Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius
From AwardAnnals
| Film: | Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius |
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| Director: | John A. Davis |
| Honors: | |
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| Distributor: | Paramount |
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Reviews
Amazon.com
Jimmy Neutron, the feature that launches Nickelodeon’s attempt to create a new children’s franchise, plays like a cross between Rugrats and Dexter’s Laboratory in outer space. Accompanied by his cyberdog Goddard, “boy genius” James Isaac Neutron (voiced by Debi Derryberry) invents fantastic devices that work only sporadically and with decidedly mixed results. The communications satellite he makes out of his mother’s toaster allows for a race of gooey, egg-shaped aliens to kidnap the adults in Jimmy’s town with the intent of sacrificing the parents to their chicken-god. Converting amusement park rides into spaceships, Jimmy saves the day, despite a few false starts and misadventures. Several of the characters feel like slightly older versions of Rugrats: smart-alecky Cindy (Carolyn Lawrence) resembles Angelica; sniffling nerd Carl (Rob Paulsen), Chuckie. The most original member of the cast is Sheen (Jeff Garcia), the maladroit devotee of superhero Ultralord—a very funny spoof of cartoon fandom. The characters look more like plastic toys than human beings. Instead of the thousands of individual hairs on the heads of the realistic figures in Final Fantasy, Jimmy sports a one-piece hairdo that recalls a soft-serve ice cream cone. The animation is weightless and the acting minimal, but the often quirky story carries the limited visuals and will appeal to elementary school kids. Rated G; suitable for ages 6 and older; cartoon violence, minor gross humor. —Charles Solomon
Barnes and Noble
What a blast! This brightly colored, computer-animated comic adventure received a much-deserved Oscar nomination for Best Animated Feature, which bodes well for the future of Nickelodeon’s Jimmy Neutron character. Retroville resident Neutron—the Boy Genius behind such inventions as a transportation bubble, a shrink ray, and a robot dog named Goddard (which defecates nuts and bolts)—makes Dexter from Dexter’s Laboratory look like Pauly Shore. But the plucky whiz kid is still “Nerdtron” to jeering classmates…until aliens abduct all of Retroville’s parents. It’s up to Jimmy to launch a rescue attempt (in spaceships fashioned from amusement park rides) and save the grown-ups from the egg-shaped marauders (voiced by Patrick Stewart and Martin Short). This being a Nickelodeon production, belches abound, the adults are clueless, seemingly cool kids are revealed to be cowards under fire, and girls are a mystifying, albeit alluring, species. But Jimmy Neutron really soars with its clever writing, which will tickle adults. When Jimmy tells his parents about wanting to communicate with advanced alien civilizations, his mother rebukes him, “I don’t care how advanced they say they are. If your father and I haven’t met them, they’re strangers.” The soundtrack is also hip enough to include the Ramones’ punk tune “Blitzkrieg Bop,” which blasts as the children momentarily celebrate being adult-free with an all-night junk-food bacchanal. Jimmy Neutron proves himself a hero for the brainy bunch and a friend to kids everywhere. Donald Liebenson
Related works
Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack
Jive Records again draws heavily on its roster of teen-pop stars and wannabes for this Nickelodeon film’s soundtrack album. The disc offers various tracks by ‘N Sync, Britney Spears, and the Backstreet Boys, while 13-year-old Aaron Carter delivers more mock-boasts and party-boyisms on three cuts, including “Go Jimmy Jimmy.” The cheerleading doesn’t stop there, as vintage punk-pop from the Ramones (“Blitzkrieg Bop”) and Go-Go’s (“We Got the Beat”) and a remake of Kim Wilde’s early-’80s hit “Kids in America” by No Secrets help fill out the disc. (Yet another new…
