Rock-a-Doodle
Directed by	Don Bluth
Produced by	Gary Goldman John Quested Morris F. Sullivan
Written by	David N. Weiss
Starring	Glen Campbell Sorrell Booke Christopher Plummer Charles Nelson Reilly Ellen Greene Sandy Duncan Eddie Deezen Phil Harris Toby Scott Ganger Will Ryan
Music by	Robert Folk T. J. Kuenster
Editing by	Lisa Dorney Dan Molina Fiona Trayler
Studio	Goldcrest Films Sullivan Bluth Studios
Distributed by	Theatrical: The Samuel Goldwyn Co. 1992 VHS and 1999 DVD: HBO Video 2005 DVD: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Release date(s)	2 August 1991 (UK) 3 April 1992 (US)
Running time	76 min.
Country	United Kingdom Ireland
Language	English
Budget	$18,000,000[1]
Gross revenue	$11,657,385

Rock-a-Doodle is a 1991 animated re-telling of Geoffry Chaucer's Chanticleer and Edmond Rostand's comedy, Chantecler. This film was directed by Don Bluth, produced by Goldcrest Films for The Samuel Goldwyn Company, and originally released in the United Kingdom on 2 August 1991 and in the United States on 3 April 1992.

The title comes from the film's theme song, which is a pun on "cock a doodle (doo)" and a parody of "Rock-A-Hula Baby", sung by Elvis Presley in his 1961 movie Blue Hawaii.

[edit] Plot

Chanticleer (Glen Campbell) is a proud rooster whose singing wakes the sun every morning, or so the other farm animals believe. His singing keeps the other animals happy, and the farm free from downpours. However, one morning, Chanticleer is attacked by a rooster sent by the "Grand Duke of Owls" (Christopher Plummer). Chanticleer wins but forgets to crow, and the sun rises without his singing. The other animals reject him and drive him out of the farm, causing a perpetual rainstorm and the beginning of the Grand Duke's reign of terror on the farm. The story is then revealed to be a storybook that a mother (Dee Wallace) is reading to her child Edmond (Toby Scott Ganger), who is becoming increasingly concerned about the impending flood on his parents' farm. As his mother leaves to help battle the storm, Edmond calls for Chanticleer to come back. He is instead confronted by the Grand Duke of Owls, who expresses anger over Edmond's lack of consideration for the needs of the owls and subsequentially transforms Edmond into a kitten. Before the Grand Duke can devour Edmond, he is distracted by the appearance of Patou (Phil Harris), and is driven away by the shine of a flashlight. The farm animals tell Edmond that they also seek Chanticleer's return, as his crowing is the only thing that can bring sunlight back to their farm. Edmond teams up with Patou, the magpie Snipes (Eddie Deezen), and the mouse Peepers (Sandy Duncan) and they make their way to Las Vegas, where they hope to find Chanticleer.

Meanwhile, at the Grand Duke's lair (where he creates rainclouds through the use of a gigantic pipe organ), the Grand Duke is alerted of Edmond's journey to the city by his pygmy nephew Hunch (Charles Nelson Reilly), who the Grand Duke then sends off to stop Edmond and the other animals, who are floating on the flood. After fending off an attack from Hunch and the rest of the Grand Duke's owl henchmen, Edmond and the others finally reach the city, where they begin their search for Chanticleer. After a few hours, they finally find Chanticleer, who is now making a living as a famous Elvis impersonator, arousing the jealousy of a fellow performer, a pheasant named Goldie (Ellen Greene). Edmond and friends try to talk to Chanticleer, but are pushed aside by a group of singing bodyguard toads. Once the Grand Duke finds out where they went, he sends Hunch after them, but fearing the bright lights of the city, the Grand Duke gives him a pair of protective goggles to prevent the light from hurting him. The flood worsens and the farm animals lose communication with Edmond and the others as the Grand Duke and his owls wait for the batteries in the animals' flashlight to run out. Edmond and his friends disguise themselves and manage to send a note to Chanticleer, but he is distracted by Goldie, who has fallen in love with him. Edmond's attempt to reason with Goldie results in him and his friends being captured by the bodyguards and locked away in a trailer. Hunch breaks into the trailer and tries to do away with the group, but his failure inadvertently sets them all free. Out of guilt, Goldie shows Chanticleer the note that Edmond sent him and the two ride off on a prop motorcycle to save their friends.

Chanticleer and the gang manage to flee from the bodyguards in an intense car chase and steal a helicopter, which they use to make their way back to the farm, where the farm animals have run out of batteries in their flashlight and are about to be eaten by the Grand Duke and his owls. After using the helicopter's searchlight to temporarily drive off the owls, Edmond and the others try to get Chanticleer to crow, but he's out of practice and soon gives up. The Grand Duke taunts Chanticleer in his stupor and strangles Edmond when he chants for Chanticleer. Awed by Edmond's courage, Patou and the other animals chant the rooster's name in unison, driving an angry Grand Duke to transforming himself into a tornado. Finally regaining his confidence, Chanticleer crows loud enough for the sun to rise, shrinking the Duke down to a harmless miniature version of himself that Hunch attacks with a flyswatter. The floods begin to subside and Edmond once again becomes a human. Edmond awakes in the real world, where it is assumed by Edmond's mother that his adventures were just a dream. Nevertheless, Edmond still believes in Chanticleer, causing the real world and Chanticleer's world to merge into one.

[edit] Cast

• Glen Campbell as Chanticleer, a rooster who lives on a fairy tale farm with many other animals, who are fond of and love him. When the sun rises without his crowing, his friends, believing he was lying to them about how his crowing brought up the sun (a fact he himself thought was true), leave him, leading to the adventures of Edmond and the others. He serves as the main protagonist of the film.

• Toby Scott Ganger as Edmond, the son of a farmer. He is transformed into a kitten by the Grand Duke and is the one who organises the farm animals to bring Chanticleer back to the farm after the flood started.

• Phil Harris as Patou, a dog and a good friend to both Chanticleer and Edmond. He despises the Grand Duke and is dedicated to Edmond's cause to bring Chanticleer back home. He's brave and reasonable, but is somewhat temperamental. His endeavour to find Chanticleer is hampered by the fact that he does not know how to tie his shoes (which he wears because of bunions).

• Eddie Deezen as Snipes, a magpie. He, Edmond, Patou, and Peepers travel to the city in a toy box floating on the floodwaters, with Snipes more interested in exploring the city and its sights than actually helping his friends. Being claustraphobic, this poses a problem when he pokes holes in the box trying to escape and reach open air. He hates garbage and dirt, but loves the food served in the city when they go inside a restaurant where Chanticleer sings, particularly lasagne.

• Sandy Duncan as Peepers, a mouse. Because of this she is initially terrified of Edmond, but he tries to convince everyone that he used to be a boy. It is not until the very end of the movie that she believes him, and comments "He was a little boy.... oh, he was a handsome little boy..." She has a lisp and very round glasses, and is constantly arguing with Snipe's chauvinistic views.

• Christopher Plummer as the Grand Duke of Owls, a magical owl who despises Chanticleer. He overhears Edmond's call for Chanticleer in the real world and transforms him into a kitten, planning to eat him. The Duke hates his nephew and threatens several times to kill him if he fails. The Duke is a malevolent and omnipotent creature of the night with a penchant for eating smaller animals as meals and commanding other villainous owls to do his bidding. He hates sunlight, like all owls, and recoils when light is shined on him. Also, he possesses magical breath that can transform anyone into any creature. He serves as the main antagonist of the film.

• Charles Nelson Reilly as Hunch, the Grand Duke's pygmy nephew and lead henchman. Hunch enjoys rhyming words with "aggravation" and humming "The Ride of the Valkyries". He is dimwitted, but extremely aggressive. He carries a Swiss Army Knife in a lidless soda can strapped to his back, and uses its various bladed objects, tools, and household objects (like a flyswatter) as weapons. A small running gag in the movie was that whenever the Duke would breathe on him, his magic would transform Hunch into a random different creature.

• Sorrell Booke as Pinky, an obese fox who favors golf. He is discovered to be a crony of the Grand Duke when he captures Edmond and the other farm animals. He is also Chanticleer's manager in the city. His job is to ensure that Chanticleer never feels the compulsion to return home by convincing him that his friends hate him, making it easy to profit off of Chanticleer's superb singing skills. Chanticleer and Goldie, who have fallen in love with each other, escape with Edmond's friends, ruining Pinky's industry.

• Ellen Greene as Goldie, a pheasant, and a singer also in Pinky's employment. She initially dislikes Chanticleer for stealing her spotlight, but falls in love with him upon becoming more acquainted with him. She is seen at the end of the film and seems to have not only moved onto the farm with Chanticleer. But also seems to have married him and had 2 children.

• Will Ryan as Stuey is a chronically nervous pig. While Edmond, Snipes, Patou, and Peepers go to the city to return Chanticleer to the farm, he stays behind to keep the owls at bay. He is almost eaten by the Grand Duke, but is saved when the group returns with Chanticleer, shining a helicopter light on the Grand Duke.

[edit] Production

Plans for an animated version of the Chanticleer tale dated as far back as the early years of the Walt Disney Studios, where several of its artists were interested in combining elements of the story with those about an anthropomorphic fox named Reynard. Though character designs by Marc Davis survive, Walt Disney personally rejected the pitch, and the film was never put into production or animation tests.^[2] In the late 1980s, as a response to the success of Who Framed Roger Rabbit, the proposal was revised by a former Disney animator, Don Bluth, who wanted to tell the rooster's story through live action and animation.^[3] Originally, the story's first and last scenes were to be shot in black and white, similar to 1939's The Wizard of Oz. The film's opening, which took place at a farm, had Edmond's mother reading the tale of Chanticleer to him.^[3] Victor French from Get Smart was set to direct these scenes, but terminal lung cancer forced him out of production. Bluth, who had never done anything in this field, took over from this point. However, very little of this footage made it in the final cut.^[3]

Chanticleer's girlfriend, Goldie the Pheasant, was designed to have attributes similar to that of Roger Rabbit's Jessica (as seen in the original trailer). Reactions from mothers during test screenings of her scenes made Sullivan Bluth, at the insistence of their investor Goldcrest Films, cover her chest with feathers as cel overlays, or simply paint her cleavage out.^[3] To avoid a potential PG rating, Bluth edited out the showing of the Duke's "skunk pie" (the pie is not seen in full view in the final version), the animators had to replace Chanticleer's wine glass with a transparent cup of soda in the "Kiss and Coo" sequence, and had to draw coloured effects into the Grand Duke's breath to make him less scary for young audiences. The crew, because of these changes, had to work overtime in order to finish the film by Thanksgiving 1990.^[3][4]

Rock-a-Doodle was originally going to be released by MGM-Pathe, but studio partnership was facing financial difficulties, so Bluth rescheduled Rock-a-Doodle for the 1991 Christmas season and found a replacement in The Samuel Goldwyn Company, which released two other animated features (The Care Bears Movie and The Chipmunk Adventure) in the late 1980s.^[3] However, that date was further moved to April 1992, in order to avoid competition with Disney's Beauty and the Beast and Universal/Amblin's sequel to Don Bluth's film, An American Tail, Fievel Goes West, which Don did not associate with.^[3] Ironically, SGC was sold to MGM in 1998, and MGM owns the film today.

Rock-a-Doodle was the first feature-length family live-action/animated film since 1988's Who Framed Roger Rabbit, but unlike the live-action characters from that film sharing the screen with Roger Rabbit, Edmond is the only live-action character to share the screen with the animated characters; this was at the beginning, where The Grand Duke would have to answer Edmond before being turned into an animated cat, and at the end, where Chanticleer is singing a reprise of "Sun Do Shine" like he does at the beginning. Don Bluth chose this direction because he was influenced by Roger Rabbit.

Animation Production took place at Sullivan Bluth Studios in Dublin, Ireland, and was the last Don Bluth film to feature the end credit "A Don Bluth Film" logo.

[edit] Aspect ratio

The live-action and animation sequences were filmed in two separate aspect ratios. The animation was shot on an open-matte fullscreen negative, meaning the top and bottom of the image was cropped in order to fit the theater screen. However the live-action scenes, including all animated elements, were shot in hard-matted widescreen. When the film is viewed in fullscreen, all the animated sequences (except for parts of the finale) can be seen in full, but the live-action segments lose information on the sides.

[edit] Soundtrack

The original songs written and produced by T.J. Kuenster

1. .-"Sun do Shine" by Glen Campbell
2. .-"We hate the Sun" by Christopher Plummer
3. .-"Come back to you" by Glen Campbell
4. .-"Boungers" Theme Song by The Don Bluth Players
5. .-"Tweedle te Dee" by Christopher Plummer
6. .-"Treasure hunting fever" by Glen Campbell
7. .-"Sink or Swim" by Ellen Greene
8. .-"Kiss ´N coo" by Glen Campbell & Ellen Greene
9. .-"Back to the Country" by Glen Campbell
10. .-"The Owls Picnic" by Christopher Plummer
11. .-"Tyin´Your Shoes" by Phil Harris
12. .-"Sun do shine"(Reprise) by Glen Campbell

[edit] Reception

Upon its initial release, Rock-a-Doodle was not well received by critics or audiences. The film has a Rotten Tomatoes rating of 20% "rotten",^[5] but has a "C" rating at Box Office Mojo. The film was negatively reviewed by the Nostalgia Critic, who cited that it was the beginning of the downfall of Bluth's career in animation.

Its $11.6 million take at the U.S. box office forced Don Bluth's studio into liquidation half a year after its release. Moreover, a Hong Kong company, Media Assets, purchased Bluth's next three films, Thumbelina, A Troll in Central Park and The Pebble and the Penguin.^[3] None of these did any better than Rock-a-Doodle, commercially or, with Thumbelina being a slight exception, critically. All of them preceded 1997's Anastasia, his comeback hit.

A book adaptation of the film, by Don Bluth and Chip Lovitt, was published by Troll Communications LLC (ISBN 0-816-72475-X).

[edit] Video release history

Rock-a-Doodle was first released on VHS on 17 August 1992. It was first released on DVD by HBO Video on 20 July 1999. A second edition was released by MGM on 8 November 2005, but despite apparent cover changes, both appear to be identical, and both are now out-of-print. The third edition will be announced soon.

[edit] See also

• List of animated feature-length films

[edit] References

1. ^ Gary Goldman at donbluth.com
2. ^ Hill, The "Chanticleer" Saga - Part Three
3. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h} Beck (2005), pp. 233-4.
4. ^ The copyright date of 1990 appears in the film's end credits, although it was not released until at least a year later.
5. ^ Rock-a-Doodle at Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved May 26, 2007.

[edit] Sources

• Beck, Jerry (2005). The Animated Movie Guide. ISBN 1-55652-591-5. Chicago Reader Press. Accessed May 26, 2007.
• Hill, Jim (August 2000). "The "Chanticleer" Saga - Part Three". http://jimhillmedia.com/blogs/jim_hill/archive/2000/12/31/308.aspx. 

[edit] External links

• Rock-a-Doodle at the Internet Movie Database
• Rock-a-Doodle at Allmovie
• Rock-a-Doodle at the Big Cartoon DataBase
• Rock-a-Doodle at Keyframe - the Animation Resource
• Rock-A-Doodle at Box Office Mojo
• Rock-a-Doodle at Rotten Tomatoes