Meet the Feebles

1989's "Meet the Feebles" by Peter Jackson.
Starring the voices of Mark Hadlow, Donna Akersten, and Peter Vare-Jones.

Peter Jackson is an Oscar winning guy (2003's "LOTR: The Return of the King"), and established Hollywood player, but not many know that Peter Jackson started off as a glorified exploitative B grade filmmaker. He's always been an obsessively detailed craftsman, storyboarding (at least until "the Hobbit") his creations and utilizing clever camera tricks, old fashioned puppetry and miniatures (before utilizing CGI in LOTR onwards), and buckets of fake blood and plasma, to tell a story no matter how ridiculous. "MtF" is Jackson's greatest challenge to viewers, in that he creates a puppet world from start to finish filled with loathsome characters engaged in reprehensible behaviours. Wisely avoiding references to creating a Muppets grand guignol, Jackson has said he meant to satirize human behaviour through this work of puppets portraying a variety of animals engaged in low brow activities.
In "MtF", we meet a performing stage troupe with Heidi, the insecure diva hippopotamus, who has a relationship with the show's owner, Bletch the walrus. Bletch is cheating on Heidi with Samantha the poodle, when he is not engaged as a high level drug trafficker in the drug trade (which he conducts on golf courses and on the docks). Blech's right hand man, Trevor the rat, is the show's director, who films pornographic films on the side. There's also Wynard the frog, a knife thrower, whom is a drug addict, which the flashbacks explain are the result of his experiences in Vietnam (leading to the world's first puppet filled flashback to Vietnam), as well as Harry the Hare, who seems to have a terminal STI, and Sid the Elephant, who is involved in a paternity suit. Taking all of this in as the chief protagonist, is Robert the hedgehog, who has a speech impediment and has doe eyed wonder at the spectacle of depravity laid before him, but also wants to marry innocent Lucille the poodle.

The movie simmers in it's toxic stew, and it all comes to a dismembered puppet head when Heidi takes matters (and an M60) into her hands, before a live audience. Filled with Bad Taste and almost no Heavenly Creatures, this is a King Kong on the Towers sized tribute to Frighteners without Fellowship, and is Dead Alive on arrival. May it's Lovely Bones rot in puppet purgatory forever.

3/5

Trailer:Click Here.