Cinema
FernGully — The Last Rainforest ('U', Odeon West End) Daydream Believer ('15', selected cinemas)
Nauseous nirvana
Vanessa Letts
The new cartoon from Australia, Fern- Gully — the Last Rainforest, is an ecological fable for children about a couple of lum- berjacks who are bent on the destruction of a colony of jungle laeries'. The makers call it 'ultimately a timeless celebration of life'. Very commendable and all, except that the minute you've been exposed to the upbeat Opening chorus 'Everybody now/ Life is a magic thing/ Yeah Yeah' you feel like You'd rather be sick than listen to a word of What follows.
. Sadly, the debate in this cartoon is not just pompous but moronic as well. 'Acid rain falling down like egg chow mein' is one of the more suggestive lyrics. And do the makers seriously believe that young- sters nowadays are going to sucker for the Idea that 'everyone can call on the magic Powers of the web of life, you only have to find it in yourself? — this, what's more, as a solution to rainforest destruction? People in Fern Gully are represented by Californian surfer-boys with Bergasol tans and pert lit- tle noses, but the degree to which these human beings are actually to blame for the demise of their environment is left ambigu- ous. They puff on dirty old fag-ends and Chomp down pizzas and dairy products, and that is the extent of their wickedness. This is is pretty galling for the audience con- sidering that the film itself is prefaced by a Whole load of advertisements for various Children's junk foods including Mcdonald's. One looks in vain for anything with a bearing on real life, say politics and eco- nomics, or even aboriginies. Instead, the film goes for evangelical archetypes like there's no tomorrow, presumably to stress that there might not be. Turning her back 9n the haven of FernGully, the faerie hero- ine Chrysta picks up teenage yobbo Zak Young, and eventually, finding 'the hero in herself forfeits her own life for the sake of the planet. This causes dismay amongst the aerie brethren. `Aw Chrysta's gone,' one cries out. But no. To general relief, Chrysta rises out of a liana and Zak and his mates are Initiated in woodland wisdom. To cap it all, we have a gratuitous and bizarrely cosummated romance between Zak and
Chrysta in a ridged tunnel beneath Fern- Gully — 'Even though the winds of change may come sweeping', the lyrics drone on boringly, 'It's still a dream worth keeping'. One wishes film-makers would resist this kind of sentimentality, as it only makes for disappointment later in life. Still, some- where, deep in the impenetrable jungle of eco-virtuousness, there is the lone sardonic voice of Robin Williams, playing Batty the lab-damaged flying-fox. Here at last is a degree of irony the audience can relate to, and it sticks out like a freak aberration.
I could forgive FemGully a lot, if it weren't for the awfulness of the animation. The faces of the cartoon characters are almost too grotesque to look at and Fern- Gully, which is supposedly the rainforest equivalent of nirvana, is coloured in the glutinous avocados and sunset yellows of the most hideous concept bathroom. According to the credits a team of about 70 draughtsmen collaborated in this outrage. All the same, as I casually spat some chew- ing gum onto the pavement on my way out of the cinema, it did seem rather a shame that a film this well-meaning should founder so disastrously on its own good intentions.
Daydream Believer, a sex 'n' stud version of Equus, is Australia's other bizarre con- tribution to the world of cinema this week. Nell's father bit her at an early age, and consequently she thinks she is a horse and has hang-ups about sexual relations. But this is not necessarily a bad thing. A sympa- thetic psychiatrist advises her to eat carrots and whinny, and eventually the fact that she can talk to horses wins over south Lon- don stud owner Digby Olsen (blue-eyed Martin Kemp). 'You're a real one off, intcha,' says Digby, and so they fall in love. Daydream Believer is easily lampooned, but even so I can't help harbouring a secret admiration for an apparently mainstream film equipped with a plot which is absurd from whichever angle you look at it.
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