“A point in any direction is the same as no point at all.”

Well, whaddaya know, another animated feature. This one’s a bit…odd though. The Point was made in 1971 as a made-for-TV movie based on an album and drug-induced children’s fable by singer/songwriter Harry Nilsson. The only reason I sought this out is because I watched it as a kid and it was weird as all hell.

Plot
So a father reads his son a bedtime story about a kingdom where everyone there has a pointed head, except for one kid who’s born with a round head. When he’s older, he gets a pointed hat, a loyal dog and earns the ire of the son of a powerful Count and gets exiled from the kingdom on the technicality of not having a pointed head and is sent into the Pointless Forest, where he meets all sorts of weird things before learning the moral of the story (that everything has a point, if you couldn’t guess already), and returns home.

Characters
The Father/Narrator: Originally Dustin Hoffman, then in subsequent releases/broadcasts, it was Alan Barzam, then Alan Thicke and then finally Ringo Starr for the home video version. Anyway, whoever it is, it’s a normal dad reading his kid a bedtime story. The Ringo version is the one I watched and he does a fine job of it.

Oblio: Mike Lookinland voices Our Hero, a decent kid who’s treated differently by the accident of his birth. Not much to his character though.

Arrow: Oblio’s loyal, blue and pointy dog. The badass of the film, because he’s never annoying and generally more observant of his environment than Oblio.

The Count: Lennie Weinrib voices our villain, a purple-bodied guy with a gigantic moustache and a surly attitude. He’s a jerk, his son’s a jerk, and he manipulates the rather foolish king into exiling Oblio. Like a jerk.

The Pointed Man: A really trippy, three-headed weirdo who Oblio meets in the Pointless Forest and tries to espouse some kind of nihilistic belief system onto the poor kid. Has a habit of popping in and out of sight to “his” own musical cue.

The Rock Man: Bill Martin voices a guy made of multi-colored pastel rocks that Oblio runs into in a ravine after evading giant bees. Gives the kid some vague advice and talks like he’s stoned….

…

Look, I need to apologize for that pun: I’M SORRY!

The Leaf Man: Paul Frees voices a guy who looks like a walking shrub that talks like Dom DeLouise who’s trying to get Oblio involved in the growing field of leaf selling. Probably not a direct drug reference, but it was 1971 so I’m not ruling it out.

Visuals/Effects
Directed by Fred Wolf, the film has a really unique visual style that has a lot of sketch-like, hand drawn elements to it by the animators. Sometimes its kind of charming, sometimes (like the Rock Man) slightly less so, and sometimes, like those bouncing pink ladies that never stop laughing, it strays into nightmare fuel. Still, its really memorable what the animators did.

Writing
Original Fable by Harry Nilsson, Story by Nilsson and Carole A. Beers, screenplay by Norm Lenzer, and additional story stuff by Fred Wolf. The story itself is a fairly inoffensive tale about accepting people different from yourself. Still, the ending is a bit…weird when you think about it. Spoilers on, though I doubt you’ll check it out for the story. Oblio returns home, people are happy and the Count tries to boot him out again, knocking Oblio’s hat off…only to reveal a point on Oblio’s head. Then suddenly, the heads of everybody and everything else in the town become rounded, except for Oblio. I guess this is all well and good, but the whole crux of the story was that Oblio was disliked for being different from the majority, and at the end of the movie, he’s still different from the majority…um...

Sound
The songs by Harry Nilsson are generally catchy and easy to listen to. Pretty nice, actually, especially “Everything’s Got ‘Em,” “Me and My Arrow,” and “Are You Sleeping?”

Conclusion
The Point is a weird little movie, but not without its charms. The songs are catchy and occasionally the animation is surprisingly engaging. Not recommended for everybody, but it’s a harmless enough little tale.


No trailer, but here's the clip of "Are You Sleeping?" since I rather like the song and it showcases the animation.

“Talking man hurt Hulk! Hulk rip off talking man's head!!”

Okay, I feel the need to preface this with something of an apology. The way the Octoverride worked out, a lot of stuff got bounced around. So while in real-time, I may have thrown in 2009’s direct-to-DVD animated Hulk vs. in to take a break from Dracula movies back in late September, you get a face full of Superheroes in January.

Plot
This actually is two short films. In the first, Hulk vs. Wolverine, we find the Marvel U’s most over-exposed mutant sent back home to Canada to investigate a Hulk who rampaged through several towns. And by “investigate,” I mean stab a lot. This only makes the Hulk madder, then both he and Wolverine get captured by the Weapon X Program, a shadowy Canadian government organization that was responsible for giving Wolverine his adamantium skeleton and is now staffed by superhumans that want to see Logan dead.

In Hulk vs. Thor, we get some Asgardian politics where the trickster God Loki summons Bruce Banner to Asgard, magically manages to separate Banner and the Hulk, then sends the Hulk to break stuff in Asgard while Odin is in the middle of his “Odinsleep” (essentially a long nap that leaves the rest of the gods vulnerable). Its up to Thor to put a stop to Loki’s machinations. And by “put a stop to” I mean hit things with a hammer.

Characters
Bruce Banner: The Hulk’s human form is voiced by Bryce Johnson, and puny Banner doesn’t show up much in these. When he does, its mostly to plead with people not to agitate him/the Hulk.

The Hulk: Fred Tatasciore (from Mass Effect and the animated Iron Man movie) is great as the perpetually angry big green guy. Basically, this hulk is the “dumb but talkative” version (which is  a personal favorite) which leads to some good comedy. Of course, the Hulk is also a monster when it comes to fighting, and the battle with Wolverine is particularly brutal.

Wolverine: Steven Blum, who’s one of the big names in voice acting for the last decade, and the current official “voice” of Wolverine, plays…wait for it…Wolverine. Wolvie’s the grumpy, short, nearly impossible to kill Canucklehead we’ve all grown to love through overexposure, and the PG-13 rating of the movie means that he and the Hulk can just go nuts on each other.

The Weapon X Department: There’s a bunch of them, so let’s work our way through the list.

The Professor: Tom Kane is the bald, sinister director of the program, and has a claw for one of his hands.

Sabertooth: Mark Acheson is Wolverine’s arch-nemesis with almost comparable healing and no Adamantium skeleton. He’s embraced the feral side of his personality and, well, he’s always been boring.

Lady Deathstrike: Janyse Jaud is a Japanese lady with some creepy cyborg arms who’s had a messy past with Wolverine.

Omega Red: Colin Murdock is a Russian Super-Soldier/mutant with a pale complexion and two energy draining tentacles.

Deadpool: Nolan North steals the show as the completely insane Merc with a Mouth, Deadpool. And unlike that terrible Wolverine: Origins movie, he has the powers, personality, motormouth and costume of Deadpool. Possessing a healing factor even more powerful than Wolverine’s and a complete lack of inner voice or restraint, Deadpool is awesome for his one-liners and the fact that at one point the jumps onto the Hulk’s back and shoves a live grenade into the big guy’s mouth. It doesn’t work, of course, but major badass points for trying. This is Deadpool done right, and for that he’s the badass of both films, even though he’s only in one.

Thor: Matthew Wolf voices the Asgardian Thunder God who’s got to keep things together when Loki brings the Hulk to town.

Loki: Graham McTavish voices the always asshole Loki who really just wants to see his legitimate half-brother Thor suffer and/or die. Unfortunately, letting the Hulk loose in Asgard isn’t a good idea.

Amora the Enchantress: Kari Wahlgren voices a sorcerers who was spurned by Thor a while ago and kind of has a love/hate thing for him going. She teams up with Loki to get Hulk there.

The Asgardians: Okay, the film really throws in a lot of surprise residents of Asgard into the mix.

Lady Sif: Gray DeLisle voices Thor’s lover and second in command in the defense of Asgard.

Balder the Brave: Michael Adamthwaite voices one of Asgard’s more steadfast warriors and a good buddy of Thor’s.

The Warriors Three: Holy Shit! They actually put the Warriors Three into this. Fandral the Dashing (Johnathan Holmes), Hogun the Grim (Paul Dobson) and Volstagg the Voluminous (Jay Brazeau) don’t do a whole lot, but damn, they’re actually in this. Major props for that. If it weren’t for Deadpool, they’d be the collective badass just for being put in.

Hela: Janyse Jaud voices the Asgardian goddess of the underworld who’s also Loki’s daughter. She’s not a nice lady.

Visuals/Effects
Frank Paur directed Hulk vs. Wolverine and Sam Liu directed Hulk vs. Thor. Both are well animated and heavily action-oriented. Actually, they’re pretty much all action oriented. And the action is nice. The Thor one does go a little bit long at about 40 minutes, but nothing game breaking.

Writing
Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost do a solid job of hitting all the right character notes quickly then getting to the “Hulk Smash” parts. Nothing complicated, but solid nonetheless.

Sound
The original score by Guy Michelmore is appropriate and fitting.

Conclusion
There’s really not lot to either of these short films. Hulk Gets Mad. Hulk Smashes Things. Deadpool Behaves Awesomely. Simple, but with an animation style that is very conducive to fluid and surprisingly brutal action scenes, it’s a really fun dose of straightforward power fantasy.