The Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland (1999)

SUCKS!!! Rekt This Movie!!!!!! It's Pure Garbage, Thomas And The Magic Railroad Is BEtter! Elmo loves his fuzzy, well-worn blue blanket more than anything in the whole world. Elmo's blanket gets sucked into colorful, swirling tunnel into Grouchland, the yuckiest place on earth. Elmo goes on an adventure to Grouchland to retrieve his blanket. I Am Mad! Elmo is playing with his blanket in his house. After he bumps his blanket on a juice cup, he dries off his blanket at the laundromat. On the way home, Elmo sees Zoe feeling depressed because her father cannot take her to the zoo, so he decides to make Zoe happy again by imitating zoo animals. When Zoe sees his blanket, Elmo refuses to share, resulting in a tug of war that rips Elmo's blanket. Elmo is upset and declares that Zoe is no longer his friend. Suddenly, Telly Monster inadvertently takes away the blanket while rollerskating out of control. They go around Finders Keepers and knock over a tray of glasses that Ruthie is carrying. Telly hits Cookie Monster at the revolving door of Furry Arms hotel. The blanket accidentally lands in the hands of Oscar the Grouch, who drops it in his trash can after sneezing on it. Elmo drops into the bottom of Oscar's trash can, where he finds the blanket snagged on a door. While attempting to retrieve it, they are both teleported to Grouchland USA, a world filled with Grouches where a manipulative and greedy man named Huxley (Mandy Patinkin) steals anything he can grab including Elmo's blanket. Elmo is determined to find his blanket and begins a journey through Grouchland. A kind Grouch girl named Grizzy tells Elmo that his blanket is in Huxley's castle at the top of the faraway Mount Pickanose, and Elmo begins a journey to get his blanket back.Meanwhile, the Sesame Street residents are informed of Elmo's absence and go to Grouchland to find him, with help from Oscar. When Big Bird and Zoe find a Grouch Police Officer and ask him for help, the entire group ends up arrested and put in jail as the police officer informs them that it is against the law to ask for help in Grouchland.Meanwhile, Huxley's sidekick Bug and the Pesties trap Elmo in a tunnel using a trap door. However, he gets out with the help of fireflies. Then, he meets the Queen of Trash (Vanessa Williams) in a garbage dump. At first she thinks that Elmo might be in league with Huxley. Elmo says he is not, but then realizes that he refused to share his blanket with Zoe and feels ashamed. The Queen gives him a test by asking him to blow 100 raspberries in 30 seconds. Elmo succeeds and continues his journey to Huxley's castle. Elmo is later confronted by Huxley's humongous chicken and gets tossed far away. Resting on a rock, he realizes that night has come, and becomes discouraged.Grizzy visits the jail and tells Elmo's friends that he went to Huxley's castle. Oscar is convinced to help set things right as well as admitting that Elmo is his friend. He then convinces the Grouch Police Officer and all the Grouches of Grouchland that even though Grouches hate cooperation, the only way they can finally stop Huxley from stealing any more of their trash once and for all, is if they swallow their pride and work together just for once. The Grouch Police Officer releases the Sesame Street residents and the Grouches aid them to go to Huxley's castle to fight for their trash and rescue Elmo.A caterpillar wakes up Elmo the next morning on the rock. He gives Elmo advice to look inside himself and he'll see that he has what it takes be brave. He then makes it to Huxley's before he could make Elmo's blanket "his" blanket. However, Huxley prevents Elmo from escaping by grabbing him with a claw and deciding to label them "MINE". Just as Elmo is about to face the fate of never seeing his friends again, the Sesame Street and Grouchland citizens appear in time to rescue Elmo and the Pesties flee. Bug takes Elmo's blanket from Huxley and turns against him as Elmo catapults a basket over his shoulders. Bug then gives Elmo his blanket back. Elmo is hailed a hero by the Sesame Street and Grouchland citizens and Huxley unanimously tries to change his mind about his selfishness but fails. Elmo is happy to get his blanket back, He goes with his friends back to Sesame Street and apologizes to Zoe for not sharing his blanket and hurting her feelings. He gives his blanket to her and she happily accepts for being kind by sharing with her. Elmo says goodbye to the audience when Ernie and Bert head home as the film ends, but Bert stays to look at the credits.

The cleverest thing about 'The Adventures of Elmo in Grouchland (1999)' is the degree of self-reference. The film begins with Sesame Street stalwarts Bert and Ernie, our hosts for the evening, breaking the fourth wall to greet the audience and introduce the feature presentation. We, the audience, are asked to count backwards from ten so that the film may begin; in keeping with the spirit of the viewing, I acquiesced. Our hosts regularly interrupt the main story whenever our hero's predicament is looking particularly dire, probably to remind the younger viewers that a happy ending is just around the corner. Then Bert gets excited about the closing credits.The meat of the film centres on that adorable reddish monster Elmo (Kevin Clash), who wakes up one morning and begins to sing about his beloved blanket. (Bizarrely, Elmo's bedroom features just one recognisable feature – a giant poster of Tiger Woods). When he accidentally travels to the mystical Grouchland (via a '2001'-like wormhole accessed through Oscar the Grouch's bachelor pad), he loses his blanket to the sinister self-proclaimed villain Huxley (Mandy Patinkin), a human with bushy eyebrows and a desire to steal anything that isn't his. A frustrated Elmo strikes out to retrieve his prized blanket, getting occasional help from various creatures and even the audience members. I know what it's like to lose a treasured possession. In fact, my dad threw away my favourite stuffed toy, for which I have never really forgiven him. Elmo's epic journey through Grouchland helps him to learn that material possessions are not everything, but the heartwarming finale is nevertheless rewarding in a predictable, slightly fluffy way. Movie references are abundant: 'Titanic (1997),' 'Gone with the Wind (1939)' and 'Doctor Zhivago (1965)' are offered by pessimist Bert as movies without a happy ending. They crafty larrikins at Jim Henson Pictures even managed to work in a reference to 'Basic Instinct (1992),' with the Grouchland cinema screening the picture with the title "Basically, It Stinks."

Red, furry and undeniably cute, who wouldn't love Elmo? A mean bushy browed villain by the name of Huxley and his bugsy sidekick that's who. Like many of the programs generated by the Sesame Workshop geared toward children, The adventures of Elmo in Grouchland is a wonderful story of sharing and cooperation. Children and grown ups alike are taught the joys of sharing and cooperation as they follow Elmo into Oscar's grouchy homeland Grouchland and he encounters many obstacles as he tries to retrieve his beloved blankie. We see many qualities children posses that we as adults lack at times, determination, love for our enemies and working for what we want. I think Mandy Patinkin makes just the right kind of villain for a children's program, with just the right amount of meanness and humor to not make it too scary. Elmo is accompanied by a dynamic cast that rounds out the entire story. This is a wonderful story that should be enjoyed by parents and children together.

I've seen Elmo in Grouchland only once, and I realised in the first scene that the next 73 minutes of my life would be wasted watching this trash (mind you, no offence to Oscar).Obviously done at a time when Elmo suddenly became the over-cute star of Sesame Street (or should that be "Elmo Street" now?), it lacks the originality of what Sesame Street was really like before the 90s (compared with "Follow That Bird" done fourteen years earlier).I wonder why the Children's Television Workshop (sorry, the SESAME Workshop <sarcasm>) had even bothered to do a movie for such a stupid character.I'm so frustrated, I have no choice but to give it a big fat ZERO out of ten.