Piglet's Big Movie is a 2003 American animatedmusicaladventurecomedy-drama film produced by the Japanese office of Disneytoon Studios and released by Walt Disney Pictures. The animation production was by Walt Disney Animation Japan, Inc. with additional animation provided by Gullwing Co., Ltd., additional background by Studio Fuga and digital ink and paint by T2 Studio. The film features the characters from the Winnie-the-Pooh books written by A. A. Milne and E. H. Shepard and is the third theatrically released Winnie the Pooh feature. It was released on March 21, 2003, to generally positive reviews from critics and grossed $62.9 million worldwide. In this film, Piglet is ashamed of being small and clumsy and wanders off into the Hundred Acre Wood, leading all of his friends to form a search party to find him.
Plot
Piglet has made a scrapbook containing pictures that depict all of the adventures he has went on with his friends. He soon finds Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, Rabbit, and Eeyore, who exclude him from a plan they're working on because of his small size, even after Piglet saves them from an attack by a group of bees. Disheartened, Piglet sets out to discover how he can be useful. Meanwhile, Piglet's friends discover his disappearance and decide to search for him; using Piglet's scrapbook as a guide, the four use its pictures to tell the stories depicted therein, leading to several flashbacks.
The first story told is when Kanga and Roo first moved to the Hundred Acre Wood. Pooh, Piglet, Tigger, and Rabbit are afraid of the newcomers and Rabbit concocts a plan to use Piglet as a decoy, so they can ransom Roo to force Kanga to leave. When Kanga finds out about the plan, she plays along by pretending that Piglet is Roo, eventually causing Piglet to realize Kanga's kindness, which prompts his friends to accept the kangaroos into the Hundred Acre Wood. Back in the present, Roo joins the others in searching for Piglet.
The second story tells the story of how everyone in the Hundred Acre Wood went on an expedition to find the North Pole. During the search, Roo falls into a river, prompting Piglet to use a long stick to launch him out. Unfortunately, his heroism is overlooked when he gives the stick to Pooh to try to catch Roo (where he is caught by his mother), causing Christopher Robin to mistake the stick for the North Pole and credit Pooh for finding it. Back in the present, the friends begin to realize how much they have ignored Piglet's actions.
The third story concerns the building of the House at Pooh Corner. Pooh, Piglet, and Tigger get the idea of building Eeyore a house in an area they name "Pooh Corner", using some neatly stacked sticks for building. After many failed attempts, Pooh decides to offer Eeyore to move in with him only for Eeyore to reveal that the sticks Pooh, Piglet and Tigger found was his house. Piglet manages to rebuild Eeyore's house and shows it to him, satisfying the donkey.
Back in the present, an argument between Rabbit and Tigger ends with the scrapbook falling into a river. Without their guide and with a storm coming, the gang sadly return to Piglet's house, where they draw pictures depicting all of Piglet's heroic actions. Eventually feeling reinvigorated, the group decide to resume their search for Piglet.
During their search, the gang find Piglet's scrapbook suspended on a hollow log looming over a waterfall. Pooh goes to retrieve it, but he falls into a hole in the log, and the others are unable to reach him. At that moment, Piglet arrives and, with encouragement from his friends, helps pull Pooh to safety just as the log begins to break in half. Everyone manages to escape just as the front half of the log breaks off, but the scrapbook itself is destroyed by the fall. Although saddened by this loss, the group take Piglet back to his house to show him all of their drawings, much to Piglet's joy.
Sometime later, a party is thrown in honor of Piglet, where Pooh reveals that he renamed Eeyore's home "Pooh and Piglet Corner" to represent all the big things that Piglet has ever done. During this scene, the camera pulls back to show a large shadow of Piglet behind everyone.
The film was originally intended as a direct-to-video release, in February 2002 Disney announced that the film and The Jungle Book 2 would be released theatrically.[5]
American singer-songwriter Carly Simon wrote seven new songs for the film, and performed six of them ("If I Wasn't So Small", "Mother's Intuition", "Sing Ho for the Life of a Bear", "With a Few Good Friends", "The More I Look Inside", and "Comforting to Know"), as well as recording her own version of the Sherman brothers' "Winnie the Pooh" theme song which she previously recorded in A Very Merry Pooh Year.[7]
"The More It Snows" features Jim Cummings and John Fiedler, as Pooh and Piglet. Simon was accompanied by her children Ben Taylor and Sally Taylor on many of the songs. Renée Fleming accompanied Simon on the song "Comforting to Know". On "Sing Ho for the Life of a Bear" Simon was accompanied by the cast.[6]
The soundtrack also features five tracks of the film's score by Carl Johnson, as well as five of Simon's original demonstration recordings.
Piglet's Big Movie was number seven on the box-office charts on its opening weekend, earning $6 million. The film domestically grossed $23 million,[4] half the amount of what The Tigger Movie earned,[8] and it grossed nearly $63 million worldwide.[4]
Critical response
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film received a rating of 70% based on 77 reviews, and an average rating of 6.2/10. The site's critical consensus is "Wholesome and charming entertainment for young children."[9] On Metacritic the film has a score of 62/100 based on reviews from 23 critics.[10] Audiences surveyed by CinemaScore gave the film a grade A, on a scale of A+ to F.[11]
Film critic Stephen Holden of New York Times called the film an "oasis of gentleness and wit".[12] Nancy Churnin of The Dallas Morning News stated that Piglet's Big Movie was "one of the nifty pleasures in the process", despite her belief that "Disney may be milking its classics".[13]
In 2003, Disney released Piglet's Big Game for the PlayStation 2, GameCube, and Game Boy Advance, as well as a game on CD-ROM that was also entitled Piglet's Big Game. The latter was developed by Doki Denki Studio and involves helping Piglet assist in the preparation for a "Very Large Soup Party".[15] In their review, Edutaining Kids praised various features including the adventure/exploration aspect (the game is linear instead of using a main screen) and many of the activities (such as the color mixing, which they said offers an incredible variety of hues), but noted that it is much too brief and that Kanga and Roo are absent.[16]
Sources
The film's plot is based primarily on five A. A. Milne stories: "In which Piglet meets a Heffalump," "In which Kanga and Baby Roo Come to the Forest, and Piglet Has a Bath," and "In which Christopher Robin Leads an Expedition to the North Pole" (chapters 5, 7, and 8 of Winnie-the-Pooh); and "In which a house is built at Pooh Corner for Eeyore" and "In which a search is organized and Piglet nearly meets the Heffalump again" (chapters 1 and 3 of The House at Pooh Corner).
