Around the World in 80 Days

Around the World in 80 Days

It’s under 90 minutes long, but sometimes it felt like it took me 80 days to get through this most recent adaptation of Jules Verne’s novel about a trip around the world. There have been more than a dozen adaptations of that novel; they’ve made Best Picture Oscar winners out of Mike Todd’s version and Razzie nominees out of the one with Steve Coogan and Jackie Chan, and David Tennant starred in a television series based on it earlier this year.

This French/Belgian animated version tells the story of animals once again trying to win a bet by circling the globe in 80 days and that’s about all it has to do with Verne. So I entertained myself while watching the movie fail to do so by asking myself some questions: Why take that premise and those characters and lose all the good parts, including one of the greatest twist endings ever, substituting new ones that are almost completely lifeless? Why make a movie about going around the world and spend most of it in nondescript fictional places? Why is the journey of a note in a bottle depicted with more wit and visual panache than the journey of these characters trying to win this bet? And also, why is this movie so loud?

In the book, Phileas Fogg is an extremely punctual Englishman who makes a bet at his club that he can travel around the world in 80 days. He takes along his newly hired French valet, Passepartout (in French, it means “goes everywhere,” as related to “passport”). In this film, however: Phileas (voiced by Rob Tinkler) is a frog (I think he calls himself Phileas Frog at one point), who is also a surfer and pickpocket/con artist.

Passepartout (Cory Doran) is nerdy little bespectacled marmoset who’s a fan of world-explorer frog Juan Frog de Leon and wants to be one himself someday. His shrieking, overprotective mom (Shoshana Sperling) makes him wear his yellow slicker even when it isn’t raining and keeps reminding him he mustn’t do anything until he’s fully prepared. And as far as she’s concerned, no preparation is enough. She reminds him that they moved to a seaside town to get away from the dangers of the jungle: “No adventure here.”

Not unless you count it an adventure to be tormented by the locals, who are shrimps, who like to bet on which of them can make Passepartout cry first. Which may explain why Passepartout has anxiety dreams about being sent off on a grand adventure without any pants on.

Philéas has arrived, riding his surfboard and blasting a rap song off of it. The surfboard is called “Boardy,” so this movie isn’t exactly subtle. He steals some wallets, cheats at poker, and makes a bet with some gangster shrimp. But he does have another reason to get out of town fast: the bank has just been robbed and the local sheriff (Heather Bambrick as Fix) thinks Philéas did it.

So off he goes, with Passepartout in tow. And where are they going? Well, you’d think a movie about going around the world in 80 days would feature some interesting stops at actual places on earth, but not really. Our heroes, when they’re not tediously learning to appreciate one another’s talents and skills, spend most of their time in generic environments: desert, jungle. They befriend (and are befriended by) a smart, pretty frog princess (Katie Griffin), who also happens to be an aviator. Plus they run into none other than Juan Frog de Leon (Juan Chioran).

But instead of being funny or clever or charming or anything like that this story should be, the movie settles for stupid jokes (“Kiss my ax!” yells Passepartout) and even stupider insults (“How much does a princess know about science-y stuff?”). Yelling and pratfalls can’t hide a lack of freshness or life.

Watch Around the World in 80 Days For Free On Gomovies.