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littlealeta · 8 months ago

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Tom and Jerry (2021) Review

LONG BLOG! IF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ THIS BLOG, SCROLL DOWN TO THE OVERALL SECTION FOR A TL;DR and ALETA REWRITES

Just to let you know, I didn’t want to watch this movie. That’s why I put it off for so long. I only watched it because my ex-mutual on Twitter is bonkers for it and keeps harassing people who criticize the movie with his think pieces. So, for some reason, I was curious to see if he was right to defend this film. And… I personally don’t know what he sees in this movie. Clearly, he likes the Tom and Jerry stuff, but that’s only a small part of the film that doesn’t even compare to the plethora of other major problems this film has.

Story

At first, the story starts off ok. I don’t know how Tom and Jerry wound up in New York City or why Tom is trying to be a jazz pianist when he should be going around catching Jerry, but Jerry, meanwhile, is trying to find a home and live a decent life, which is a much more reasonable plot. Unfortunately, Jerry decided to be a jerkass for whatever reason and cheats Tom out of his donations. Their rivalry causes a woman named Kayla to lose her job (somehow) and she has to re-apply in a month. Because of this, Kayla gets the bright idea to manipulate her job applicant into giving her her resume to use to her advantage. At this point, I’d rather be watching Tom and Jerry because Kayla is such a toxic protagonist and I was hoping that the movie would end with the job applicant punching her, getting fired and thrown out into the streets (spoilers it does not). She is hired to help a couple plan for their wedding (which I don’t know why it even needs to be there, it’s the most pointless part of the movie, but ok). And then, the movie gets kinda interesting when it switches back to Tom and Jerry trying to fight each other, this time, because Jerry is intruding the hotel.

Unfortunately, the adolescent draft plot decides to say “fuck all of that, let’s make Tom and Jerry friends”, almost like this movie is trying to remake the 1992 film. Human characters take the focus? Check. Terrible music? Check. Tom and Jerry are homeless? Check. Tom and Jerry trying to be friends? Check. Young girl as the protagonist? Check.

Tom and Jerry end up rudely interrupting a baseball game and get arrested by animal control. Wedding gets ruined because some dumbass decided to bring wild animals to it. Yatti yatti yatti. It just gets worse and worse.

And we have to get the all is forgiven ending because this is for kids. And kids, I guess, are too sensitive to see people get consequences for their actions, because it reminds them of the reality of what happens when you behave poorly.

Two questions: Wasn’t this movie about Tom and Jerry again? Why are we teaching kids that it’s okay to steal someone’s resume just because you don’t have a job and are jealous of some rare lucky people living their best life? Sure this insecurity might be relatable to teenagers, but this is a family movie, it doesn’t need to cater only to Gen Z. Having a character commit a crime because she’s insecure just makes her come off as extremely petty and immature and overall, not sympathetic. And have the other characters forgive her just because “she made a mistake” is even more toxic. She should be thrown in jail and have this shit permanently on her criminal record.

And that’s all the film does, is force in random 21st century pop culture (including some that are dated) just to cater to the Millennial and Gen Z crowd. What about the older people that watched Tom and Jerry? What should they take away from this? There’s nothing wrong with modernizing Tom and Jerry, but that doesn’t mean you need to contrive every possible modern reference under the sun.

Characters

Besides the complaints I made about Tom and Jerry in the story section, they were actually one of the better parts of the movie and they were portrayed alright. Their antics are still witty like the cartoons and Tom even gets a devil and angel on shoulder thing which is also portrayed cleverly. I would say every Tom and Jerry character mostly keep to the spirit of their cartoons. It’s too bad that they’re not in the film more.

The human characters on the other hand, are all subpar. Most of what they say are either punny, cornball dialogue or pop culture references, and it often feels terribly contrived. Often feeling dumbed down to kids or just clearly phoned in.

The only characters I thought were kinda okay were Terence (because he’s the most normal person in the film) and Joy (just because I think she’s neurodivergent, unfortunately, she’s often played off as a joke and the other characters treat her like some horror movie character (abelism much?)).

Kayla is an all around horrible person and character who’s just a complete self-absorbed jerkass to everyone in the hotel. I don’t mind watching horrible people/antiheroes in fiction, but this character does not get any comeuppance for her actions and the character development she kinda got felt shallow and forced and like she didn’t really regret her actions because she just makes it out to be a “mistake” instead of something she should genuinely atone for. Secondly, this is a Tom and Jerry movie, this whole subplot has no place being there. I think in a movie that doesn’t star Tom and Jerry or any franchise character, this could’ve been an interesting plot. Someone going through hell and back to get a job, even if it gets in the way of other people. However, her only motivation to get the job was because she temporarily lost her other one and because of her own jealousy of other people, which makes her come off as petty. Especially when she’s worked in other hotels and was told she can re-apply in a month. If she was extremely poor and was suffering, that would’ve at least made me understand the character more. But no, she had a well-to-do job, she’s living a decent life, yet she wants to be at the top of the food chain.

There’s this black guy who Kayla has this weird thing with. They’re not a couple, but they meet one time, he disappears for most of the movie, and then he turns up out of nowhere at the end. There’s a hotel boss that should also be fired because he lays off Terence (who’s done nothing wrong) for Kayla and Tom and Jerry’s mishaps. The human characters, in general, have a thing for finding fault with innocent people for petty reasons. I don’t have much to say about anyone else because they don’t really have much of a personality.

And then we have Chef Jackie who's clearly an Asian rip-off of Gordon Ramsay. Yay... more stern Asian stereotypes.

Animation/Acting/Music

Usually, I don’t talk about the technical aspects of films, but oh boy, do I have a lot to say here. The animation, I would say, is smooth by itself, but when placed into the real world, it feels like they don’t belong there.

If you look at Who Framed Roger Rabbit, the cartoon characters blend in with the real world. The real world looks gritty and dark and the cartoon characters look gritty and dark and the lighting on them reflects the lighting of the real world. If you look at Tom and Jerry, they just look like smooth 2D characters stickered onto this rough three-dimensional world. Also, why every creature has to be animated and why this takes place in a live action world is never explained. Are insects also animated? I don’t remember seeing them.

Spike’s saliva though….wtf…? Are you sick?

The soundtrack has to be the worst soundtrack I’ve seen in forever, and I’m usually impressionable when it comes to music. Seriously, what are rap and r&b doing in a Tom and Jerry movie? It would be something if they actually sounded good, but they don’t. They’re all some of the worst songs I’ve ever heard. Tom gets autotuned and Let’s Get Married is ruined by some fucking hip hop.

Acting is a mixed bag. Sometimes the actors put humor and energy into their performances, sometimes they sound phoned in, and sometimes they don’t even even care about their roles, and frankly, I don’t blame them. I do think the rapping pigeon voice is miscast, though.

Overall

To start with the positives, the Tom and Jerry scenes are ok. Their antics and quirks capture the humor and charm of the cartoons perfectly. There are some good ideas here, with Jerry trying to find a home and he’s stealing things to have for his home and this causes mayhem inside the hotel. Meanwhile, Tom is enlisted by the staff to get rid of Jerry. And that’s about it in terms of major positives, because oh my god, does it feel like a different person wrote the human parts.

The world and story Tom and Jerry are caught up in are chock-full of pointless references, idiocy, contrivances, dumb middle-school type humor, and a mediocre cast of characters. If they’re not flat like the couple, they are a mean-spirited bunch like, unfortunately, our protagonist, who takes up what should’ve been the cat and mouse’s screentime. And even the good people like Terence and Joy, are often at the expense from the mean-spirited cast. The story of Tom catching Jerry is thrown out the window for a redo of 1992 with them becoming friends because our dumbass human protagonist says so. And then, the rest of the third act is just a bunch of mess because of the stupid decisions the characters make.

The theme encourages kids to forgive a criminal if they happen to steal a resume just to get the top job where they OBVIOUSLY show how unskilled they are. I am so glad this movie is forgotten, unfortunate that it is popular on Netflix.

The cartoon designs clearly don’t belong in this world. Every animal is a cartoon for some unexplained reason. Soundtrack is complete dogshit, nothing about it is good, it’s probably the worst soundtrack I’ve heard in forever. Acting ranges from wooden emotions to awkwardness at attempting to charm the audience with their cringy dialogue to ok there’s effort put into it to the rapping pigeon’s voice not fitting.

I give Tom and Jerry (2021) 4.1 bells out of 10.

For the people that are saying Tom and Jerry can’t make a good movie, go watch The Magic Ring. Maybe it’s not particularly great, but it’s so much better than this crap.

In an Aleta Rewrites story, I would make the story about both Tom and Jerry trying to find a home. They don’t want to live with each other, which is what starts their rivalry. Then, when Jerry gets to the hotel, we can still have the plot where Kayla enlists Tom to catch Jerry while Jerry is stealing from the hotel (and other places) in order to use them for his new home. This is where the action starts. Jerry has to avoid being captured and getting his items taken away. Eventually, maybe a bit after the All is Lost moment, Jerry can build himself a new home (in a box or something) that starts a third act conflict, since this could be where he ends up running into the Alley Cats. And then, the movie, I guess, ends just like how the final product did, with Tom and Jerry still being homeless and down on their luck and continuing to chase each other, because the cycle just never ends. Make Jerry the villain instead of Kay… I mean, Terence. Get rid of the wedding and job applying parts because they are not necessary.

#tom and jerry #tom and jerry 2021 #chloe grace moretz #michael pena #rant #review #hbo #warner brothers

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