SERIOUSLY. This is what the crap Hollywood still puts out?

Did you people see the same film I saw?

Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

A Brilliant Conflict

This TV special was actually shown at my elementary school (I can't remember if I saw it on TV). Taking the most popular cartoon characters of the day (Bugs Bunny, Garfield, a Ninja Turtle, etc.), as merchandise that come to life to save a boy from drug addiction, Cartoon All-Stars acts as a public service announcement warning kids to stay away from marijuana and other illegal drugs.It's a novelty to see all these characters in one cartoon (copyrights usually prevent that), and the underlying purpose is noble, but the end result isn't impressive at all. The laugh count stands at zero (maybe kids would like it more), and the musical number is a bust. As a story it lacks consistency and logic (the character made out of smoke can go through a brick wall, yet is trapped in a garbage can). More to the point, as a public service announcement, it's a failure. The cartoon is too heavy-handed; the kid seeing himself in green (looking into a magic mirror and then a crystal ball), seems over the top and dishonest. More importantly, did it work? Did this special actually stop kids from trying drugs? As I mentioned, my class and I saw this in school; I never did any illegal drugs, but plenty of others did. At most, after watching this a child may take the message for a little while, but by the time he or she gets to high school they've outgrown Winnie the Pooh and will likely experiment with marijuana anyway.So what do we have at the end of the day? Cartoon All-Stars turns out to be a historical oddity, a place to go for unintentional comedy and surreal material. It also glorifies consumption of corporate merchandise- the Garfield lamp and the Kermit clock, both likely made in Asian sweat shops, will save the day. But that's a different issue. Show this to your kids if you feel you must, but don't expect any results.

Cartoon All-Stars to the Rescue has to be one of the most hilarious things I have ever seen. It's an anti-drug video from the early 90s, where a bunch of media companies (Disney, Warner Bros, etc) teamed up to produce a cartoon special to tell kids that drugs are bad.However, it soon becomes obvious that the kid's sister is pretty whacked out on drugs as well, despite her trying to persuade him to drop the drugs habit...The kid, Michael, is smoking marijuana, and steals money from his sister, Corey, in order to get money for drugs. At that point, something truly weird happens and the cartoon characters dotted around Corey's bedroom come to life, and end up trying to "wake her up". Pooh Bear then talks to her (which couldn't happen... unless you're tripping...), and tells her to go and see her parents about his drug problem (but not about her problems, which are obvious because she's hallucinating a bear talking to her).Michael goes to his "friends" who are smoking weed, and they take his wallet to buy crack. Then... then he appears to embark on a psychedelic journey where various cartoon characters talk to him, complete with glowing colours, and Michaelangelo the Ninja Turtle who appears to endorse drugs by calling him "cool". All along the way there's this character called "Smoke" which I guess is meant to represent his addiction to drugs. The other characters try to fight him off, and finally Michael manages to get rid of him when his sister tries to take drugs (although given she's seeing Smoke and Pooh Bear talking to her, she's riding the acid train already...). They then go and talk to his mom and dad about his problem. I guess they'd better get the sister to 'fess up too judging by what she was seeing. In fact, these people are pretty bad if they're letting both their kids get this messed up.It basically is a piece of corporate propaganda - stern moralising via out-of-touch "cool" methods, in the way that dominated the 90s (see Don't Copy That Floppy...). In that respect it failed - drug use has indeed become a fact of life, seen in video games, films and TV shows, and being portrayed in a much more realistic way than the horror stories shown in this. Indeed, I would say that it would push kids in the opposite way - the message here is that if you take these drugs, your favourite cartoon characters will pop up out of boxes and magazines to see you and tell you about drugs! It's worth watching for the sheer hilarity of seeing squeaky clean cartoon characters express familiarity with drugs. It's hilarious for the fact that drugs apparently make you look like the Plastic Prince of Pop. And it's also hilarious just that anyone in a boardroom might think that anyone, child or adult, would take this seriously.

This film spends a lot of time preaching against marijuana. However, the plot and visuals are so insane that it seems more like the poster-child for LSD.Plot: The heroic struggle of Michael as he battles his drug addiction while being subjected to the humiliation brought on by the likes of Winnie the Pooh and Papa Smurf.Yea, yea, there's a good message, but it's obscured by the fact that the writers have taken a rather stale PSA idea and tried stretching it into 30 minutes. This includes a song sequence, where you're told that there's a million, rational ways to say "No!" such as "I can't smoke pot, I have homework!"The writers can't make up their minds what to do with the characters they've brought in royalty-free. At first we see they all have to hide from the human characters, but within five minutes we see them all running around in plain sight without anyone noticing. Soon they begin interacting with the human cast, and the only one who's even slightly disturbed by this fact is not the drug-abusers, it's the little sister who talks to her teddy bear (Pooh, by the way.) Further, there's the little drug demon floating around. Because you know, pushers don't give kids drugs. He too is ambiguous - while he might be symbolic of Michael's addiction and hence is not supposed to be seen by other people, he laters goes and haunts little Corey to get HER into drugs. So I guess he's...uhhh.....moving on!The whole plot finally culminates in some insane sequence in which Michael is in what would appear to be the Saturday Morning Carnival of Souls, aka a theme park from hell where the various cartoon characters beat him up and ignore him and stuff. For example, Miss Piggy eats him in a sandwich and spits him out. If the writers were not high when writing this, I must recommend they try getting high because they can't get crazier than this. Of course, the film ignores the fact that Michael's been having highs for two years by this point, so why this tripping sequence would frighten him is beyond me.I realize I'm completely whaling on this film, but I actually just saw it again because I went through the trouble of tracking it down on eBay because of it's sheer infamy of being a BAD cartoon. The level of unintentional humor is is brilliant. Take this scene for example - Michael's dad is rooting through the fridge for a beer. He notices many of them missing and mentions it to his wife. The ever-observant Mom tells him "Don't worry, you probably just drank them last night watching football." While we're obviously supposed to be learning that Michael is drinking beer (in addition to the pot and crack), we instead read further in and realize - Hey kids, it's okay to have chemical dependencies as long as you're a grown-up! Scenes like this are worth the tiny price tag of this film. Oh yea, and the fact you get to hear Simon the Chipmunk say "Marijuana."

Hilarious video depicting a young boy who's using drugs and turning for the worse. Quite cute in the parts where it shows him stealing his baby sisters piggy bank to get money for some pot. Other scenes that stick out in my mind include seeing his future looking like some guy from Night of the Living Dead. As you would expect, complete and utter propaganda, however, it's one of the funniest films I've ever seen.