Rainy Daze

It was a gray and gloomy morning when I finally climbed out of bed. I decided to spend the morning working on dubbing the animated films I bought last week. I also baked Applesauce Cookies from the natural baking cookbook I bought last year, adding the last of the coconut from Easter baking into the mix.

Although Jetsons: The Movie and Happily Ever After were released in the early 90s, both films' hearts are firmly in the previous decade. Jetsons takes the "First Family of the Future" to a new home on an asteroid populated by many different creatures, from fuzzy aliens to friendly robots. Mr. Spacely, George Jetson's greedy boss, is mining the asteroid to make his sprokets. The new factory has been plagued by sabotage from day one and has gone through several head operators, and Spacely thinks the ever-devoted George is dumb enough to keep the factory going. His family accepts the change pretty well. Jane loves her husband enough to follow him most places. Elroy makes friends with a blue fuzzy alien kid and a robot kid who seems a bit stuck-up at first. Judy's far less happy - Dad took her away from a big date - until she meets a dreamy alien teenager with a fondness for late 80s synthesizer pop and abstract music videos. The movie takes a sugary turn when Elroy and his new friends discover who's causing the sabotage...and why.

Happily Ever After is supposed to be a follow-up to the Disney Snow White, but it looks and sounds more like "Snow White as interpreted by the makers of He-Man." The evil queen's equally wicked sorcerer brother (Malcom MacDowell) is determined to avenge his sister. He kidnaps the Prince, using him to lure Snow White (Irene Cara) to the Land of Doom. Snow White is joined by the Seven Dwarves' female cousins, the Dwarfelles, a group of goofy ladies whose powers control nature. Mother Nature herself (Phyllis Diller) commands that the ladies help Snow White and learn to work together, or lose their powers. The eight women are helped on their way by a strange creature who looks something like Orko from He-Man with spindly human arms, and inadvertently aided by an owl and a bat who keep trying to be evil and end up  totally useless.

Jetsons is a nostalgic favorite of mine. My siblings and I loved this one when we were kids. I even listened to our cassette of the soundtrack, with music done by late 80s pop princess Tiffany, endlessly. (She was also the voice of Judy Jetson.) The first half is fun if you're a Hanna-Barbara fan, especially the interesting abstract music videos and not-bad CGI animation used for some backgrounds. Unfortunately, the second half takes a turn into preachy environmental territory, and the cutesy characters who pop up at this point don't help. If you remember this from your childhood, it's not bad, but for anyone else, start with the classic 60s series if you really want a taste of the Jetsons.

(Actually, the best part of this video may have been what came with it. This was taped off of what appears to be an NBC airing in 1993, and it comes complete with vintage commercials and trailers for episodes of Blossom and The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, among others.)

Happily Ever After is weird but generally enjoyable. It reminds me a bit of The Swan Princess, another barely-released "cult" animated princess film of the 90s that I liked. The action is the high point. There's some real nail-biting stuff, including a sequence involving a flash-flood in a cave and the finale, that's very well-done. The Dwarfelles are a riot at times, and even Snow White gets in on the action (which isn't something Disney's version can claim). The music is the trouble. It's really, really bad 80s pop and rap, worse than even the passable synthesizer songs that showed up in Jetsons: The Movie. In fact, the music is a problem with both films - the very 80s pop tunes badly date both movies and take them out of their intended fairy-tale and far-future settings.

I headed out to run today's errands after I pulled the Applesauce-Coconut Cookies out of the oven. Stopped at the bank first to deposit my birthday money into my savings account, then headed to Westmont for lunch. I always forget that there's a Friendly's in the shopping center across from the Haddon Township Library, between the Game Stop and Nick and Joe's Pizza. Despite the competition, they seemed to be doing pretty well when I was there around 1:30. I had a half of a Chicken Ranch SuperMelt and a garden salad for lunch. It was very tasty and not too much to eat. I'm glad I didn't get a whole sandwich. The round of chicken they used for just the half-sandwich was juicy and soft...and huge.

Went to the library next. It had been raining lightly on-and-off all morning, and people must have been taking advantage of the weather to do chores they'd put off earlier in the week. There were plenty of DVDs to return and books to shelve. I didn't take anything out, though. I work for the rest of the week and won't have much time for extra watching and reading.

I had originally planned on riding to Haddonfield, but not only was it 3:30 by then, but the weather remained iffy. I made a few stops at Super Fresh and Dollar Tree instead. I picked up currants, cooking spray, and maple syrup on sale at Super Fresh. Got sponges at the Dollar Tree and decided to try something I hadn't done since my childhood - one of those paint-on plastic rounds with patterns in them that were all the rage when I was little.

Spent the rest of the afternoon at home. I baked a Rosemary-Lemon Cake and, still feeling in the mood for fantasy, watched The Princess Bride. The title character is a beautiful farm lass (Robin Wright) who loves a young hired hand (Cary Elwes) who is reported dead after being killed by the Dread Pirate Roberts. A nasty price (Chris Sarandon) takes her as his fiancee, but she doesn't really love him. When the Pirate himself rescues her from three bumbling assassins, she finds herself falling for her rescuer all over again. The course of true love never did run smooth, and before the two are reunited, we'll encounter sword fights, romance, kissing scenes, and enough wacky comedy mixed with high action to impress even jaded 80s boys and their grandfathers.

Mom taped this during some random showing on cable in the late 80s, and it's been a beloved family favorite ever since. I picked it up on video during college, and it was one of the first movies I replaced when I bought a DVD player in 2004. Like Clue, another cult 80s film with an all-star cast, it starts as a slow romantic drama, but builds into a crazy comic swashbuckler by the finale. Look for Mandy Patikin as the Spanish fencer who utters the movie's most famous line and Andre the Giant as his oversized buddy.