Film Review: Big Bird’s Existential Adventure

The latest big-budget children’s film from the Sesame Street team shows a definite change in style from previous movies, and also from the popular television series. Written by Charlie Kaufman and directed by Michel Gondry, Big Bird’s Existential Adventure is a fun, multi-layered, philosophically rich movie for all the family to enjoy and discuss afterwards over coffee.

In the film, puppeteer Matt Kogel (played by Matt Vogel) undergoes a personality crisis after playing the character Big Bird on the Sesame Street set for an extended period of time. Even when out of costume he starts walking and talking like the Muppet, and his friends feel that he is forgetting where Matt ends and where Big Bird begins. After an incident in a shoe shop where he forces Tyra Banks (playing herself) to count every single item of footwear in there, the producers of Sesame Street make him go on a break in his home town, where his love of puppetry began.

It is initially difficult for Kogel to readjust to a place where he is no longer a man in a giant yellow bird costume, no longer forced to talk like a child while operating a comically long mouth with one hand. Here, he is simply Matt, and learns that for the people close to him, this is enough.

In the course of the film, the dichotomy of actor and role are explored, and with many of the characters in the film playing themselves, there is a lot of self-referential material. At the beginning of the film, we see that the line between part and player is blurred and vague, and the world of the Jim Henson Workshop seems to permeate into the real world, courtesy of Big Bird’s existential angst. But as the line between Kogel and Big Bird solidifies, the two worlds go back to their separate existences.

Kids will adore the metaphysical implications of this movie. Many of the children who were at the same screening as me came out discussing the relative merits of free-will and deterministic approaches to the self, and how they related to Big Bird/Matt’s quandary. This could indeed be the best philosophical children’s movie since Disney’s Hannah Montana and the Ontological Proof of the Existence of God.

As with most films aimed at kids these days, the adults are not forgotten, either. There are plenty of fart jokes and people falling off chairs to stop the parents from getting bored.

Of course, the film is not flawless, and many of the kids I talked to found some of the concluding scenes a little too simplistic. Kogel’s relationship with a childhood sweetheart is a little tacked-on and unnecessary. The cameo from latest Henson Workshop wunderkind as a puppeteer at a party is five minutes of nothing more than cynical advertising. And it’s possible to get a little disoriented by Gondry’s eclectic camera selection and off-centre framing.

But these are just small niggles in what is otherwise a fine example of existential children’s cinema, carrying on the great tradition that started with Disney’s Snow White and the Seven Solipsists, moving through to 2003’s Spy Kids 4: Cartesian Dualism Duel.

New Magazine Round-Up

One of the hottest new magazines in the 9- to 14-year-old age group is Renaissance Tween. Fifteenth-Century Italy is huge among youngsters these days, and RT is at the forefront of the Renaissance renaissance, being one of the biggest-selling publications on the stands right now.

This month’s magazine has a great guide for making oil paints from scratch, with handy hints on locating the best pigments around the home. I found this fascinating, and had no idea that if your parents don’t have any ultramarine stored away, you can simply grind up Mum’s blue eye shadow with a pestle and mortar.

Also in this issue: There’s an informative article on becoming apprentice to a great master, Miley Cyrus discusses Chiaroscuro, the Jonas Brothers share their tips on creating depth in landscape painting using grid-style perspective techniques and Who is Dreamier: Michelangelo’s David or the Mona Lisa?

Look out for the great free gift, a block of wax for making scale models of your favourite sculptures!

One of my own personal favourite magazines is Magazine Reviewer Magazine. This month’s issue is one of the best ever, with a free cut-out-and-keep guide to similes that one can use when reviewing magazines. It’s really useful, like a…a…a…like a…oh, my mind just went blank there, sorry.

February’s MRM has some great features, like an article outlining ways in which reviewers can read as much of a magazine as possible in the store without having to buy it. There’s an ethical debate on the morality of reviewing naughty top-shelf publications, with contributions from Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist Tobermory Flange and Reverend John DeWitt. A free gift is also included in this month’s issue – a copy of next month's Magazine Reviewer Magazine, for reviewing purposes.

Finally, I was pleasantly surprised by new publication The New Yorker Reject Pile Magazine. This promising journal features all the articles and columns that were sent to the New Yorker but which were rejected. I was expecting the articles to be poorly researched, badly written and derivative, but there were a lot of gems.

John Eager’s wonderful Things I Have Found in my Ear is a great, 16-page article that made me laugh, cry and snot up a little. Also, the excellent opinion piece Why Don’t You Publish Any of My Articles, You Snobby Know-Nothing Magazine Editor by Ian Struggle is a vitriolic treatise on the plights of a freelance journalist.

Not everything in this magazine is as good as these examples, though. David McWriter’s Letters I Received from the Bank is far too unbelievable for my liking, and Judith Craptacular’s photographs of twine are nothing short of dullsville. But the rest of the mag is well worth a read, even the barcode, which consists of a very aesthetically-pleasing series of lines and numbers.

Magazines are available from shops.

Special in-depth Chickenhat Round-up

Now that we are firmly entrenched in the holiday season like a puppy in quicksand, the average person will find their party attendance rising by a factor of at least plenty. Family get-togethers, New Year’s parties, work shindigs and soirees held by desperate religious organisations are just some of the possible evenings out that Christmas holds, and historically these have been terrible, depressing affairs.

But last year, a gap appeared in the clouds of holiday party boredom, and the sunlight shone through in the form of the hit party game, Chickenhat.

For people who spent the last 12 months in a womb, I will briefly explain. Chickenhat is a game like Pass the Parcel: while music plays, a circle of people pass a roast chicken from head to head. When the music stops, the person with the chicken on their head gets to take a piece and eat it. The game continues until no meat is left on the bird, and everyone is full of fowl.

Chickenhat was such a resounding success last year that greasy hair became a mark of pride for some people, and it was completely normal to see people in the street with drumsticks behind their ears. The game was an international success, with fans including the Pope, Ricky Martin and the King of Gambia, who now refuses to eat anything that hasn’t first sat on his head.

Flushed with the success of the Chickenhat phenomenon, many companies have released expansion packs and accessories for the game, which I will explore for you now.

Possibly the most eagerly awaited Chickenhat product is the Official Extended Rules System Book, created and released by the Official World Chickenhat League. Several dozen new variations are included in this guide, from the much-loved Welsh Lladdybhoy Chickenhat (in which the bird is filled with melted cheese) and the Swiss version (in which dropping the chicken from one’s head to the floor is punishable by expulsion from the game and stoning). I loved trying out these different rules, especially Speed Chickenhat, which uses the smaller Scots Dumpy breed for ultra-quick games. A word of warning, though: Combat Chickenhat is for experts only. My friends and attempted to play this variation in my living room, and while it was fun for a while, the game had to be suspended after several hundred pounds of damage was created and one competitor became pregnant. That aside, the plethora of new games to try out will brighten any Chickenhat aficionado’s day.

Travel Chickenhat has been released by MG Games for Chickenhatters on the go. I will admit, I can’t see the appeal of playing the game while in a car, ferry or plane, but addicts may well like it. All the essential accessories are included in this kit, including gizzard net and giblet dice. Plus there’s an adaptor for in-flight airplane meals, which is rubbish.

Warner Brothers have made an official Chickenhat Compilation Album, featuring songs to play while engaged in a poultry headwear party. With songs such as Got a Chicken on my Head (Yay!) by Miley Cyrus and Pullet Frenzy by Parson and the Noses, this is a great collection of music to play – stop – eat some chicken – play – stop – eat some chicken.

A quick warning now, to be wary of the many different non-official Chickenhat knockoffs out there. Grousehat, Goosehat, Swanhat and Toasthat are all vastly inferior games, with vague rules, poor equipment and – in the case of Swanhat – the danger of serious neck damage. Avoid.

Finally, Chickenhat: The Fowl Play Board Game is just as much fun as the original game, and allows anyone to play Chickenhat, even if they are unable to play the game proper due to, for example, having a pointy head. Players roll the dice and move their chicken around the ‘head-board’ (get it?), answering questions and riddles while simultaneously trying to avoid the Spaniard who is chasing the chickens around the board so he can put them in a pie. The figurines are extremely detailed, with majestic, regal chickens and a realistically evil Spaniard. This gave my friends and I hours of fun and a genuine distaste for continental Europeans. Of course, it doesn’t match up to the fun of having a real roast chicken on your head, but it’s close.

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Autobiography Review - Maddie Briann Aldridge: My Story

More and more people are writing their autobiographies these days. Celebrities and sportspeople are finding time in their busy schedules to produce works of several hundred pages’ worth of material, not even counting the pictures and indexes. Most surprisingly, troll-faced footballer Wayne Rooney (a man who finds it difficult to string two words together, let alone a grammatically correct sentence), was able to write 320 pages of prose at the same time as playing and training for both Manchester United and England. Miley Cyrus’s autobiography will be released early next year, surely an essential purchase for anyone interested in learning about the no-doubt sizable amount of events and experiences she has had in her fifteen years of existence on Planet Earth.

Before that, though, comes My Story, the long-awaited autobiography by Maddie Briann Aldridge, the daughter of Jamie Lynn Spears. Reports claim that as soon as Britney’s sister announced her pregnancy, publishing houses were falling over themselves to secure the rights to the offspring’s story. Random House won out, and rumours have it that they paid Spears several million dollars for her child’s book.

Beginning with her time in Spears’s womb, Maddie writes with surprising clarity and presence of mind, especially for a three-month-old. Many subjects are covered, including some very private ones: her bout with depression after the pregnancy was announced, for example, while her mother was vilified by the press. Her intense confusion and disorientation upon being thrust into the world. The incessant sensory stimulation that constantly contributed to the development of her brain.

And anyone looking for celebrity gossip need look no further than this book, either. Aldridge talks at length about her views on the relationship between her parents, the torrid life of her aunt, Britney, and the other celebrities she has met since being born. She writes of her own ambition, too, and the singing opportunities that have come her way in the twelve months since her conception.

There is a lot to recommend from this book. Maddie has an excellent writing voice and sense of pace considering she was in a prenatal state for much of this book’s production. Indeed, one may say that this was a benefit, as the book was allowed to gestate just as the author was gestating. It’s not without its drawbacks, however, and I found several sections were dull and self-serving. Aldridge skips around the subject of her grandmother, which will disappoint many star-watchers, and her political opinions are ridiculously ill-informed.

Maddie Briann Aldridge: My Story is a well-written, fascinating insight into the world of a newborn celebrity. I would recommend anyone interested in the book to buy and read a copy soon, because rumour has it that Maddie is planning a second volume as we speak. At this rate, it should be released in time for her first birthday.

The author celebrates at the book's release party

Maddie Briann Aldridge: My Story is published by Random House and has lots of pages. Other books are available.