A good Russian-made animated family film with a useful message but perhaps too many characters.
Hero Quest, Blu-ray (2016)
Voice-overs: Milla Jovovich, Sharon Stone, Whoopi Goldberg, Joe Pesci, Will Chase
Director: Max Fadeev
Studio: Glukoza Animation/Art Pictures Studio/ Cinedigm GL5057 (3/31/16)
Video: for 26:9 screens, 1080p color
Audio: Orig. Russian or English DTS-HD MA 5.1
All regions
Extras: Music video, Theatrical trailer
Length: 86 min.
Rating: ****
This feature-length animation is about Forgiveness, Love, Friendship and Teamwork. The Russian animators really outdid themselves in the creation of many different characters, too many for me, but all quite well done. Getting several Hollywood big names to do the voices in English helps the film, but I could do without the big mouse (or whatever he was) in the style of one of the Three Muscateers, and the little pink animal with big ears, who tried much too hard to be constantly cute.
The ten-year-old human boy is Savva, who wants to save his village after it is taken over by the horrible hyenas. He goes into the woods, where he meets a great white wolf named Angee (who speaks, of course) and together with the sort-of mouse (Sharon Stone) (who has an unexplained mosquito on his shoulder voiced by Joe Pesci), the little pink thing, and later a girl from a tribe of natives, they make their way to visit the great wizard who lives at the top of a hill. They have to fight a strange assembly of too many monkeys and apes on their way. The leader of the monkees has three heads and is voiced by Whoopi Goldberg.
In the end, the great wizard turns out to be only a cute little girl, and Savva succeeds in freeing his village people, because he stood by this dream to save his village and got thru all the colorful adventures to get there.
—John Sunier
