The Nutcracker

Classic Christmas movie.

Five stars means "I love it," so I decided to go with it. I had the VHS as a child. My grandfather gave it to me as he knew I was a big fan of E.T.A. Hoffman's original story. When I was a kid, I didn't mind the cheaper grade animation, the simple dialog and voice acting. It was a faithful, fast-paced fun adaptation of the original Hoffman story that surprisingly used only the March theme of the famous ballet and three original songs. Some time ago, I picked up a DVD copy. It uses the same cover artwork, just now adapted for a DVD cover. And I must admit, nostalgia did play a factor. But let's face it. This is a cheaply made anime adaptation for a line of budget video releases. The line it's from has other titles that have previously adapted for film, particularly by Disney. Their Nutcracker came out in 1995. Disney hadn't released a Nutcracker movie at that time, but that was about the time the New York City Ballet's version with Macaulay Culkin came to home video. The story of the Nutcracker is originally set in Germany. I've seen several adaptations move it to London, France, once even in Canada, or just "a vague European city," and the voices of the characters don't sound German, with the occasional exception of Drosselmeyer. This version definitely doesn't try to place the story anywhere, in dialog, character's accents, or the way the places look. It's quite possible that they hired the cheapest voice actors available, though lack of accents aside, the cast doesn't really do a bad job. That said, the dialog is certainly modern, a far cry from Hoffman's 1816 Germany. One can either hold this against this version or let it pass. I fall in the latter camp. There's also some really goofy humor at times. The animation is serviceable, telling the story well. The songs aren't memorable ballads, but they're sweet and serve the story well, even though there's one at the beginning, one near the end, one at the end, and the first one played over the end credits. The story is very faithful to Hoffman's story, even telling the story of how the Nutcracker came to be (unlike the original book, it's not broken up into three sections but told all at once) and the Mouse King demanding Marie's things in order for him to not destroy the Nutcracker. And yes, just like the original book, the little girl in the story is named Marie here. (She wasn't named Clara until the ballet adaptation, 76 years after the original book came out.) It simplifies some other parts as well, but overall, it's very much Hoffman's story, faithfully retold in animation in 45 minutes. I had to write my little appreciative review here. Is it the best? No, but it's not bad either. Check it out and enjoy it.

I'm a elementary music teacher and use this as an easy to understand version of the story of the Nutcracker. It only has one of the piece of music from the original ballet playing in the background of the movie, but the kids are mesmerized by it! It would be fine for any classroom teacher or parent to show kids. They will be glued to it. A chatty group will immediately begin starring at it and be super quiet the entire movie! It's like an addictive drug, but totally safe!

Most GoodTimes videos are poor imitations of better productions, but this adaption, although not first-class, is interesting because it includes portions of E.T.A. Hoffman's original story that are mostly excised in other videos. "The Tale Of The Hard Nut" is Hoffman's rendition of how The Nutcracker Soldier came to be - and involves a young princess who is transformed into a hideous "nutcracker" like creature by the evil Mouse Queen, and how the curse is broken, and later transferred onto the son of Herr Drosselmeyer. I showed parts of it to some 7-8 year-old children, and they enjoyed it. My biggest complaint is really the underuse of Tchaikovsky's music - they use one theme over and over (the "March" in a solo piano rendition) but with so many themes and moods to choose from, they could have used much more.

Granddaughter loves this movie, thinks the mouse-king is funny! No scarey stuff! Great Story

My daughter is obsessed with this cartoon. It calls the main character by her original name, Marie, so that was a little confusing. The songs are cute and the anime style is a nice change from Disney.

Great Movie! Thanks for having it for sale ! It takes me back to my childhood ❤

Wonderful

No music in it!!!!!

Todo correcto!!

A Christmas gift

My 7 year old son loves the story of the nutcracker. He borrows it from the library often and now he has his own copy.

I have just received my copy of the DVD - it is a cartoon, an animated film, and does not feature any of the ballet dancers mentioned in the write-up. I cannot tell you if it is a good cartoon as I will be returning it, as I intended to buy a proper ballet for my daughter; but it looks quite pretty. So please disregard the number of stars I awarded - I wasn't allowed to leave this blank. 45 mins running time, if that's useful, as I can't see any mention of this on the website. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 5 November 2013 - Revisiting old reviews, I noticed I've had 2 comments saying that my reviews weren't relevant, as I'd obviously received the wrong DVD ... ... and I also notice that, some time since I wrote my review, the description of this DVD has been changed, and now reads: "Animated re-telling of the classic story about the Nutcracker Prince and his attempts to win the love of Marie, break the curse of the evil Madame Mouserik, and return to human form. Along the way he must defeat the malicious, seven-headed Mouse King and overcome other impossible hurdles. " I'm SO glad that I sent it back, as I was correct, it was a cartoon. And possibly worse than I imagined at the time! We are off to see the actual ballet, later this month. Real people doing real ballet; very inspirational!