Captain New Eyes has discovered that what children wish for in the middle future is to see real dinosaurs. So he travels back in time and feeds a group of dinosaurs some Brain Grain cereal, which makes them smarter and non-violent. Armed with this new kind and civilised attitude, the dinosaurs are sent to the middle future to make children’s wishes come true at the Museum of Natural History. But when they arrive, they make friends with a runaway boy named Louie and a neglected girl named Cecelia and they get sidetracked when their new friends run into the evil Professor Screw Eyes who has other, more sinister plans for the dinosaurs.
Another film that I was brought up on as a child, We’re Back is an interesting film from Steven Spielberg, that’s packed with music, comedy, memorable characters, and romance.
Captain New Eyes has discovered that what children in the middle future wish for is to see real dinosaurs. So he travels back in time and feeds a group of dinosaurs some Brain Grain cereal, which makes them smarter and non-violent. Armed with this new kind and civilised attitude, the dinosaurs are sent to the middle future to make children’s wishes come true at the Museum of Natural History. But when they arrive, they make friends with a runaway boy named Louie and a neglected girl named Cecelia, and they get sidetracked when their new friends run into the evil Professor Screw Eyes, the brother of Captain New Eyes, who has other, more sinister plans for the dinosaurs.
Admittedly, watching this film as an adult, I cannot see what I saw in this film as a child. It must have been the fact that the main characters are animated dinosaurs which are both friendly and provide great moment of physical comedy.
The film is very clever in that it both increases and decreases the junior audience’s fear of monsters: first decreasing it by showing the more sedate and friendly creatures under the influence of Brain Grain, and then decreasing it by showing what the dinosaurs were like in nature under the influence of Professor Screw Eyes’ Brain Drain. It’s an interesting mix to be sure.
The animation is great and, without a doubt, the musical number in the middle is the real star of the show. Watching that as an adult, that song Roll Back the Rock (to the Dawn of Time) still puts a smile on my face. I love it.
Featuring the voice talents of John Goodman, Rene Le Vant, Felicity Kendal, Charles Fleischer, Joey Shea, Yeardley Smith, Kenneth Mars, Walter Cronkite, Martin Short, and Julia Child, We’re Back!: A Dinosaur’s Story is a great family film packed with adventure, romance, a great random musical number, and comedy. It’s no Disney or Don Bluth production, and it tends to move forward very abruptly, but it’s not bad.
Roll back the rock. Turn back the clock. Roll back the rock to the dawn of time and sing this song with me.
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