Muppet Treasure Island relies heavily on incongruity, and the contrast between the Muppet world and reality. The directing and music are pure swashbuckler -- the opening sequence is brilliant, with a dark pirate song with sprinklings of straight-faced jest, setting the mood for the film.
Many of the gags are cheap shots -- roll is called for Old Tom, Real Old Tom, and Dead Tom, along with Headless Bill (yes, he's headless) and Big Fat Ugly Bug-Faced Baby-Eating O'Brien (a Geena Davis look-alike who barks "Aye" in a rough bass). Others are character humor, such as the exchange in which Rizzo laments that they are "captured by crazed wild pigs and about to be sacrificed hideously on a pagan altar," to which Gonzo breathlessly adds, "Are we lucky or what?!" Anachronisms abound, such as when Miss Piggy reflects on her dalliances with the murderous Captain Flint and her most recent beau, Long John Silver, who has tied her by the feet and left her dangling at the edge of a cliff. "You know," she muses, "I'm beginning to see a pattern in the men I date." A Greek chorus of tourist rats adds a surrealistic touch of The Love Boat.
For all the silliness, characters are still able to develop. Jim's love for Long John Silver is real, and the betrayal cuts to the quick. Their parting scene is heart rending but not overdone. Jim simply chokes out, "Now take your oars and row away. I don't want to see you again, ever."
Brian Henson has done his father proud.
Many of the gags are cheap shots -- roll is called for Old Tom, Real Old Tom, and Dead Tom, along with Headless Bill (yes, he's headless) and Big Fat Ugly Bug-Faced Baby-Eating O'Brien (a Geena Davis look-alike who barks "Aye" in a rough bass). Others are character humor, such as the exchange in which Rizzo laments that they are "captured by crazed wild pigs and about to be sacrificed hideously on a pagan altar," to which Gonzo breathlessly adds, "Are we lucky or what?!" Anachronisms abound, such as when Miss Piggy reflects on her dalliances with the murderous Captain Flint and her most recent beau, Long John Silver, who has tied her by the feet and left her dangling at the edge of a cliff. "You know," she muses, "I'm beginning to see a pattern in the men I date." A Greek chorus of tourist rats adds a surrealistic touch of The Love Boat.
For all the silliness, characters are still able to develop. Jim's love for Long John Silver is real, and the betrayal cuts to the quick. Their parting scene is heart rending but not overdone. Jim simply chokes out, "Now take your oars and row away. I don't want to see you again, ever."
Brian Henson has done his father proud.