The Oogieloves in the Big Balloon Adventure

Well I just finished this film. Full disclosure, I lost a bet on whether the Pittsburgh Pirates would go above .500 this season and for some crazy reason they actually finished above .500 so I had to watch this film. With that said, I can say that at times I was thoroughly entertained.

Let's start with the acting, it's hard to imagine why some talented actors chose to work in this film but then it's not that hard to imagine when you think about the one day of shooting for the significant pay day. Listen, every actor or actress was just horrible in the film. Tony Braxton was so self centered that it was almost uncomfortable for me to watch and not one time do I remember her stating who she actually was in the film. Was she playing herself? I'm still left wondering about this one.

Cloris Leachman was the first respectable actress to appear and she essentially played a crazy person. Her character was obsessed with circles. If you just read that sentence and re read it because it didn't make sense then let me spare you the third re read, yes...she was actually obsessed with a circular shape. When the Oogielove trio enters her home and begins speaking with her they mention nothing about this psychopathic problem. If I entered a situation like that, my initial thought would be something like "What the hell is wrong with this woman? I gotta get outta here. This woman is crazy and I legitimately need to be worried about my safety." Instead Cloris's character induces the trio into a disturbing dance about circles that is sure to leave the audience questioning their sanity.

By the way, let me interrupt my character and acting assessment to quickly explain to you the plot of this film. The Oogieloves wake up in the morning and it apparently is their pillow's birthday. Once again, you read that correctly, it is their pillow's birthday. Now there is no explanation for why there pillow is alive or whether it can even speak at this point, as a viewer you just have to go with it and as I tried to immerse myself in the Oogielove world, just for a second I was able to believe that the group was really excited about there pillow's birthday.

Now we are introduced at this point to our first supporting character in the film, a window with a woman's face on it. Think Snow White mirror but a beautiful woman instead. I wish I could say that this talking mirror is the most unique and weird character in the film but frankly it probably doesn't even approach the top three. The talking mirror speaks with a southern accent for really no reason whatsoever. I'm not sure where the accent comes from but it is just accepted despite no one else in the film having that accent.

The window wakes up the Oogieloves and they look into her. She has the magical ability to see anywhere in their mysterious land so she shows them an approaching character. What character you may ask? Well this character is hands down the most unexplained and unbelievable character in the film, it's a talking vacuum cleaner. Why a vacuum cleaner? I repeatedly asked myself that question while watching the movie and came up with no good answer. I'm just going to assume they simply thought of a household object and for some reason believed a vacuum would make for an interesting character. They were wrong.

The talking vacuum accidentally lets go of some helium balloons for the surprise birthday party for the talking pillow because I think he tripped on the sidewalk. (There is a sentence I never would've believed I would've typed in my life.) So the Oogieloves trio set out to go and find the balloons for the party. Now at this point my spidey senses were tingling. I had a ton of issues with their decision making here. So you're telling me they can't just go buy 5 more balloons? The talking vacuum has an answer for that question. No, these are the last balloons in their world. Hmmmmmm...well played director, well played. Well truthfully, we learn later these are magical balloons that can sing but their song was really stupid and basic and I don't really think the talking pillow enjoyed it but I don't want to give away the ending for you all.

So the Oogieloves go from place to place and meet the celebrities. The worst acting performance (and believe me this was not an easy decision) had to go to Christopher Lloyd. In about 10 minutes of screen time he had 1 line...ONE. I mean really? He just blankly stared at the camera and then made weird threatening faces towards the Oogieloves when they stared at Jaime Presley the wrong way. And yes, we were to believe that Christopher Lloyd was hooking up with Jaime Presley. The sad fact is that this was not the most unbelievable subplot of the film.

Listen there is other characters in this film and other terrible story lines that are worth discussing but I think I've talked enough. It was a disturbing film and really entertaining at times. It was an awful film and I don't believe for a second that kids would actually enjoy it (kids aren't stupid) but from a satirical standpoint I somewhat enjoyed it. View at your own risk.

(As a side point you have to love the people that come on here and are hired to write reviews. They are so blatantly hired to write positive reviews and frankly it is comical.)

***UPDATE - Another bogus review added by someone who JUSt registered and NEVER reviewed anything before, and still it's on 1.9!

***UPDATE*** Worst movie opening of ALL time - the American public speaks!

Firstly, I have a pre schooler and I watch a lot of kids movies and TV. Dora can be a little annoying at times to me, but I can see it's educational value and that it has a plot, a point, some thought went into the episodes.

The Oogieloves had a bad plot, bad writing, bad songs, bad acting and was quite frankly and insult to your average pre schooler.

One of the reviews here said it was for 8 years and under, and I say to that NO WAY IN HECK! You will not find a kid above 5 wanting to sit through this garbage.

It makes the lack lustre The Lorax (of which most would say the book was far superior), seem like it should have garnered numerous Oscars.

If I was a writer on this project I would have told them they didn't have to put my name in the credits, it's THAT awful.

NOW, to the bogus reviews - there are 5 here as of this moment - 1 is a good review by someone who has written a lot of reviews, so I can respect that they found something appealing in this pile of dross that I obviously didn't see. 2 are awful reviews like mine, written by people, like me, who have written other reviews.

Two of the reviews are bogus in my opinion, probably written by someone in connection to the movie, since neither of these people has EVER written a review on ANYTHING before. Does that scream fake review to you? Even with the bogus reviews this movie is only on a 2.2 so far, that should tell you it's just plain bad.

Don't even rent it from a Redbox, it's not even worth that much! Parents everywhere hear me, you're going to be happy in a couple of weeks because Finding Nemo is coming back to theaters, save your money and take the little guys to that - they haven't seen it on the big screen and it's even going to be 3D too, now THAT is a movie worth your movie ticket bucks.

I would have given this a zero with no qualms at all, except that there is no option for a zero out of ten!

If I were 3 years old and had this garbage foisted on me...I'd consider putting myself up for adoption.

If I were 3 years old and had this garbage foisted on me...I'd fling fecal matter at the screen.

If I were 3 years old and had this garbage foisted on me...I'd throw a tantrum just to get taken out of the theater.

If I were 3 years old and had this garbage foisted on me...I'd never want to see another movie again.

This movie was not good.

Don't take your kids to see this garbage. There are TV shows far superior to this. There are classic movies far superior to this. Last year's Winnie The Pooh is perfect for kids. Show them that.

Not this sludge.

Awful, pointless, unlikable, and unfunny. One: the costumes are just awful. They're disturbing and they can give you nightmares. Especially the 3 creatures (The Oogieloves AKA Goobie, Zoozie and Toofie). Two: The actors. CHRISTOPHER LLOYD, CARY ELVES, CLORIS LEACHMAN....These famous actors play unlikable characters. Congratulations, the career of these actors have a new low. =_= Three: The. Horrible. PLOT! They expanded finding 5 balloons in 83 minutes? It's repetitive! With lots of SLOW POINTS. Also, there are horrible puns and jokes. Like when Toofie's pants fall down...IT'S NOT FUNNY. Four: The songs are absolutely horrible. They will make you want to rip your ears off. The worst song is the awful theme song. I can't believe this piece of trash has many positive reviews. Five: The fact that this movie got theatrical release when everything screamed "Direct to DVD". I'm not forcing anyone to avoid this, but who doesn't like very annoying kid's movies shouldn't watch this.

The Oogieloves in the Big Balloon Adventure is the worst kind of film you could ever show your young children. It's unsubstantial, witless, lacks anything in the way of a lesson or a moral, too kiddish for even the youngest viewer, and largely comprised of things that have been proved unhealthy for your visual and auditory senses. It has been reported by Box Office Mojo as having one of the worst opening weekends for a film opening on more than 2,000 screens, with a dismal $102,564 and a final gross of $1.06 million. Against a $20 million budget (and an extra $40 for marketing), this makes this one of the worst performances for a film ever.

Our story is concerns Goobie, Zoozie, and Toofie, the three Oogieloves that exist in their own world, which is so colorful that is borders along the lines of nauseating. They are celebrating their pillow Schluufy's birthday, and plan to give him five bright gold balloons for his surprise party, which they plan to set up while he is sleeping. When J. Edgar (their vacuum cleaner friend) accidentally frees the balloons outside, they become scattered all over the whole mythical land, leaving the Oogieloves no choice but to get them back. They bounce in and out of colorfully artificial sets, running into people like Rosalie Rosebud, Dottie Rounder, Marvine Milkshake, Bobbly Wobbly, and Lero Sombrero.

That's all well and good, but would you believe those characters are played by none other than Toni Braxton, Cloris Leachman, Christopher Lloyd, Chazz Palminteri, Jamie Pressly, and Cary Elwes? If one thing is guaranteed to make your jaw drop when watching this film, whether it be the stunningly frothy atmosphere, the corny singalongs, or the inept nature of the characters, it will be the list of talent involved with this project. What could've been going through Chazz Palminteri's mind when he signed up for this film? He was the driving force behind the film adaptation for A Bronx Tale, an amazing coming of age story I'm sure those who attended The Oogieloves won't go on to see. To give him credit, he plays his role with convincing motivation, but witnessing him batting dopey milkshake puns and dancing around the milkshake diner, concocting cockamamie shakes filled with peppermint, chili, pickles, and other ingredients is one of the most dreadful things I've ever seen a talented actor succumb to. And I saw Movie 43, mind you.

Let's talk about the box office performance of this film. Normally, if I catch a film on DVD, when all its financial information is already public and mostly complete, I shy away from explaining it because it usually has nothing to do with the quality of the film at hand. It's not worth mentioning, per say. Yet we need to talk about how The Oogieloves performed theatrically. I already wrote an entire blog when this film was in its theatrical run about how this film's dismal performance was either an indication of the end of August being a generally poor time to release a film (kids are going back to school, adults are generally rushed, and time is fleeting) or a smart public. Both of those, I believe, are big factors, but one of the biggest ones is the lack of an introduction on these characters or "Oogieloves." Think about it. Films like the Rugrats trilogy, The Spongebob Squarepants Movie, and The Wild Thornberry's Movie succeeded largely due to their name and familiarity amongst elementary schoolers and maybe those of selective age groups. The Oogieloves in the Big Balloon Adventure is marketing characters nobody knows to a demographic that still can't completely influence their parents to take them to the cinema to watch the film of their choice. Usually, the parents decide the film and see if the child has any dissenting remarks. The Oogieloves were not introduced to the public prior to this unexpected movie adventure, and with no prior consumer knowledge via an album debut, a TV special, a TV show, books, etc, this was a project doomed from the start. Why was $60 million invested into this? The Oogieloves in the Big Balloon Adventure was marketed as an "interactive" movie feature, allowing children to fearlessly speak to the characters in the film, get up and dance on que, or openly talk during the picture. During the course of this eighty-one minute endeavor, ten songs are played, hoping to get children out of their seats and on their feet dancing. What is played are some of the most redundant, idiotic, monotonous songs that showcase nothing but maddening tedium. If there was any prior music released by the Oogieloves prior to this film I'd hate to hear it. The theatrics, too, never stem past costumed-humans dancing robotically back and forth to the music, and in a day and age where computer animation can create an army of one-thousand characters to dance and sing simultaneously, this return to primitive style is lame and relatively bland.

To bring things to a simple close, The Oogieloves in the Big Balloon Adventure is a harmful, harmful film to show young children. Films like this give kids nothing but a shorter attention span and an energy level that can easily be adopted off of caffeine and fast food. Taking your child to see this film will do nothing to make them smarter, better, and will do nothing to further them in any way shape or form. Taking them to see films like Brave, Cars, Shrek, Toy Story, or Wreck-It Ralph fuel their minds with creative energy, giving them a lust for life, adventure, and fun. This is one of the most appalling films released in some time for all the wrong reasons.