Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue

1990
5.8| 0h30m| en
Synopsis

Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue is an American animated drug prevention television special starring many of the popular cartoon characters from American weekday, Sunday morning and Saturday morning television at the time of this film's release. Financed by McDonald's and Ronald McDonald Children's Charities, the special was originally simulcast on April 21, 1990 on all four major American television networks: ABC, NBC, FOX and CBS, and most independent stations, as well as various cable networks. McDonald's also distributed a VHS home video edition of the special, produced by Buena Vista Home Video, which opened with an introduction from President George H. W. Bush, and First Lady Barbara Bush. The show was produced by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences Foundation and Southern Star Productions, and was animated overseas by Wang Film Productions Co., Ltd.. The musical number "Wonderful Ways to Say No" was written by Howard Ashman and Alan Menken, who also wrote the songs for The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast and Aladdin. The plot chronicles the exploits of Michael, a teenager who is using marijuana and stealing his father's beer. His younger sister, Corey, is worried about him because he started acting differently. When her piggy bank goes missing, her cartoon tie-in toys come to life to help her find it. After discovering it in Michael's room along with his stash of drugs, the various cartoon characters proceed to work together and take him on a fantasy journey to teach him the risks and consequences a life of drug-use can bring and save the world.

Cast

Director

Producted By

Southern Star Productions

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Reviews

Diagonaldi Very well executed
BootDigest Such a frustrating disappointment
Smartorhypo Highly Overrated But Still Good
Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.
emasterslake This is one of the few best half hour animated TV specials you'd find.Approved by Bush Sr. himself and NBC,CBS, and ABC.It's about a teen named Micheal who's addicted to drugs and he eventually steals money from his sister Corey to buy more.Corey finds out what he did to her piggy bank, but she was told not to tell their parents that Micheal is on Drugs.Things seem bad till some unlikely heroes show up to help Micheal's problem. And they are highly copyrighted cartoon characters! Every famous cartoon character you'd find from the old school Saturday Morning line ups are on a mission to talk some sense into Micheal that drugs are bad for him.Those who were around during the late 80s-early 90s won't have trouble in knowing who's who in this TV special.It has a great moral to it. And a fun way of telling kids to say no to drugs. And highly appropriate for all ages. Course for those who are parents just be sure to explain some parts to your kids when you watch this program.What's cool is they actually got permission to use more than 10 copyrighted characters. And they're even voiced by the actual voice actors that put life into them.It's really cool to see, don't know if it'll have a chance in a decent DVD release.But I highly recommend it to those who grew up watching the cartoons from 16 years ago.
ligl I was 9 when this aired, and in the habit of watching TV on saturday mornings, so I sure did see it.And it scared the living crap out of me.Drugs make your skin turn green and your eyes sink in, and your brain goes all haywire and you'll DIE!! The Muppet Babies said so!So, to experience the full effect of this movie, be 9 years old. Preferably 9 years old in 1990, or you won't know any of the characters. Alternately, you can appreciate it by just having a really keen sense of pop culture irony.Fun fact! A whole day of Congress was devoted to talking about this thing. It got gummint funding, so they talked about it, in the context of the drug war. The best statement made in the proceedings (as far as I remember, paraphrasing): "Gentlemen, we have a new weapon in the war on drugs. It is not a some tool or a some other tool or a caterpillar bred to eat cocaine . . . it is a cartoon." I wonder how many congresmen's eyes were rolling.Anyway, this thing is an amazing artifact. For the then-hip clothing of the kids, for the lingo, for the fact that it's a bunch of cartoon characters telling you that drugs are bad.
Rebochan This film spends a lot of time preaching against marijuana. However, the plot and visuals are so insane that it seems more like the poster-child for LSD.Plot: The heroic struggle of Michael as he battles his drug addiction while being subjected to the humiliation brought on by the likes of Winnie the Pooh and Papa Smurf.Yea, yea, there's a good message, but it's obscured by the fact that the writers have taken a rather stale PSA idea and tried stretching it into 30 minutes. This includes a song sequence, where you're told that there's a million, rational ways to say "No!" such as "I can't smoke pot, I have homework!"The writers can't make up their minds what to do with the characters they've brought in royalty-free. At first we see they all have to hide from the human characters, but within five minutes we see them all running around in plain sight without anyone noticing. Soon they begin interacting with the human cast, and the only one who's even slightly disturbed by this fact is not the drug-abusers, it's the little sister who talks to her teddy bear (Pooh, by the way.) Further, there's the little drug demon floating around. Because you know, pushers don't give kids drugs. He too is ambiguous - while he might be symbolic of Michael's addiction and hence is not supposed to be seen by other people, he laters goes and haunts little Corey to get HER into drugs. So I guess he's...uhhh.....moving on!The whole plot finally culminates in some insane sequence in which Michael is in what would appear to be the Saturday Morning Carnival of Souls, aka a theme park from hell where the various cartoon characters beat him up and ignore him and stuff. For example, Miss Piggy eats him in a sandwich and spits him out. If the writers were not high when writing this, I must recommend they try getting high because they can't get crazier than this. Of course, the film ignores the fact that Michael's been having highs for two years by this point, so why this tripping sequence would frighten him is beyond me.I realize I'm completely whaling on this film, but I actually just saw it again because I went through the trouble of tracking it down on eBay because of it's sheer infamy of being a BAD cartoon. The level of unintentional humor is is brilliant. Take this scene for example - Michael's dad is rooting through the fridge for a beer. He notices many of them missing and mentions it to his wife. The ever-observant Mom tells him "Don't worry, you probably just drank them last night watching football." While we're obviously supposed to be learning that Michael is drinking beer (in addition to the pot and crack), we instead read further in and realize - Hey kids, it's okay to have chemical dependencies as long as you're a grown-up! Scenes like this are worth the tiny price tag of this film. Oh yea, and the fact you get to hear Simon the Chipmunk say "Marijuana."
Synetech A truly impressive collection of characters. I remember seeing this long ago when I was a child. Now that I'm older I understand what a big deal it was that sooo many celebrities came together to allow a lot of the biggest animated characters to do this show. It should be shown again.