The Simpsons Movie

In Entertainment today, we hear two reviews of The Simpsons Movie – yes,after 400 TV shows, America’s most famous dysfunctional cartoon family –Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie – step up from the television to the bigscreen for the first time. ‘Dysfunctional’ means not functioning, or working,properly. ‘A dysfunctional family.’
　　The Simpsons series has been running on TV since 1989. The Simpsons Movieis 87 minutes long – much longer than a TV episode, and everything about thefilm. He also explains that it’s a big production – it’s ‘on an epic scale’.
　　As you listen, try to catch any of the extremely positive adjectives Nick uses todescribe how the film looks.
　　Nick Newman‘I think it looked absolutely stunning visually. It’s on an epic scale of the kind that watching iton a 26-inch television you can’t believe – I mean, you go pan over Springfield and all of that,I didn’t have a problem with any of that. I thought it was all dazzling. It was very funny, butfor those who have seen hundreds of episodes – of which there are 400 odd! – a lot of thejokes seemed quite familiar!’
　　Amber:   Nick says the film looked great – it was ‘absolutely stunning visually’. And hethought the film was ‘dazzling’ – it was spectacular. For example, the camerapans over Springfield – ‘to pan’ means to move a camera in such a way thatyou get a broad view of a scene. Exciting stuff.
　　Listen again and notice the informal expression Nick uses to say that he wasrather indifferent to, in other words - he didn’t mind, the way the film looked.
　　He says ‘I didn’t have a problem with …’ the epic look of the film.
　　Nick Newman‘I think it looked absolutely stunning visually. It’s on an epic scale of the kind that watching iton a 26-inch television you can’t believe – I mean, you go pan over Springfield and all of that,I didn’t have a problem with any of that. I thought it was all dazzling. It was very funny, butfor those who have seen hundreds of episodes – of which there are 400 odd! – a lot of thejokes seemed quite familiar!’
　　Amber:  Next, the journalist Andrew Billen gives his opinion of The Simpsons Movie.
　　He’s impressed – he says it’s ‘very funny, very silly at points, but not actuallytrivial.’ If something is trivial it lacks seriousness or importance.
　　Well, the film has some ‘surreal’, or strange, moments – Homer falls in lovewith a pig! And that’s what leads to the environmental threat to Springfield.
　　This is obviously ‘a low point’, a difficult time, for Homer – when he ‘reachesrock bottom’! But in Andrew’s view, the film exactly fits – it’s ‘absolutelybang on’ – the archetypal, or typical, popular American story. Can you catchwhat that plot is?
　　Andrew Billen‘Well, yeah, Homer reaches rock bottom doesn’t he when he does fall in love with a pig!
　　There was an American critic who once talked about all popular narrative being one plotbasically which is the family is threatened and the family is reunited and effectively you haveto do this by restoring daddy to the head of the table, his rightful place. And I thought in thatsense this movie was absolutely bang on the archetype and that was why it was so satisfying.
　　It was very funny, very silly at points, but not actually trivial.’
　　Amber:  So a family facing threats then coming together with the father back in control– ‘at the head of the table’ – makes for a ‘satisfying’ – a pleasing – film. Listenagain.
　　Andrew Billen‘Well, yeah, Homer reaches rock bottom doesn’t he when he does fall in love with a pig!
　　There was an American critic who once talked about all popular narrative being one plotbasically which is the family is threatened and the family is reunited and effectively you haveto do this by restoring daddy to the head of the table, his rightful place. And I thought in thatsense this movie was absolutely bang on the archetype and that was why it was so satisfying.
　　It was very funny, very silly at points, but not actually trivial.’