Muppet Treasure Island is a film that exhibits all of the Muppet tropes and… exists.
OK, look. I’m burnt out. I was a different person when I started Muppet-palooza: I was on furlough, and I naively thought I could stream all of these during the 7-day free trial of Disney+. The Muppet Movie was so glorious that my expectations of the other 6 movies were… I’m not going to say high, but I was fairly optimistic in the direction this was heading. After all, I watched 7 Fast and Furious movies in 7 days, and while I thought that would be torture, I came out the other side an indoctrinated member of the Toretto family.
It’s been several months and 2 Disney+ payments under my belt and I just want to be free of this project. But, I made a commitment and goddamn it, I’m going to follow through.
This movie is not bad by any stretch, and it has a lot of redeeming qualities, including this melodramatic death scene like 5 minutes into the movie:
I’m not going to bore you with the plot of this, because I’m guessing most people know the basic touchstones of Treasure Island. This is actually by design, because the team aimed to create another “classic” movie, riding on the coat tails of A Muppet Christmas Carol. Orphan gets a treasure map, recruits a crew of pirates to go and find the treasure, and is swindled by the kindly cook to give up the map and lead the bad guys to the treasure. A sword fight between the bad guys and the good guys ensues, and the good guys get the treasure in the end.
Let’s dive into what works about this movie:
- My first thought during the opening credits scene was oh wow, this sounds like Pirates of the Caribbean. I shortly discovered this is because Hans Zimmer composed this. It is canon that Muppet Treasure Island walked so Pirates of the Caribbean could run. There are few more iconic movie scores than Pirates. Blah blah Star Wars blah blah Harry Potter blah blah Jaws Indiana Jones blahhhhh… Pirates is better than anything John Williams ever did, don’t @ me.
OK, I’m clearly kidding about John Williams, but you can’t tell me that 17 years after Pirates came out that this isn’t still a bop.
Sorry, I got distracted, what was I talking about? Right. Muppets.
- The songs are fairly good, but this is the obvious standout:
The costumes, the choreography, and the humor – it’s the perfect Muppet movie song. This song is why The Muppets Take Manhattan makes me so mad, because it illustrates the kind of excellence the team is capable of.
- The cast is pretty great. Tim Curry is doing his best Tim Curry impression, and has enough makeup in his eyebrows that it’d make a drag queen blush. NOT TO MENTION FUCKING EDINA MONSOON IS IN THIS FOR A HOT MINUTE KICKING ASS AND TAKING NAMES. Also, the kid who plays Jim looks like he’s thrilled to be there, which showcases what happens when you cast someone who wants to be in a movie, as opposed to the sad children they forced in front of the camera emotionally dragging down Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.
- The sets are truly impressive, as always. The scene where they burn down the tavern after shoving a bunch of bad guys through broken windows and walls was a joy to watch.
The ship is also pretty cool, which they show in more detail in this behind-the-scenes clip. There is also a fairly amusing story where the director admits to drugging Tim Curry with Dramamine so he wouldn’t get seasick, which had the side effect of making him almost comatose.
- The running gag with Rizzo and the cruise ship rats. Stupid stuff like that is my aesthetic, but the line about the midnight margaritas sent me.
- Sam Eagle. I feel like I haven’t adequately expressed my love for Sam Eagle in any of the other movie reviews. He is perfect – the side eye, his curt and earnest statements, and his inability to get caught up in the silliness of the Muppets… We should protect him at all costs.
I am 100% certain when they cast Jack Davenport as Norrington in Pirates, it was because he did the best Sam Eagle impression.
…I had no idea that this review would just lead to me gushing about another, slightly unrelated movie. Damn you, Hans Zimmer!
- Miss Piggy’s costume on the island is fabulous. I’m not joking when I affirm that Miss Piggy is a fashion icon and we should bow down to her.
I also enjoyed she had relationships with almost all the men in this movie, leading her to utter, “I’m beginning to see a pattern in the men I date.”
Also, Kermit has an embroidered Miss Piggy tattoo, which made me giggle.
Things that didn’t work for me:
- The movie is extremely predictable, so there aren’t any stakes, which is probably why I found it hard to keep my attention. Jim is a kid, so even if his house burns down, or he’s being threatened by pirates, no harm was ever going to come to him. There was a 0% chance Kermit and the crew wouldn’t end up with the treasure, excited to embark on their next adventure. I recognize this movie, more than any other Muppet movie, was targeted toward kids, so while this might not have been captivating for me, it very well could be exciting for a younger audience.
- Green screen flipping Kermit. Physical effects always play better with the Muppets, and the CGI just looked strange.
- There was this terrible trend in the 90s where a pop rendition of the big emotional ballad would play during the ending credits of a movie. The most famous ones are probably from Beauty and the Beast and Titanic (Thank you, Celine Dion), but we get “Love Led Us Here”, covered by two country stars I’ve never heard of. It’s so of-its-time, and it has not aged well. The song in the movie is passable, mostly because it’s cut between scenes of the pirates throwing treasure all over themselves.
This movie is perfect if you know a kid who loves pirates. If you’re looking for a Muppet movie filled with more adult-ish humor and touching emotional moments, maybe skip this one.
Now, we jump forward 15 years to The Muppets. Jason Segel, here I come…