like it or not, needs to take a cue from Pixar and strive for family-friendly originality if they hope to maintain the integrity of the brand. ***