Rugrats in Paris: The Movie

After the box office success of the 1998 film, The Rugrats Movie, it’s not a surprise that Paramount would want another shot at releasing another theatrical picture. Given the fact that Rugrats was still one of Nickelodeon’s most popular, as well as longest lasting, TV shows, it only made sense to give it another go two years later with Rugrats in Paris: The Movie. Upon its release, the results were roughly about the same as they were previously, but not met with the same kind of surprise success. After all the babies and their families attend a wedding, Chuckie Finster (voiced again by Christine Cavanaugh) starts to feel a little bummed out that he doesn’t have a mum, with his father, Chas (voiced again by Michael Bell) noticing this, and decides to try and start dating again. This plan will need to go global however, when Stu Pickles (voiced again by Jack Riley) is called to Paris to fix up a malfunctioning Reptar robot he designed. With everyone coming along including Tommy (voiced again by E. G. Daily), Phil and Lil (voiced again by Kath Soucie) and Angelica (voiced again by Cheryl Chase), the babies try to help find Chuckie a new mommy, with his sights being set on the princess of the Reptar parade, whom he tries to meet along with the help of a new baby named Kimi (voiced by Dionne Quan). As this is going on, the child-hating woman who runs the park, Coco LaBouche (voiced by Susan Sarandon) is trying to earn the favor of her supervisor, Mr Yamaguchi (voiced by Mako Iwamatsu) in order to take over his position, and she plans to do so by wooing Chas and marrying him in order to give off the image of a caring woman. With Kimi’s mother, Kira (voiced by Julia Kato) being forced to help Coco as her assistant and with Angelica assisting after being given the promise of her own personal parade, Chuckie will have to grow braver than he ever was before and show his father that Coco is not a fit to be his new mother. Doing better critically than the first film but not making as much at the box office, Rugrats in Paris provides for fans of the show with everything they’d expect from a typical episode outing, no more and no less. While certainly not strong and ironically being a little too juvenile even for its premise, it is also a perfectly harmless film that will entertain its target demographic perfectly fine.

This movie was made before the release of the seventh season, and therefore introduced a few new characters that would become staples like Kimi and her mother Kira who would become Chuckie’s new mother and sister, essentially doing what the first film did with introducing the character of Dill and inserting him into the main roster without doing the origin in the show. You can also feel the usual sequel tricks that are used by a popular franchise that doesn’t really rely on storytelling, including putting a side character in the main role, a heavier focus on subplots that go nowhere, inserting as many of the main cast in as possible regardless of how many of them are used, and travelling to a new location (usually a marketable real-world location) in order to bank on familiar locations. With this formula in mind, the film doesn’t come across as manipulative or lazy for doing so and is presented in a way that does feel in line with the original series. The first film did get some criticism from critics for its weirdly dramatic tone and how seriously it took what was supposed to be a risk-free day-in-the-life kids show, whereas this film is delivered in a very comical, baby-friendly, even slightly childish, and gross demeanor that never takes itself too seriously. The plot is very simple and despite having a few things to focus on, doesn’t overcrowd itself, it’s very short with only a 78 min running time, and there’s a lot of goofy moments, loud pop songs and frantic bits of animation to keep the kids distracted, but just enough of a stable heart at the film’s centre to keep it from being a mindless time-waster. While the film’s directors, Paul Demeyer and Stig Bergqvist, didn’t direct any episodes of the show, they have been associated with Nickelodeon in the past through shows like Aaahh! Real Monsters, and The Duckman Show, so they know the studio’s style of comedy and pacing, and can make the transition nice enough. With that said, even if it does work for its target audience and is entirely acceptable for what it is, it’s hard to say that it’s really anything that memorable or even that effective. The writing by J. David Stern, David N. Weiss, Jill Gorey, Barbara Herndon, and Kate Boutilier is never funny and contains a lot of juvenile puns and potty humor (it is a show about babies, but at least have some dignity), the flow of the story is ironically a little too quick so its hard to really care about anything that’s going on, and the whole thing feels more like an extended episode or special rather than a proper movie (which the first movie to its credit, at least felt like).

Considering how simple most of these characters are, it’s pretty hard to really mess them up and while none of them are particularly interesting to watch, it doesn’t feel like any of them are done wrong here. Honestly, the only really noticeable flaw is that most of the ones outside of the core five have to struggle to get screentime. While all the babies get attention and people like Chuckie, Angelica and Chas feel properly focused on, the rest contribute next to nothing in the film and sometimes only get singular lines to remind people they’re in the movie, with the parents of the kids suffering this the most. While some of this is excusable, the fact that this also happens to Kira and Kimi is very bizarre, as it doesn’t allow the audience anytime to really get to know them or why they should be excited for them to be main stayers. Kira and Chas don’t get a lot of time together, so they barely form any chemistry outside of the last few minutes of the movie, and while Kimi seems like a perfectly fine character, she’s barely given enough time to form her own identity and show what she would bring new to the table (it was probably just a reason to get another girl in the group as well as add some form of diversity into the show). The only characters that leave a little bit of an impression are the villains, with Coco being a second-rate Cruella de Villa, but still providing an entertainingly shrill character, and John Lithgow as her French accomplice, Jean-Claude, who isn’t as distracting as you’d expect him to be. Given the fact that this was the last movie that Christine Cavanaugh worked on before she passed away, it does make it a little bittersweet in that regard, but it’s not really like any of the actors are doing anything they couldn’t do in their sleep already, it’s not a movie that really tests anyone or allows them to be really funny or dramatic. What’s more surprising is the amount of celebrity cameos this film has, no doubt added in after the success of the first film. It ranges from big hitters for major characters like Susan Sarandon and John Lithgow, to small cameos from people like Mako, Tim Curry, Debbie Reynolds, Kevin Michael Richardson, Billy West, Charlie Adler, Casey Kasem and Dan Castellaneta, its pretty surprising, but might be a bleed over from cameos within the show (otherwise, it would just feel random and wasteful)

The movie had an increased budget of about $10 million from the first film, which would make you think that it would increase the look of the visuals, but instead it feels like it all went towards getting the celebrities into the film rather than increasing any of the quality. This isn’t to say that the film looks bad in any way as it’s still bright, colorful, fluid, gets the unique animation style across and even portrays the other cultures in a distinct manner while still keeping its sketchy abnormal personality (the way the villains are constructed do make them more entertaining and memorable). It does still feel like an upgrade from the show, but not an extreme upgrade and certainly not to the level of being cinema-worthy. Not to beat a dead horse, but the first movie did have a few interesting bits of animation that were trying to be a little higher grade than what would be expected on a series, and had appropriately cinematic angles, lighting, and atmosphere to it, whereas here, everything just kind of looks the same all throughout and isn’t even that interesting to look at by comparison. The idea of setting the film in a Japanese-inspired theme park does result in a few cool buildings and even some fun real world tie-ins (making a dramatic musical with Reptar being akin to Godzilla is a pretty good idea), but it never goes far enough to really have an identity or even showcase it very well. Despite being called Rugrats in PARIS, the city of lights isn’t really shown off that much or even represented, with the film being a lot more Japanese-focused than anything (they could’ve just set it in Tokyo and gotten the same results). Outside of the climax taking place around famous French landmarks, nothing about this movie uses Paris in an effective way and therefore doesn’t feel like that interesting a location. As would be expected from a kid film during the early 2000s, it is packed full of pop songs (either already existing or made up ones for the movie) and while none are truly terrible and they do match the vibe and time period pretty effectively, it doesn’t help change the film’s pretty childish demeanor.

Rugrats was a brand that even after it stopped airing and disappeared for a while, wasn’t left behind by those that grew up with it (even though its recent revival was quickly cancelled and deleted after only one season, so it must not be a huge crowd), and Rugrats in Paris feels like a movie that appeals more to its fan base than to casual moviegoers. The first film ironically reached taller than its baby-sized feet could push toward and couldn’t hit the same kind of resonance as this film seems like it did, which is not the most gripping or interesting material, but does provide what its audience seems to be looking for and offer something harmless and overtly childish and silly, but not cynical or inauthentic. While the first film might technically work better as a feature film with better pacing, character dynamics and visuals, this movie is a little more entertaining overall in spite of some dumb writing and poor story pacing. It doesn’t pretend to be a meaningful sap-fest like the first film, It looks fine, it sounds okay, a lot of the characters aren’t too annoying, and it does have a nice heart at the centre of it, so in the end, it could be worse.