Common Sense Note
Parents should know that old-school Hollywood musicals are a major source of the spoofing here. You can explain to young viewers about the MGM spectacles of yesteryear (especially those starring Esther Williams) as providing a model for the sprawling land/sea/air dream ballets that go on here, mostly between Kermit and Miss Piggy.
Families can talk about how each Muppet movie that came after the first one in 1979 has made tuneful fun of a particular type of classic movie, from "Christmas Carol" adaptations to the science fiction of MUPPETS IN SPACE to this heist-film takeoff. Ask kids which ones are their favorites and why.
Common Sense Review
Reviewed By: Charles Cassady, Jr.
This second Muppet movie after THE MUPPET MOVIE is just as good –- maybe even better; we won't argue. It set the mold for Muppet movies to follow, as really a shift back to what made TV's "The Muppet Show" (which itself was done in England, by the way) a worldwide smash: witty, full-length versions of the parodies and variety skits in which the Muppets played stock roles for relax-folks-it's-only-a-movie satires.
Here Kermit the Frog and Fozzie Bear portray twin brothers –- though they look nothing alike -– who are cub (and frog) reporters. With their jobs in danger unless they come up with a big story, the duo fly to London to interview celebrity fashion designer Lady Holiday (Diana Rigg) victim of a series of jewel robberies.
After checking into a Muppet-filled dump called the Happiness Hotel, Kermit meets Lady Holiday and they fall in love –- except that it's not really Lady Holiday but Miss Piggy, a would-be model who has taken a job as the dressmaker's secretary. She pretends to be her own employer to woo Kermit, unaware that the real thief is Lady Holiday's own playboy brother Nicky (Charles Grodin). He tries to frame Miss Piggy for the crimes, but the Muppets rescue her from jail and catch the culprits in the act.
THE GREAT MUPPET CAPER is a sparkling takeoff on old-fashioned Hollywood romance musicals (as would be the next one in the series, THE MUPPETS TAKE MANHATTAN, even more so) cross-bred with a heist thriller. But actually the whole plot is a light framework on which Muppet creator Jim Henson (directing this time) and his team hang their clever jokes and Muppet wizardry. If Kermit dazzled audiences the first time by riding a bicycle, here Kermit and Miss Piggy pedal around a London park in a bicycle ballet, while Miss Piggy herself swims underwater in a musical fantasy. Sometimes the song-and-dance business takes up a lot of storyline time, but we challenge viewers big and small to watch the antics and try to figure out how they did all that with wired marionettes. No wonder it's called `Muppet Magic.'
A number of celebrities put in surprise cameos, including Oscar the Grouch from "Sesame Street." Watch for the bearded fellow who gets his picture taken in the fancy dinner club. Yes, that's Jim Henson himself. Other less-recognizable Muppeteers, such as Frank Oz, Richard Hunt and Jerry Nelson, show up in human form, usually for one-line gags ("That's a frog. Bears wear hats").
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Sexual ContentJust G-rated romance. |
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ViolenceSlapstick includes Miss Piggy's famous martial-arts skills and motorcycle riding. |
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LanguageSomebody says `hell.' |
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