Live-Action Animation is such a tricky beast. Animation is known is for its wildly, over-the-top characters and actions that are generally impossible in the real world. Imagine trying to drop an anvil on someone’s head in the real world? Or hand them a piece of dynamite? The consequences of the real world don’t particularly apply to animation, as creatives are allowed to let their imaginations flow without much restriction. Now, this doesn’t mean that live-action films can’t have this same rule. The Home Alone series is essentially a live-action version of the Looney Tunes. However, generally speaking, animation tends to be livelier than the real world, so trying to blend the two together can be a hard balance if the world doesn’t particularly align.
Who Framed Roger Rabbit was one of the first movies to fuse this concept and it works because the live-action counterparts actually fit into the animated world. The characters are colorful, yet the rules are established on how this world runs from the beginning. It’s generally a fun ride from beginning to end and a prime example of live-action animation done correctly. Enchanted is another great film that actually plays up the fish-out-of-water trope that effortlessly blends action and animation together. The real world doesn’t follow the rules of animation, so when the stark contrast of rats cleaning toilets or Prince Edward popping out of a sewer bed happens, it is genuinely a funny experience when the real applications clash with the animated aesthetic. However, the genre really wouldn’t be popularized until movies like The Smurfs or Alvin and the Chipmunks came out.
Now, the genre itself has more hits than misses, with both Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Enchanted making over $700 million worldwide combined. It’s actually surprising that Hollywood didn’t start pumping out more of these types of movies given the success of Who Framed Roger Rabbit. That success continued with the string of kiddie affair, though unlike Who Framed Roger Rabbit and Enchanted, critics absolutely hated movies like The Smurfs and Alvin and the Chipmunks. Part of the problem is that the films didn’t really take advantage of the uniqueness of live-action and animation together. Having the two worlds collide isn’t enough to serve a satisfying story as Smurfs and Alvin relied on bland storytelling, slapstick humor, and low common denominator jokes to get through their runtime. These films pandered to children and stripped any possibility of making something interesting with the plot. To be fair, Alvin and the Chipmunks has always been…weird. Not only is it odd that three chipmunks operate in a world that doesn’t particularly feature talking animals, but the high-pitched singing voices was always annoying. However, Hollywood cares about only one thing: money. Of course, that isn’t me saying that quality isn’t a concern too. No filmmaker goes into production purposely trying to make a bad movie. Well, unless you’re making a Syfy exclusive movie.
Point is, these films were growing in popularity, but it didn’t particularly take long for the live action/animation hybrid to collapse under its own weight. Just like The Smurfs and Alvin elevated the financial status of the genre, they also dropped with each film as the quality was continuously ridiculed by critics and fans. Soon, the live action/animation hybrid type films faded in the mainstream, with a couple popping up here and there. The problem with live action animation clearly isn’t based on the audiences’ interest. It’s an interesting concept that can bring in both children and adults. Movies like Who Framed Roger Rabbit, Enchanted, or Space Jam did so well because they never pandered to one side of the spectrum. That’s where Smurfs and Alvin and the Chipmunks went wrong. The films went out of there way to target kids that it didn’t seem that they cared much about what adults thought about the respective features. Each new film such as Tom & Jerry and Space Jam: A New Legacy went this route. However, the biggest crimes that these movies commit is being incredibly lazy story wise.
Tom & Jerry isn’t an easy adaptation. Is it possible to make a feature with them? Yes, but some rules of the original cartoon have to be broken. However, it never felt that the filmmakers found a way to dance around a non-talking cat and mouse trying to kill each other. So, there’s a bunch of plots surrounding the beloved characters that nobody cares about. Space Jam: A New Legacy is just a rehash of the first film, minus Michael Jordan, sexy Lola Bunny, and a ton of Warner Brothers pandering. These films have an opportunity to create something truly unique but never capitalize on that notion. Audiences noticed. The recent string of movies felt more like cash grabs than original pictures that the world needed to see. Live Action animation will never die, but the genre needs to step up and introduce something bold and exciting so the spark run high amongst fans and critics.
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