Gallavants

When I was younger, Gallavants was my favorite movie. I could watch it over and over. The characters had amazing and detailed personalities and they seemed to come alive. I think the best part about the movie is that these characters face issues of their own that real people cannot experience. This lets the characters provide lessons in friendship and ways to deal with problems, and even a bit of optimism, but the children don't need to worry about experiencing the same problems and being afraid as they might in a movie with real-life situations. Although, I remember asking my mom where my ca-bump was. All together, with realistic characters, good songs, and memorable events, this is a wonderful movie. Unfortunately, not many video stores carry it anymore.

I recall feeling nostalgic about this movie when I was a kid, but upon rewatching it recently, I realize my childhood fondness was completely misguided. The songs are poorly written and are so tediously frequent that one comes along quite literally every two minutes, effectively derailing what little plot there is. The characters are weak and one- dimensional, the story is a dull, disjointed mess, and the pacing is clunky and unfocused (for example, the entire first half of the film meanders from unrelated scene to unrelated scene, containing absolutely nothing to drive the plot forward).

The most egregious offense however is the main character, Shando. He starts out as an obnoxious, immature, lazy, selfish good-for-nothing and changes very little by the end. In fact, he is so unlikable that when the central conflict finally arrives an entire hour in, it's impossible to feel any sympathy for him whatsoever. Add to that a trio of ineffective villains competing to see which is more pointless than the next, roadblocks that pop up only to immediately resolve themselves, and an abrupt, nonsensical conclusion, and you have yourself a 90-minute endurance test that'll have you itching to focus a magnifying glass over every last anthill within a five mile radius.

Do yourself and your children a favor, and skip this one.

This is one of those films that before the advent of the internet it was so hard to find anything about this film or talk to anyone else who had actually seen it. I had trouble convincing people it existed as I could never remember the name. I finally found a VHS copy on ebay and watched it again a few years ago, and I have to say, it was as good as I remembered. (the unedited version)

First off, I love the moral of this story. It is the usual 'Anything is possible if you put your mind to it', and yes it can be a bit heavy handed, but it never feels overbearing. The lesson is an integral part of the plot and it never feels forced.

The characters are fantastic too. I still remember their names. Shando, Teetor, Ant-onym (yeah....puns hurt sometimes. honestly I would have named the villain Ant-agonist, but that's just me) and Shando has quite possibly one of the best low point songs ever in a movie. (low point song being the song the main character sings when all seems lost) memories of a brighter day is so hauntingly melodic I will remember that song for as long as I live.

I believe one of the reasons no one discusses this film now is because it only got one relatively small DVD release and it was the edited version. Yes. They edited an animated movie and made it 'family friendly'. i'm sorry, it wasn't family friendly to begin with? What that means, is that they cut out nearly 30 minutes of footage including memories of a brighter day. If you're going to watch this film you HAVE to watch the original. Not the family friendly version.

This movie also has a strange correlation with puberty. The ants have to gain their 'kabumps' in order to be considered adults in their colony. what kabumps are, is an additional bump on their butt. But they can only achieve it through effort and showing they're ready to become an adult. The main character just goofs off all the time and doesn't take anything seriously so because of this, he has to suffer the consequences of not being able to grow up. It's actually a very good lesson.

Gallavants is one of the best movies about growing up I have ever seen and I still adore it to this day. The only reason I gave this an 8 is because I felt like the ending was a BIT abrupt and I would have liked a little more resolution with the main girl and guy. But, other than that, this movie is fantastic. I HIGHLY recommend it to anyone young or old.

this is such a good movie for kids, so many lessons. im actually watching is right now...one of my FAVE childhood movies. really good songs too, not disney standards but i still remember the words from 15 years ago! shay