The Rooster In Yellow- Let's Watch: Rock-A-Doodle!

Part 0: Foreword

Every once in a while, there is ia movie that will influence careers. George Lucas had Star Wars. Orson Welles had Citizen Kane. However, sometimes these movies will backfire, careers and livliehoods on which fortunes were bet upon disintegrating into smoke, the acrid barbs of bad reviews tainting the Hollywood air for years. One such film was unleashed by none other than Don Bluth, the animation genius, supposedly the animator who could do no wrong.

This.

Is.

That.

Movie.

Join me, brave tropers, as we gaze into the heart of insanity itself: the maelstrom of madness that lesser men call "Rock A Doodle".

There is no escape.

edited 10th May '10 3:47:44 PM by CrowT.Robot

Part 1: The Madness Begins

As the film opens, we gaze into the open void of space. We see the tendrils of the Milky Way. In retrospect, I'm very much reminded of a certain Maxis game when I look at this.

Aswe push through the ever-expanding cosmos, I half-expect to hear William Shatner informing us about the seven-year mission of the Starship Enterprise, but with a remorseful jolt back to reality I suddenly remember we're watching "Rock-A-Doodle".

And that's terrible.

To make matters even stranger, the music for this scene is posssibly one of the most jarring forms of Soundtrack Dissonance I've seen in a while. You see, the music being played is neither grand, nor eloquent. Instead, it's that sweeping string chord always used in shitty 1970's family comedies when the neighbourhood paper boy comes passing by tossing newspapers with improbable accuracy.

If I may quote a certain golden mechanoid that I identify with, "this is going to suck."

So, we push onwards through space, and we're treated to all these pretty views of stars and such, when suddenly, a planet appears! The shitty "here-comes-the-paper-boy" music gives way to a harmonica, so now it sounds a bit like the music you might hear from a boxcar-riding hobo or possibly a prison inmate. "What is this planet?" you ask yourself. Well, it's grey, and the credits are kind of obscuring it, but suddenly a sterotypical folksy voice breaks through and begins to tell us his exciting tale.

"Once upon a time," it says, "back before I knew how to tie my shoes..." Um, narrator? I don't think that's a standard unit of date measurement.

"...The sun... came up!", he continues. You know, like it does every morning? Now I think that the narrator is really trying to get us confused about the date. The sun, true to form, does come up, and I have to give them credit, this is actually a pretty nice sequence of the sun rising, solar flares and all. However, Mr. Drunk-Sounding Narrator ruins my momentary awe of this sequence by continuing his craptacular tale. "But what if," he slurs, "instead of rising up, like this, she took a look around, and decided to go back to sleep?" So shocked and horrified by this reversal of astrophysics, our Narrator feels the urge to mention that "it happened to us!"

"Well," groans the Drunk-Sounding-Narrator, as the camera zooms in closer and closer to the planet I can now positively identify as Earth, "let me tell you all about it."

This is where things get weird.

A solar flare/sunbeam/Death Star beam/LAZOR somehow stretches across the sky. As the camera moves fasterand faster to keep up with this... thing, clouds and such fill the camera, and as we plunge downwards, we hear the cry of "Cock-a-dooooooo!" The camera races across an extremely-poorly rendered barnyard, only to focus in on the throat of a singing rooster, dangling, vibrating uvula and all. Uh, ew.

Zoom back a bit, please?

As our newly-introduced hero hops of his rock, he struts across a garishly animated farmyard. To make matters worse, he feels the need to express his feelings in song. To push matters to some kind of critical mass of worseness, he decides to sing his song while imitating Elvis Presely.

Welcome to Hell, folks.

"Cock-a-doo, what a day," he sings, prancing around the farm. "The sun is shinin' brightly," he continues. "Cock-a-doo, sunny day, down here on the farm!" he wails. Suddenly, an evil looking raincloud bursts out of nowhere, horrifying the sun! (Who as already mentioned, is a girl,for, no apparent reason.) Feeling the need to intervene in the weather, our avian hero races off, Sonic-like, to save the day, singing his terrible Elvis-knockoff song all the while.

As he hops up onto a fencepost, he defiantly gazes into the face of the cloud, Fortunately, the cloud gives up without a fight, probably because of how horrible this song is. "Cock-a-doo, stay away!" he siings at him. "You big ol' li'l (?) raincloud, or I'll crow out loud, with this voice of mine!"

Yep, I think that's a pretty good threat.

His daily meteorlogical-phenomenon battling duties done for the day, he hops off towards the barnyard. He is followed by a bunch of chicks (No, not the hot groupie kind). As Chanticleer jumps around onthe heads of random farm animals, the Drunk Narrator, apparantly having emptied another bottle, decides that now is as good as a time as any to cut in. "This was our rooster, Chanticleer," he drawls, "and though it was true that he liked to horse around [...] that boy could sing!"

Though he's not exactly singing as much as he is just stealing from the vocal stylings of another, more talented artist. God, this guy's anoying. As he walks on top ofthe fence, we're treated to a shot of piglets breastfeeding. And Don Bluth here wanted a 'G' rating. Getting Crap Past the Radar, indeed.

"Well, my daddy taught me how to sing," howls that goddamned rooster, "and now this fork (?) means everything..." So plagarism runs in the family, now does it, Chanticleer?

Drunk Narrator continues his blathering narration, talking about how everybody had their jobs on the farm. (Am I detecting a huge Animal Farm similarity here? Next thing you know we'll have "Four legs, good, two legs bad!" But I digress.) Apparantly Chanticleer's was to bring up the sun, which doesn't seem like that hard of a job. "Hey look," exclaims the Drunk Narrator, who is himself probably trying to figure out what the fresh hell is going on here, "here's me tying my shoes." We see an old-looking cartoon dog struggling with a pair of sholeaces. So we finally get to see the Drunk Narrator, and I'm a little disappointed. Chanticleer and the Drunk Narrator (who shall hereby be referred to as 'Patau') have a pun-laden discussion about the subtleties of sholeaces. Chanticleer is then interrupted from this scintillating conversation by a bunch of chicken groupies, which are pretty creepy looking, and are about a third of Chanticleer's height.

Eventually, everybody gathers around the chicken coop to help sing this song, which is progressively getting worse. In the end, we see some kind of hideous squirell-thing play the banjo, and everybody sings the words "you better shine".

Patau then tells us all about how great Chanticleer is and how he kept everybody happy. "But all that changed," he continues, "before morning, before Chanticleer was even awake!" He says that last line like sleeping before daybreak is the worst act in existence. Yeah, Chanticleer! Shame on you for not waking up before daybreak. Although, if you think about it, it would always be before daybreak when Chanticleer woke up, because he's the magic rooster who brings up the goddamned thing.

"A stranger snuck onto our farm to stop Chanticleer from crowing!" Silly Chanticleer, if a stranger approaches you, just yell "NO!" and run in the other direction. If it's good enough for a scary-as-all-fuck Pooh puppet, it's good enough for you! Patau exposits, claiming that Chanticleer wouldn't give up without a fight. However, we see that the stranger has strapped razor blades to his talons. I don't care how crappy this movie is, that is awesome. I want a chicken with razor talons! Big fight, etc. etc.

Apparantly, the stranger was sent by the Grand Duke of Owls, who, if Patau is anything to go by, a "nasty fella." (Un)forutnately, Chanticleer survives the ordeal. However, the sun is coming up without his crowing! Fancy that- provable astrophysics would take precedence over a fable from the medieval era! All of Chanticleer's frineds gather around to mock him and just generally show that they're assholes. Patau, clearly deciding not to take a hand in the mockery, exposits that Chanticleer got kicked out of the farm and left to seek his fortune in the city, despite being a talking rooster that nobody would take seriously. Interestingly enough, the sun goes down as Chanticleer gets the boot, though everybody is too caught up in the douchebaggery to notice. "Then," says Patau, "came the rain."

This seems like a good time to let up for now before I break down in tears from the insanity of it all. Join me soon for another installment of this disaster!

edited 9th May '10 4:23:27 AM by CrowT.Robot

I quiver in anticipation, fear, and arrows.

Ha, I made that as a response to the intro, then you went and posting the actual opening.

Yeah, this movie is terrible. Your commentary is very clever, though.

edited 8th May '10 7:07:04 PM by Ronka87

Continuity Nod yay!

Part 2: The Plunge

Our tale of pride and the owl-aided downfall of the avian version of Elvis Presley is suddenly brought to a grinding halt as a little finger jabs at the monocle of the owl. "Who's that, Mom?" comes a shrill little voice, which I automatically hate.

It is revealed that this entire story so far was actually a picture book that a mother is reading to her child. What the hell kind of bedtime reading is this? "And then the rooster was shunned and mocked by all of his former friends and exiled from the places he loved. G'night!"

Anyways, as the mother repeats what was said previously, the Grand Duke is evil, he sent the Razor-Bladed Cockfighting Ninja Chicken of Awesomeness to kill Chanticeer, evil, blah blah blah.

"How come?" asks our inquistive young hero.

"Because," says the mother, topping herself in terms of sheer Narm, "he didn't like Chanticleer doing all that crowing, and bringing up the sun".

"How come?" asks the child in that smarmy way again. His mother, clearly grasping at straws, says that like all owls, he liked the darkness, etc. etc. (FUN FACT: Many owls also hunt during twilight and daybreak hours.) Some are also active in the day. However, she notes that owls like the rain. What the hell? Did Don Bluth really think that owls like being weighed down by water while trying to fly in poor weather conditions? Jeez, we're only in Part 2 and I'm facepalming...

Before Edmund can react, the door bursts open, and a cloaked figure stares ominously at the two. For a moment, I hope that it's Death, or maybe the Nightbringer, come to slaughter the entire cast, but sadly it's only the father, wearing a big black raincoat. Where's an Eldritch Abomination when you need one?

"This is my favorite part of the story," whispers Patau, who has apparently broken beyond the confines of his own storybook to interact with the real characters. "This is Edmund," he says. If you think about it, this opens up a whole other host of questions. Who's actually narrating this atrocity? The mother, or the talking dog? "Of course," continues Patau, still flagrantly violating traditional narrative approaches, "he didn't look quite like this when I first met him."

Apparantly, judging by his (and Patau's) little piece of exposition, there's a giant storm coming to the farm, and regretablly this one doesn't have a big grumpy face, bounce up and down, or can be repelled by folk songs. Dad needs "the boys" to sandbag the river, who has apparantly burst it's banks and is rising fast! Although we never actually see the live-acton flood in the same shot as the protagonists, we can be assured that it's there. Edmund, ever-ready to help out, asks if he too can join in the disaster preparation efforts.

"I'm one of the boyth," lisps our hero, but is quickly forced back into bed by his doting mother, who explains that while yes, he fulfills the mechanical requirements for "boy", he is not, techically, one of the "big boys" required for the task at hand. Denied of his primary bartering advantage, Edmund then tries to use the "big boy defence", by asserting the fact that he is, indeed, a "big boy." (For you locomotive geeks out there, Edmund is also claiming to be a 2-8-8-2 steam engine. Niche humor FTW!)

His mom and family go outside to put sandbags on the river and to bring in the animals. "I wanna help," whines Edmund in a way that is not at all endearing or charming. Fortunately, his mother tries tell him to rely on spirituality, and asks him to pray for the rain to stop. (On a side note, this kid looks exactly like an older version of the toddler from Its A Wonderful Life, who was also told to pray for help. However, that movie was charming, emotional, and witty, whereas this one is crap.)

Edmund's older brothers wonder if the National Guard is coming to help. By this point, the only way the National Guard could help is if they stormed the studio and pulled the plug on this mess.

Edmund decides to do what anyone trying to act mature would do- read a picture book about talking animals. As the family screams and staggers around in an attempt to look like they're in a storm and not in a wind machine, Edmund dons a Davey Crockett hat and realizes something- weather is not controlled by the logical interactions of hot and cold air, it's controlled by a cartoon rooster who sings like Elvis Presley! "We need Chanticwaiw!" he exclaims, and bolts to the window, attempting to summon an animated bird in an effort to save his family.

"CHANTICWAIW!" shrieks Edmund into the storm, once again attempting to sound cute and appealing but coming off as horribly irritating. "CHANTICWAIW!"

Suddenly, lightning strikes a nearby tree and all hell breaks loose.

Well, more hell than there already is.

The descent into madness has just begun, fellow tropers. Stay tuned for Part 3!

edited 9th May '10 4:54:33 PM by CrowT.Robot

I seem to vaguely remember this movie terrifying me as a kid.

^ Me Too!

BTW, you may want to boot up 'Friends on the Other Side' for the next part. Just saying.

I think I must've been sleep deprived when I first saw this movie... I remember up to this point and a little after, and then maybe I shut it off and had it returned? Or slept through it. One or the other.

It was a long time ago, and I don't remember which defense mechanism I used.

Denial, perhaps?

I've seen this too. I didn't think it was that bad, exept the weird narrative structure confued the hell out of me (ok, the part with the rooster is just a book. But why is the dog from the book still narrating? Wait, why are the characters from the book interracting with the life action people? Is he in the book now? WTF?)

And then this next part happens and after that my memory gets a little fuzzy. This is coming from someone who can remember tiny little details from practically every movie I've ever watched and been even mildly interested in.

Bad sign.

@Nomic: Trust me, it gets even more confusing.

Much, much, much more confusing.

I didn't like the "book is being read to a kid" narrative style in The Princess Bride, and was annoyed at the damn kid the whole time, even when I was a little kid.

Here it's even worse.

Show us, Crow!

Oh don't worry guys, the foundations of reality will soon collapse into a twisted mess soon enough.

Part 3: Slippage

"Edmund had the right idea to call for Chanticleer," says a bored-sounding Patau, "but he never could've guessed who would answer." Red, EEEEEVIL-looking smoke fills the room, and the Grand Duke somehow manifests, despite being a cartoon. So the storybook is real? Patau? A little help narrating here?

"Who awe you?" asks Edmund, completely oblivious to the fact that he had been reading about this guy less than five minutes ago. I mean, come on, kid. There's forgetfulness, and then there's forgetfulness.

AS a way of response, the Grand Duke growls that "you put your finger in the Duke's face'', which sounds like some kind of veiled, vaguely phrased innuendo. Angrily, he throws his monocle at Edmund. To complete the Mind Screw, the monocle turns real as it is hurled at Edmund. Of course, in true Rock-A-Doodle fashion, things are going to get wierder.

The Grand Duke continues his little villain monologue (trust me, it isn't the last one), and says, among other things, that he plans to eat Edmund. Suddenly, I feel a lot nicer towards this guy. "You see," he continues, "We creatures of the night have worked very hard to make absolutely sure that that bird does not return." he says. Hey, Duke, you do realize that you have between nine and twelve hours a night to do whatever you want, right? Just checkin'. Duke berates Edmund for calling back Chanticleer, because one wierd little kid with a speech impediment will surely resurrect a cartoon bird (I never thought I'd ever use those words in the same sentence). The Duke also makes it very clear that he "absolutley loathes rock-n'-roll [sic]."

As the Duke laughs evilly, he begins to upchuck what seem to be a swirling mass of Lucky Charms. "You're not eatin' me!" says our "hero", and runs as slowly as possible over to the door. However, this angers the Duke for some reason (Hey Duke, prey doesn't usually like to be killed and eaten, just so you know) and, using the power of his Lucky Charms, grows even bigger and eviller.

"Kittens are more digestible," says the Grand Duke, as he prepares to exhale more Lucky Charms magic around the room. Is it wrong to think of Salad Fingers saying that? I think so. Anyways, the magic spell turns everything into his room into a cartoon, for no real reason. So, does this mean that the Duke is subsuming his room into the picture book? Or that the picture book is coming into the real world? Or what? Patau, where the hell are you?!

"Edmund was about to have the most amazing adventure he'd ever had", continues Patau. Of course, I'm thinking that Edmund may have had a bit too many sleeping pills, but that's just me.

With a puff of his Lucky Charm breath, the room continues to become a cartoon. Edmund however, screams and vanishes, leaving only a pile of pyjamas. Yes! Hopefully that's the last we'll see of him. Wait... something's coming out of that sleeve... dammit. Sorry folks, he's not dead yet, he's just been turned into a kitten. A really ugly one, but still a kitten. Fotunately, it seems like the little runt may still be devoured, as the Duke brabs him by his neck and lifts him up. "Wake me up!" screams Edmund.

Suddenly, Patau finally gets up off of his ass and decides to have meaningful interaction with the other characters. He lunges thorugh the door, bites the Duke's ankle, and another badly choreographed fight begins. Despite not narrating the two previously mentioned mindfucks, Patau apparently still manages to mention that "this is where I come in," despite already being in the film.

As the two fight, Edmund races over to the cupboard and somhow manages to heft up a flashlight that's approximately his size. Holding it over his shoulder like a bazooka, he hits the on button and hits the owl squarely in the face. Now, here, most filmakers would decide to have the Duke blinded by the light, making him fly away, but not here. No, the Grand Duke is forcibly expelled from the room, blown away like he was just shot out of an airlock or something. Why? I don't know.

Dammit, Bluth.

Now that the danger has passed, Patau decides to get acquanited with the small, irritating creature with a speech impediment. "That was some mighty quick thinkin' there son," he drawls. "I would have walloped hiim if I didn't have my shoelaces untied!"

It seems that not even transformation into a nonhumanoid, two-dimensional form will stop Edmund from being irritating. "Why?" he asks, again. Patau finally gives us the reason why a cartoon dog wears shoes- he has a bad case of bunions and these prescription shoes aid his feet.

Uh, sure.

Movin' on, now.

Edmund offers to help the big oaf try and tie his shoes. However, as he reaches out, he realizes the full horror of what has happened to him! That is, he's turned into a cartoon cat with Dakota Fanning's hair. "Jeepers!" wails our protagonist-turned-anthro-cat. "I'm all furry!" Of course, as any Youtube Pooper will tell you his abysmal speech impediment makes sound like "I'm a furry." Dammit, Grand Duc, why couldn't you have turned him into someone who doesn't talk like Elmer Fudd on helium?

It's worth describing what Edmund looks like now. He looks less like a "cat" and more like some kind of hideous albino skunk/clown hybrid. His nose is swollen and entirely pinkish-red, his ears are tiny and barely visible, and he has a big patch of black fur over one eye. (This seems to happen all the time in cartoons, but I've never seen a dog/cat with these markings in real life.) I never thought I'd say this, but for the first time I've seen a cartoon kitten that's not cute in any way. Oh, and the speech impediment makes him really, really annoying.

Patau, being an ignoramus, tries to reassure him, not knowing the truth behind his traumatic change. "Well of course you're furry. You're a kitten!" Edmund tries to reassert the dwindling vestiges of his humanity and tells the dog that he's a little boy. However, his denial swiftly unravels as he looks in the mirror, and lets out a howl reminiscient of something out of The Exorcist.

"I'm a cat!" shrieks Edmund. "De Gwand Dook tuwned me into a cat!"

"Now keep your pants on," slurs Patau. Suddenly, Edmund realizes that he's buck naked! Fortunately, being a cartoon, he doesn't have any private parts to cover anyways. Overlooking this fact, Edmund takes a Davey Crocket doll and goes behind a mirror, and reemerges, having looted the clothes from a doll. So now he looks like a albino skunk/clown/1600's frontiersman hybrid. Next thing you know, he'll be singing "Alouette" and trapping beavers up and down the river.

As our feline hero looks at himself, he suddenly realizes that he's doing something that he would never have done as a human. "Yuck!" he exclaims. "I'm wicking myself!"

Don't jump to the wrong conclusion, my gutter-minded friends, no, he's just doing what any cat does, which is lick his hand (paw? Whatever.) Before we know it, I bet that Edmund will be saying that he was "ONCE A MAN! ONCE A MAN!" and so on.

Another installment of this mess wrapped up. Perhaps this entire film is a critique on reality. Maybe we are the cartoons, and Chanticleer and co. are members of the real world. Or maybe I'm just losing it. Next thing I know I'll be exclaiming that I'm a furry. Stay tuned for Part 4 or my imminent institutionalization, whichever comes first.

edited 10th May '10 2:27:00 PM by CrowT.Robot

And here I was expecting the flashlight to horrible scar the owl's face for the rest of the film. At least that would justify the toss across the room expulsion. And be pretty awesome. "Now it's personal you little pussy!"

Also I assume, for reality's sake, that the sun not shining is only metaphorical. The sun still works. It's just covered by eternal rain. Which jars me when it is considered a bad thing. I like the rain. I like storms. I hate it when rain and storms and owls get shafted with the evil stick.

EDIT: Also, interesting choice for a Live blog MST-fan. Will follow along.

edited 10th May '10 2:42:29 PM by NiftyLostKite

No, I'm pretty sure the sun is down. Otherwise, they wouldn't need Chanteecwaiw Chanticleer to bring it up. But I'm getting ahead of myself...

edited 10th May '10 2:51:44 PM by CrowT.Robot

Crow, I hate to break it to you, but you are a furry.

Anyway.

This is as far as my memory of the movie goes. I don't even have a clear image of what the cat-who-WAS-ONCE-A-BOY looks like, properly. Memory painted him as a ginger tabby. Anyone got a screencap?

Check out this link, it's about five minutes in.

Also, can I do what I want, 'cause a furry is free?

edited 10th May '10 3:19:11 PM by CrowT.Robot

Oh gods. I did block this out. I don't remember that cat at all.

Wow.

I have seen some dogs with that kind of coloration, but never a cat. I have no idea why some animators think that's possible.

Abnormal animal coloration is the least of this movie's problems. Just you wait and see...

Our recap continues with...

Part 4: Agony

Suddenly, Edmund smells something and runs off, an evil look on his face. His target? A cartoon mouse that could be glimpsed in the opening barnyard sequence. Yeah, Edmund! Give in to your impulses and become a cold-blooded killing machine! As the bespectacled mouse continues to wonder where they are, Edmund, continues the hunt. Kill 'er!

As he jumps up and hisses at her, the mouse gets scared and runs off. No, edmund, you're doing it wrong! You have to kill the mouse, not scare her. Kids these days....

Anyways, the mouse doesn't get killed and all the characters from the boook (WTF?) jump through the hole in the wall to join her. Patau continues to thnk of himself and wonders if anybody will ever tie his shoes. Edmund continues to whine about being a cat. So, business as usual. "Mom an' Dad won' even wekognize me!" he says (at least that's what I think he says).

"If we don't find Chanteecwaiw", moans Edmund. "It'll keep waining and waining and den we'll all dwown." I hate this kid more and more. Suddenly, a magpie comes out of nowhere and rambles about finding the city. Then him (Snipes, he's apparantly caled) and the mouse (Peepers,) have a fight,and everybody's just standing arond talking and being depressed and it's just AAAAARGH!

Sorry about that.

Edmund then berates the people that he just met and says that they made Chanticleer go away. He fails to mention that they're a bunch of douchebags, though. Patau tries to cover the animal's asses by saying that "they did wrong,"and that they're trying to bring back the Big C "to raaaise the suuuuun.".

Fortunately, Edmund manages to deus ex machina' the other aninmals, knowing that he's been to the city lots of times. If this farm is located so close to the city, it's not realy a farm, is it? Despite knowing how to save all of creation, Edmund still continues to play the role of lisping, speech-impedimented Thomas, and now velieves that he can't do anything because he's a cat (read: albino skunk/clown/Dakota Fanning/coureiur du bois.) Hey man, look on the bright side! You can manufacture your own supplies of vitamin C! (Troofax.)

However, Peepers tries to reassure him by saying that she's a mouse and she does a lot of stuff. She fails to mention that she has a voice that's almost as annoying as Edmund's and that she hangs out with a Jerkass magpie that has the same voice as Mandark and Sheen.

W Hat will happen next? Is Edmund a fwaidy-cat? Will Patau succeed in tying his own shoes? Will this plot make any more sense? Tune in next time and find out!

edited 12th May '10 6:28:15 AM by CrowT.Robot

I remember hating this movie when I was a kid because of that "Tying your shoes" motif. I couldn't tie my shoes until I was seven. It was like Don Bluth was mocking me personally.

I gave up learning to tie my shoes when I was 9. I can do them if pressed, but I prefer to just wear loafers.