Audience Member
Despiste mixing two stories, the loyal sense to the original one makes the movie go on.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
01/25/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Notable for having two English dubs, I was actually lucky to stumble upon the British dub online. I can't give the movie a lower rating because the British dub exists but I can't give it a higher rating because the American dub exists. The English title is misleading, yes but if viewed as an adaptation of Asterix and the Soothsayer, it's actually quite faithful and for me, whenever the Soothsayer stuff overlaps with the Big Fight stuff, I find them to be funny moments. The British voice acting is unremarkable but okay though BRIAN BLESSED was perfect for the role of the Roman general because the Big Fight's Roman felt compelled to SHOUT EVERYTHING HE SAYS!!! The animators seemed to be having fun working on this movie, especially during the scenes taken from the Big Fight, though the stuff from the Soothsayer has its moments even if they don't live up to Uderzo's classic illustrations. We did get Cacofonix's kick-ass musical number out of them. But now we have to bring up the dreaded American dub. Changing the names was redundant because the names are already changed in translations but the vocabulary changes. Calling a menhir a "rock-ette"? Gotta shoehorn in Flintstones' rejected rock puns somehow. Asterix has puns, right? The US voice acting is annoying. I thought Henry Winkler was okay as Asterix and Impedimenta's voice actress wasn't that bad but I think that's only because she had experience with voicing characters from Franco-Belgian comic adaptations in the past. But my God, does it never shut up. In scenes that didn't need dialogue, they have people saying cringy sentences like "No, we'll wait until somebody invents the umbrella" Even Asterix and the Falling Sky's narrative made sense to use modern words like "computer" and "hot dog". And the narration. Yes, it is Tony Jay doing it but the narration is pointless because it's nothing that children couldn't have already figured out by themselves based off of visuals. To say nothing of the Roman's stereotypical Italian accents. At least in the adaptation of Asterix in Britain, it made sense to give the Gauls stereotypical French accents, annoying as they may have been. It also removes some of the wittier dialogue in favour of more mundane lines changing an insult regarding the freshness of Unhygienix's fish from the British dub and the original Soothsayer comic to what can be summarized as "Sorry man, they stink". So yeah, I can't rate the two dubs individually so these three stars will just have to make do. You really should consider seeking out the British dub online. It's telling that this is the only one from the animated Asterix movies from the 20th century that can't be watched in its entirety for free on YouTube. Hell, even the first and third live-action films got that special privilege.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
01/23/23
Full Review
duncan p
The childhood favorite, and with good reason. Despite a pretty misleading title, it's one of the best films in the series, with a good, pretty dark plot that focuses entirely on events in and around the village, rather than on an adventure to some exotic locale. However, it has been marred as of late with issues. Specifically, the DVD release comes with some really crappy dumbed-down dub aimed at American audiences, which obliterates any plot or emotional subtlety in the film, as well as screwing up a lot of the details (vitamin potion? Really?). Truly unfortunate that the much, MUCH better British version of the dub is so hard to come by, having last been released on VHS only.
So, basically, my score works like this: the score above is what the UK dub of the film gets, and knock an entire star off of the score to get my score for the US dub. If you can somehow find the UK version of it instead of the US version, no questions asked, go for it; don't let some executive moron's dumb decision about DVD releases screw up one of the high-points in the series.
Rated 4.5/5 Stars •
Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars
03/31/23
Full Review
Audience Member
This is one of the weakest of the animated Asterix movies. Due to its mix of two comic books ("The Big Fight" and "The Soothsayer") it looks quite overloaded and tries a bit too hard to be funny. What really saves it is the good animation that continued to improve over the years.
Rated 3.5/5 Stars •
Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars
01/28/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Very original. Very funny.
Rated 5/5 Stars •
Rated 5 out of 5 stars
02/27/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Saw this at the movies when I was a kid, now watched with my own 6-year-old. This film has stood the test of time surprisingly well. The wacky Akvavitix is the best bit by far, as well as the Roman soldier and his owl.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
01/29/23
Full Review
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