Ferngully: The Last Rainforest Review; We can save all the Rain Forests with Bodacious Magic

Ferngully: The Last Rainforest

Ferngully: The Last Rainforest is one those movies that has a lot of nostalgic power, if you loved  it as a kid you probably still love it. I for my part only saw a trailer when I was a kid so it has no nostalgic meaning for me.

It was made by Fai Films in 1992 and was Australian-American venture, which is why the film itself is set in Australia. It was produced by 20th Century Fox. Nostalgia aside how is this movie, well it’s pretty in parts but it’s not that that good.

Zak and Crysta

The large bulk of the story is a culture clash between fairies and man or nature vs man. The Fairies of Ferngully, the supposed last rainforest, live all happy and believe humans are long gone.

But one day, fairy princess/ magic trainee, Crysta sees smokes and learn that humans are still around. She shrinks one called, Zack, wait I mean Zak with a K and no C, who is marking trees to be chopped for what looks like lumber. Crysta does not understand what Zak was doing but he lies about it. Crysta and Zak form a attachment but because mainstream movies need a plot there is Hexxus, played by Tim Curry.

Hexxus is a spirit of chaos or something that feeds on pollution. Magi Lune, Crysta’s magic teacher, trapped him in a tree ages ago but the human chopped the tree down freeing him. Hexxus then feeds off the tree cutter machine, called the leveler, and somehow convinces the drivers of the leveler to go to Ferngully because we need conflict.

Anyway, Zak is revealed as a liar, Hexxus comes and is scary, Zak along with Batty (a bat that escape form a biology lab), stops the leveler by turning it off which cuts off Hexxus’ power supply but then for I don’t why Hexxus’ powers go over 9000 and gets really scary but Crysta uses the power of creation in seeds, i.e. Magic BS and seals Hexxus in another tree. Crysta un-shrinks Zak and yay one very localized Rain Forest is safe, for now. YAY!

Zak and a Sexual yet Hungry Goanna Lizard

There is not much to plot outside one culture’s stance vs another. It a preachy environmental movie. The pacing is also very stagnated, it kind of hops from part to part with no fluidity. It is very annoying.

Zak

Ferngully also hasn’t aged well either and I don’t mean the animation, I mean it’s very 90’s. Zak is super 90’s, it’s almost painful. The talk about about Crysta being ‘one bodacious babe‘ is just cringe worthy. It’s pretty jarring since that’s all there is to Zak’s character and he’s on screen a lot.

Also a side note, no one has an Australian accent, no one.

Batty Koda, Crysta, and Zak

Speaking of the characters, there isn’t much to them. Zak is 90’s but I don’t find him likable. Magi Lune is ok but bland. Batty, Batty, Batty, he was Robin Williams. No disrespect or anything but Batty Koda was a little more than annoying. Pips was Mr Friend-zone and didn’t have a personality outside of jealous. Hexxus was overtly sexual, so he was basically Tim Curry.

Hexxus

Speaking of Hexxus, what is he? At the start, Magi Lune said that he came from Earth and was spirit of Chaos but Hexxus seems to need pollution, so what did he consume when the humans lived with the fairies in the forest? I’m confused.

Also what is Hexxus’ motivation? Why does he want to destroy Ferngully outside the plot needs it? I don’t get it. If he was pissed about being imprisoned shouldn’t he want revenge on the one who imprisoned him. Personally, if I was a chaotic toxic thing, I would just be chaotic and not worry about revenge.

Also it’s a good thing those drivers were so stupid to listen to Hexxus or we wouldn’t have had a third act. Why did they just listen to him? Did Hexxus sound like their boss? Lucky for Hexxus if that is the case. It’s so dumb it hurts.

Crysta

Then we have Crysta, our Princess. Crysta is, umm, she’s…. ummm….. naive, curious and tree loving? Is that a personality? That is about all I get from her and she is the main character. The movie follows her and all I get is curious and naive.

I suppose I could add nice to the mix and slightly silly but that’s it. Ah well it’s still better than most of the other Princesses I have looked at.

Batty Rapping

I will say that the animation is really good. I still think it’s pretty and I do like that the fairies look different than human. Some of the characters design are overly silly but I can overlook that. It’s well animated with vibrant colors and very clean.

Then there is the music, which is pretty bad. The two songs that are memorable are Batty’s rap and Toxic love and they are not memorable in  good ways.

Zak and Crysta

Ferngully: The Last Rainforest would be better as a film if the plot was tighter and without all the dated dialogue. When it’s being mythical and magical is very nice but it’s pretty bogus as it is.