Rating: Summary: Mr Schulz would come out of his grave... Review: ...if he could possibly see this movie!I am a life-long Peanuts fan, and I I heard that a new Film does come out (I am from Germany) I just had to get it!!! In all the years the animated Characters looked more and more similar to the Comic strip. But this film could have been done better by myself!!! The Characters dont look like themselfes. The Lip-Synch isnt given. AND the Characters are all drawn and colored on the Computer, wich doesnt fit at all to the old epidsodes. All Characters in the Film that doesnt belong to the Peanuts gang itself, look like a crossover between the Peanuts and Garfield. The Retrospective with Mr.Schulz is just the 30Year Charlie Brown Special, with some additionalcomments. (Althoug i never seen the the DVD before I had known every word. Because I have the Special in German on Video.) Collectors like me got it already. But anyone else... ...please dont buy! David Malambre, Germany (excuse my bad english)
Rating: Summary: Adults have been in MANY Peanuts videos Review: Actually, to those people on here that insist that adults have never been in any Peanuts videos before, you're wrong. Adults (both animated adults AND live-action adults) have been in MANY Peanuts videos (I can think of 8 off the top of my head). Additionally, if you check the credits on any of the videos, you'll note that Schulz did not draw the characters for animation, he was a cartoonist, not an animator. Personally, I love It's The Pied Piper, Charlie Brown. It's a great old tale with a new Snoopy twist.
Rating: Summary: Fun for Kids and Adults Review: Although, this one is done with a different style than the other Peanuts videos, we enjoyed this one just as much if not more. In this one, they show the adults and they really talk. The whole video had an upbeat mood, and there was music, dancing and humor. I just wish it was a little longer or included another video since it seems short. This video also includes an interesting look at Peanuts through the years with the creator, Mr. Schultz.
Rating: Summary: THE ADULTS ARE SEEN AND HEARD, MAN! Review: Awful! Stick to the older original cartoons. This is just terrible.
Rating: Summary: Horrible. The Worst I've Ever Seen! Review: Charlie Brown, Lucy, Linus, Peppermint Patty, Marci, Sally, Snoopy, Woodstock and all the rest of the gang, are as apart of our culture as anything else I can think of. Anybody who says they hate PEANUTS is out of their freakin' minds, I say.
All except when it comes to this particular video, IT'S THE PIED PIPER, CHARLIE BROWN. They can trash it like ISHTAR for all I care. Heck, I'd join in with 'em!
Why do I express such disgust over this short, you say? Well, for one simple reason (which other reviewers have commented on as well): Grown-ups are actually SHOWN! And they TALK! This is nothing short of blasphemy in the Charlie Brown universe!! The stories were always based on the kids' point of view, and dealt with childhood problems alone. Fully introducing adults into the picture destroys half the charm of the comics/series! Sure, adults were featured in the miniseries THIS IS AMERICA, CHARLIE BROWN, but since that was a nonfiction documentary series, that's a totally different case.
It saddens me that my 5-year old neighbor says that this is his favorite Charlie Brown video. He will clearly never fully understand and appreciate what PEANUTS is all about, what makes it so special, and why it is unique. Stick with the original classic specials from the 60s/70s, and the 80s TV series. WITH NO GROWN-UPS!!!
Rating: Summary: Not the Peanuts you remember, Charlie Brown... Review: Don't get me wrong. I love Schultz/Melendez animated films, and have amassed quite a library of Peanuts videos & DVDs. I have posted a number of 4- and 5-star reviews on Amazon. But "Pied Piper" is terribly disappointing. The Peanuts gang is relegated to, at best, a supporting role in this production, which is primarily populated by poorly-drawn townspeople who don't look like anything that has ever come from Charles Schultz's pen. The animation looks cheap and hurried (in many parts, they didn't even try to make the mouths sync with the dialogue). Even when the Peanuts characters do appear, they frequently do not look like themselves. A scene with Schroeder pops to mind -- he looks like a fourth-grader's attempt to draw Schroeder, rather than like the genuine article. The whole package -- the animation, the music, the story -- just doesn't feel like a Peanuts film. I grieve to think that this is being sold as some sort of capstone to the late Charles Schultz's career. Unless you're a Peanuts completist, your money would be better spent on any other Peanuts film. With all that complaining out of the way, I should note that the DVD does include a charming -- if a bit short -- retrospective and interview with Charles Schultz. That is a nice touch that I wish had been appended to a worthier program. I'm looking forward to DVD releases of other, classic Peanuts programs, and hope they include similar extras.
Rating: Summary: This is garbage. Review: I was wary about buying this after seeing another of the latter-day Peanuts specials, "It Was My Best Birthday Ever, Charlie Brown". That show was an all time low point in the Charlie Brown specials. But when I saw this at my local library, I decided to give it a shot. I think this one is just as bad. In fact, it's horrible! There is so little story that several scenes are here obviously just to fill up time. Scenes that show Snoopy playing the squeeze box on top of his house, mice line dancing, and city council members singing barbershop quartet music make you realize that this program should never have been produced. It seems like so much was jam packed into the 30 minute specials from the 1960s and the viewing time went by so fast. This special is also a half hour but moves so slow and seems like it's never going to finally die...uh, I mean end. I could watch the Christmas and Halloween specials a million times and never tire of them, but I could never imagine having to sit through this again. It would be too painful. The adults just don't work and a lot of the kids are not even Peanuts characters! Don't let the banner at the top of cover fool you. This is no "classic"!
Rating: Summary: It's not the same! Review: I'm a long time fan of Peanuts since my childhood and was very sadden with Schulz's death. I was excited with Schulz's very last video, but very disappointed as the style of his drawings are not the same. Schulz NEVER put adults in his comic strips or his videos which they appear with "honky" voices. I think Schulz probably died before he'd actually finished the drawings himself and someone else continued to finish the video by adding adults. "It's the Pied Piper, Charlie Brown" is such a dissappointment with adults. It's just not the same style drawings and having adults is a appalling. I would not recommend this video to others.
Rating: Summary: Zero Stars Review: I'm thankful that I took this loser of a cartoon out of the library instead of purchasing it. This is the worst Charlie Brown film ever made and the folks involved in its creation should be ashamed. Charles Schulz would not be pleased. First of all, it features adults! Charlie Brown is supposed to be a kids-only universe, where adults are not even audible, let alone seen. The grown-up animation looks nothing like the peanuts - it's as though modern animation had been cut and pasted into the show. The story line is stupid, there is no existential angst to be found, and Charlie Brown SMILES all throughout. AAAAAGH! If you love Peanuts, don't see this one - it'll break your heart.
Rating: Summary: More Like the Pied Accordianist, Charlie Brown Review: This is a pretty cute story, but I'd have to agree with some of the previous reviewers that it could've been done much better. Snoopy is the star of this story (playing an accordian instead of a flute), while most of the Peanuts gang (save Charlie and Sally Brown) are reduced to mere cameos. The music is done by David Benoit, who proves to have talent and included some of Vince Guaraldi's original standards in the soundtrack (though I still miss Guaraldi). I'll have to agree that the adults look nothing like Charles Schulz's style. At least in the This Is America Charlie Brown series, the adult characters looked like something Schulz would have drawn. They fit into the story well and didn't dominate the way the townspeople did here in Pied Piper (not to mention those mice, who are in more scenes than Snoopy). And what's with the 8 minutes worth of advertisements at the beginning of the video?! This is, after all, only a half hour presentation. The best thing about this video is the interview with the late Charles Schulz (which is why I gave this video 3 stars). It serves as a memory as to why we love Peanuts. If you're a collector, you'll probably want this in your collection. If you're not a collector, save your money.
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