Rating: 
Summary: A pointless weird cartoony trip
Review: "Cool World" does not live up to its name at all. It's a weird live action/animation merge full of bad acting and lame one-liners. Kim Basinger, a hopefully more serious actress after her Oscar win for "L.A. Confidential," made herself a ... by taking the unintelligent role of Holly Wood. Even Brad Pitt, who is typically appealing in his movies, is terrible.
"Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" was a much better movie (I've noticed people making comparisons). That movie shows charming and funny interactions between beloved cartoon characters and humans. "Cool World" is just a silly "what if a comic book came to life" film. If I want to see a better representation of a comic book coming to life, I will watch A HA's "Take on Me" music video.
Plain and simple, the movie was a wasted opportunity that didn't work.
Rating: 
Summary: Tough Times in Toon Town
Review: "Cool World" is Ralph Bakshi's bizarre live-action/animation combination that followed by four years the ground breaking (and far more entertaining) "Who Framed Roger Rabbit?" But its weirdness is wholly on the surface, weirdness for weirdness' sake, and that's exhausting. The film only runs 94 minutes, but it could have been told in six.
The story is very simple: in 1945, Frank Harris (Brad Pitt) is pulled into the Cool World after he's injured in a motorcycle accident; 50 years later, ex-con Jack Deebs (Gabriel Byrne), who made a name for himself in prison by drawing (unwittingly) Cool World-inspired comic books, is lured there by one of its denizens, Holly Would (Kim Basinger, although only her voice was used over another woman's rotoscoped body for animation). Holly -- who will remind men of every beautiful, psychotic girlfriend they couldn't resist -- wants to enter the Real World. Apparently, the only way to do that is by having sex with a `Noid ("humanoid" to us). As a Cool World police detective, Harris knows that lead to the destruction of both worlds, although how is never explained. Even "Ghostbusters" had a better explanation for why they shouldn't cross the streams of unlicensed nuclear accelerators: "It would be bad."
Most of the weirdness in "Cool World" comes from the background characters -- all of them inexplicably ugly, except for Holly and Harris' girlfriend, Lonette -- and its urban setting, a trashed city of twisted towers inhabited by ugly, angry toons (called Doodles) engaged in an endless cycle of assaulting each other. Imagine a story with scenes Hieronymous Bosch's "The Garden of Earthly Delights" playing in the background, only making even less sense, and you'll get an idea of the bizarre, incoherent visuals.
The story is a mess, full of plot holes, non-existent foreshadowing and, at the end, a deux ex machina to give it a happy ending. "Cool World" runs only 94 minutes, but tons of extraneous material was thrown in for padding; a sequence in which a Thumper-like rabbit is shooting craps has absolutely nothing to do with the story. The live-action camera work is clumsily handled, and the actors at times recite their lines as if they have no earthly idea what for. There's a joke about comedy that goes like this:
"Ask me what's the most important skill in comedy?"
"All right. What's--"
"Timing!"
In "Cool World," the actors aren't in on the joke. They slur their lines, drag them through time as if they're paid by the second. They're confused, and they know it. One scene with Pitt is priceless; after delivering some Bogart-like lines to a toon, he swivels his head with an expression that seems to ask, "Did I really say what I thought I said?"
The intermingling of reality and fantasy worlds is becoming a movie genre, with "Roger Rabbit," "Cool World," "MonkeyBone," "Space Jam" and "Looney Tunes: Back in Action" each taking a swing at it. Of them, only "Roger Rabbit" has delivered a satisfying, coherent story. The rest need to have a cartoon anvil dropped on them, if only to teach a lesson about how to animate comedy.
Rating: 
Summary: Vapid only in the eye of the beholder
Review: ...I will give Ralph B. credit for sticking to his artistic vision, however oddly anachronistic it may seem in this age of CG technology. If you accept "Cool World" for what it is: 1) Mindless "popcorn" diversion for an hour or two, and 2) only a CARTOON, then there's very little to get ourselves all worked up over, is there? "Real" actors Gabriel Byrne, Kim Basinger and Brad Pitt do as well as can be expected reacting to a blue screen and uttering some admittedly cornball dialogue, but the real star here is the animation anyway. Kim Basinger's "virtual" cartoon alter-ego, Holly Would, actually exudes a sexier presence here than Basinger does in her "real" scenes-and that's saying something about the animator's skills! As for the comparisons to "Roger Rabbit", I was reminded more of Peter Jackson's cult classic "Meet The Feebles", where most of the entertainment value came from watching Muppets screaming obscenities and engaging in other, ah, more "adult" activities. Just think of it as Merrie Melodies with Tourette's!
Rating:
Summary: Very bizzare and entertaining
Review: Although not perfect the film does deliver. It is racy, bizzare, and leaves a smeark on your face. Although I liked "Who framed Roger Rabbit?" better, I liked this one more than "Space Jam"
Rating:
Summary: Poor animation, poor storyline, poor everything!
Review: Avoid this movie at any cost! Althought it has nothing to do with Roger Rabbit, you can notice this is the "wannabe" kind of movie but with very bad and poor results. Seems to have had a very low budget for animation and camera work. Remember a very old and bad movie called "The android" that had opening credits the same way than Star Wars but done very badly? It had starships that looked like the Star Wars ships, but this were a shame. Maybe you don't remember it, and I wish I've never seen that movie. Well, I feel the same way about Cool World. You'd better watch Roger Rabbit over and over again.
Rating:
Summary: Uninspired and Disappointing
Review: Being a fan of LORD OF THE RINGS, FIRE AND ICE, and AMERICAN POP as a kid, I'm really surprised at how uninspired COOL WORLD is. On the positive side, Holly Would is way "cartoon sexier" than Jessica Rabbit (as is Brad Pitt's cartoon girlfriend), and it's great seeing Kim Basinger squirm around like she's in heat, but other than that, there's not a whole lot in COOL WORLD to get excited about. After 80 or so years of rich animation history, you'd think this movie would be loaded with in-jokes and references, but instead the ancillary characters do little more than fill the scene with your very basic cartoon gags. And the more surreal, black and white animation looks amatuerish and out of place. The pivotal moment of the film occurs when a real life Gabriel Byrne and Holly Would do the nasty, changing her into a human. Given Bakshi's graphic past, you'd think this scene would be a little more "climactic," but in truth, I didn't realize it was actually happening until it was over. It is totally uninspired (both parties are fully dressed), and given the way Holly Would looked, that's a damn shame. The review on the box calls this a "darker, more extreme WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT?", but that's being nice. It's more like a WFRR with low production value, crappy acting, cheaper animation, inferior story, and lacking cartoon charm. COOL WORLD is too crude for children, and too boring for adults. And that's too bad. In short, there's not a single character in this film I'd like to see on a t-shirt.
Rating:
Summary: Uninspired and Disappointing
Review: Being a fan of LORD OF THE RINGS, FIRE AND ICE, and AMERICAN POP as a kid, I'm really surprised at how uninspired COOL WORLD is. On the positive side, Holly Would is way "cartoon sexier" than Jessica Rabbit (as is Brad Pitt's cartoon girlfriend), and it's great seeing Kim Basinger squirm around like she's in heat, but other than that, there's not a whole lot in COOL WORLD to get excited about. After 80 or so years of rich animation history, you'd think this movie would be loaded with in-jokes and references, but instead the ancillary characters do little more than fill the scene with your very basic cartoon gags. And the more surreal, black and white animation looks amatuerish and out of place. The pivotal moment of the film occurs when a real life Gabriel Byrne and Holly Would do the nasty, changing her into a human. Given Bakshi's graphic past, you'd think this scene would be a little more "climactic," but in truth, I didn't realize it was actually happening until it was over. It is totally uninspired (both parties are fully dressed), and given the way Holly Would looked, that's a damn shame. The review on the box calls this a "darker, more extreme WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT?", but that's being nice. It's more like a WFRR with low production value, crappy acting, cheaper animation, inferior story, and lacking cartoon charm. COOL WORLD is too crude for children, and too boring for adults. And that's too bad. In short, there's not a single character in this film I'd like to see on a t-shirt.
Rating: 
Summary: Holly Wood If She Could
Review: Cool World is a more mainstream effort from Ralph Bakshi (Lord of the Rings, Wizards, American Pop) than some of his other works but it still shows his genius.There exists a two-dimensional world called Cool World. Sometimes our worlds overlap. In Cool World, humans are Noids and cartoons are Doodles. Brad Pitt is a Noid who has been stuck there for years and has been acting as a detective. The villain (if you want to call her that) is Holli Would, a sexy, talented and smart doodle who wants to get to the Noid world. She plans to do this by having sex with a cartoonist who thinks he created Cool World for a comic book. Pitt works to prevent this from happening as the results could cause the destruction of both worlds. But Pitt has his hands full as Holli is no mere brainless bimbo. The effects are wonderful as cartoon scenery goes from drawing to prop seamlessly. While Cool World looks a little like Toon Town (Roger Rabbit) with its faces on buildings and twisted landscape, but these are not cute toons (although the Tex Avery-style wolves do make an appearance). A fun movie with adult themes and unique imagery.
Rating:
Summary: Of mild interest only
Review: Cool World is a very disappointing film. While the concept is interesting, the execution leaves much to be desired.
Rating:
Summary: Coloring with chopsticks
Review: Don't listen to Leonard M. As for these other nay-sayers:
"-oh, stop whining people - its a cartoon! And a good one. I would buy it if it were on DVD with Letterbox. Cool World soars, literally. From dimension to dimension, from black top speedway to ultra level dreamscape; there's colour, goofy critters running around, imagination and short skirts. There's Gabriel Byrne - Yum! And then there is Kim Basinger: Yowza! - she's de'lish, she's zany, she can sing, she knows how to make fun of herself, has a good time and it shows. She's not afraid to take risks.
She's so beautiful to watch both as a 'toon and in reel life.
She is: HER KIM-NESS. Cool World is a treat for Kim fans. Her detractors are just jealous.
Please tell the movie folk to release this wonderful odyssey of a film as DVD/Letterbox - pronto.
Miss Holli Would
So would I! kmg
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