The Muppets Back on the Big Screen with a Bang

Winter break is coming up in a few weeks. Thank God.

My favorite part of break (besides catching up on some much needed sleep) is reconnecting with old friends. There’s nothing quite like that warm-and-fuzzy feeling you get when seeing old friends again. I didn’t have to wait ‘til break to get that feeling this year, though. I felt that familiar warm-and-fuzzy feeling watching the 2011 reboot of “The Muppets.”

It’s been 12 years since a theatrically released Muppet movie and they have fallen by the cultural wayside. Those who’ve grown up with the Muppets have grown up and kids these days have been raised in a Muppet-less world.

I can say firsthand that a childhood without the Muppets is one severely lacking. There’s something about the Muppets, pitch perfect family-friendly entertainment that is neither dumbed down or trite. As Jason Segal said in multiple interviews, the Muppets are many children’s first introduction to comedy.

Children born in the last 12 years, meet the Muppets.

The new Muppet movie hardly covers any new ground, but that’s not its weakness, it’s its charm.

It stars Jason Segal (of TV’s “How I Met Your Mother” and the hilarious “Forgetting Sarah Marshall”), who also lovingly co-wrote the script. It’s clear Segal is a fan first and his wide-eyed, goofy-smile enthusiasm for all things Muppet is infectious. He plays Gary, who lives in Smalltown USA with his brother Walter. They’re not exactly the usual brothers. Gary is 6’4”. Walter is around 30 inches. Gary is a human. Walter is made of felt. 

Somehow Walter instinctually knows this and, since the time he was a kid, he has been the Muppets biggest fans. He religiously watches the DVDs of their TV show, owns every piece of memorabilia and fantasizes about going to the famed Muppet Theater.

He finally gets the chance to accomplish the later when Gary plans a trip to LA with his sweet-as-honey girlfriend Mary (Amy Adams, showing off the chops she picked up working in dinner theater before becoming a movie star). But when they get to the city of angels, Walter finds the Muppet Theater is boarded up and forgotten and that an evil businessman (a hammy Chris Cooper) plans to tear down the theater in order to drill for oil.

What’s a Muppet to do? With help for his brother, Walter decides to get the old gang back together for one blow out benefit show to raise the money it’ll take to save the theater.

But that isn’t that easy. Kermit is hauled up in a big Hollywood Mansion, still nursing the wounds left by a certain pig. Gonzo is running a pluming supply business. Fozzie performs in a Muppet tribute band at a dead-end casino. Oh, and that pig I mentioned earlier? She’s a big time fashion editor in Paris.

But somehow, through sheer gumption and the magic of the movie montage, Walter gets them all back together and, before you can say "mahna mahna," they're sprucing up the old theater.

Sure, it’s an old-fashioned “Let’s Put On A Show!” movie (even complete with a Mickey Rooney cameo early on), but it somehow feels fresh yet well within the Muppet-verse. There’s the unusual hallmarks of a Muppet production here: spunky production numbers, loads of celebrity cameos (with “Big Bang Theory’s” Jim Parson’s being my favorite), and tons of heart.  It’s a small miracle for a film to be self-referential without being cutesy and heartfelt without feeling schlocky.

There’s a musical number fairly early on where Kermit roams the halls of his home, peering at pictures of his Muppet past. It’s a perfect example of what this film does right. It has moments of humor and a catchy song, but it’s also terribly bittersweet. The Muppets have never shied away from real emotion, a feature that has always separated them from other kids entertainment.

You’ll laugh at “The Muppets,” you might even shed a few tears, but it’s guaranteed to make your day just a little bit better. Some might complain that the celebs are underused, some songs seemed a bit shoehorned and the ending (which I thought was brave and very fitting) became moot during the end credits. Those people aren’t wrong.

But in a time when most family movies include obnoxious characters, stupid humor and gimmicky 3D, “The Muppets” is an old fashioned movie (it could have been made exactly the same in the ‘70s when the first Muppet picture was released) that will thoroughly charm kids of any age.

What I'd See This Week

• For some drama —  “My Week With Marilyn"
• For some whimsy — "Hugo"
• For the family — "The Muppets"

New On DVD This Week