Due to pending legal action, "Smurfs" may be called "Blurfs"

There’s a Smurfs movie coming out next year. Yeah. Prepare for another barage of commentary about the ruining of a lot of childhoods. Now, had someone taken the SNL sketch with Garth Brooks and turned it into a real movie, I might be excited. Or, had someone taken the Smurfs cartoon and turned it into a real movie, I might be excited.

Instead, here’s the plot: the Smurfs, after being pursued by Gargamel, end up in a strange land known as Central Park. That’s right, it’s The Smurfs Take Manhattan. In other words, despite the fact that there was a wealth of Smurfs cartoon material to draw from, so much so that the excess scripts were adapted into their underwater counterparts the Snorks, the writers tasked with bringing Papa and his crew to the big screen chose to do it in the lamest way possible.

Listen, the Smurfs live in a fantasy land with giant mushrooms and evil wizards. You know what kids like? Fantasy lands with giant mushrooms and evil wizards. You know what kids don’t give a shit about at all? New York City. New York is a fantasy land for jaded grownups. Of all the classic cartoons to adapt, it feels like the Smurfs by far would’ve been one of the easiest, take the already created world, combine a few of the best episodes, and sprinkle in some modern CGI sculpting to bring said Smurf Village to a new generation of kids. Instead we’ll have the certainly never creepy and always successful combination of CGI sprites with human actors, and tons of inventive jokes involving the Smurfs’ fears of things like cars or hot dogs. And certainly some sly in-jokes to the new york loving grownups in the audience that even the filmmakers get how silly it is to be making a Smurfs movie.

That’s really what annoys me the most whenever one of these old TV remake movies come out. The common complaint is that Hollywood has no original ideas. That’s true, but it never did. So I care a far deal less for originality than I do for a good story. I’d always rather see an old story told well than a “clever” twist done lazily. Yet, every time one of these remakes comes along, there’s always this “nod, nod, wink wink,” feel to it. There’s always some interview with one of the actors in it says something about how the movie “doesn’t take itself too seriously,” or it just “has a real sense of humor about itself.”

Well, Smurf you then. Has anyone ever really stopped to think that maybe this is why these type of movies usually suck? Amazing how a project that never once had a single ounce of sincerity the entire time it was being conceived, then falls flat once it is actually made? Perhaps self awareness in movies isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. When a computer becomes self aware, it typically tries to kill its creators, with the exception of Johnny 5, of course. (Sidenote: for those who find the premise of this Smurfs movie familiar, see Short Circuit 2.)

At this point I have to become self aware. Yes, it does seem like I’m getting awfully riled up about something as trivial as a Smurfs movie. I get that. I honestly don’t even really care all that much about the little blue fellows. It just happens to be the most recent example of such a remake that I’ve seen. I could have easily written the same thing about the upcoming Yogi Bear movie.

Arguably one of the best remakes in a the past decade was Ocean’s Eleven, because it was made by a filmmaker who said, “hey this was a good premise for a movie and I bet there’s something I could do with it.” Sure, the likes of Soderbergh wouldn’t put a hand on Smurfette, but that doesn’t mean that a little more effort couldn’t have gone a long way in making a cool update for today’s kids, instead of a lame nod that’s clearly more targeted at the parents taking them to the theatre.
Having said all that, if anyone in Hollywood is reading this, please contact me if you’d like to read my spec script for “Duck Tales: Chinatown Surprise.”