The Magic Roundabout (also known as Sprung! The Magic Roundabout; ) is a 2005 animated adventure fantasy comedy film based on the television series of the same name."Sprung! The Magic Roundabout", Film Review, Issues 652–657, Page 35, 2005 Unlike the show, which was presented with stop-motion animation, the film utilizes computer-generated animation. The story sees a group of unlikely heroes who go on a quest to stop a reawakened villain, who intends on freezing the world, from retrieving a set of powerful diamonds.
The film was released in France with a French dub on 2 February 2005 and an English-language version was released nine days later in the United Kingdom on 11 February. In the United States, the film was released as Doogal on 24 February 2006 with a new English cast, dub, and script. Only Ian McKellen's performance was retained, while Kylie Minogue redubbed her role from the UK release. The French and UK versions received mixed reviews, while the American version was critically panned.
Plot
Dougal, a well-meaning, yet greedy Skye Terrier, places a nail in the road to spike a sweets cart's tyre, intending to enjoy the sweets himself. When the driver leaves to seek help, Dougal inadvertently crashes the cart into the roof of the village's Magic Roundabout. The resulting explosion damages the structure, causing it spin uncontrollably until an ice wizard flies out and freezes it solid, trapping repairman Mr Rusty, Dougal's young owner Florence, and two other children, Coral and Basil inside an icy prison. Alarmed, Dougal joins his friends - Brian the cynical snail, Ermintrude the opera-singing cow and Dylan the hippie rabbit- in summoning Zebedee, a jack-in-the-box-like wizard, for help.
Zebedee explains that the roundabout served as a barrier to keep his evil counterpart, Zeebad, imprisoned and to prevent him from freezing the world as he once did before. Now that Zeebad is free, he can work his icy magic again. To stop him, three enchanted diamonds must be slotted into the roundabout to re-imprison Zeebad and reverse his magic. If Zeebad claims them first however, he will use them to freeze the sun. One diamond is said to be hidden on the roundabout while the other two are located far beyond the village. Zebedee sends Dougal and his friends aboard Train, a magical locomotive, to find them. After escaping, Zeebad comes across a Foot Guard animatronic named Soldier Sam, catapulted from the roundabout when it froze, and brings him to life to help him search for the diamonds. That night, while the gang camps in the mountains, Dougal wanders off and is suddenly abducted by Zeebad. Guided by a European moose, the gang finds Zeebad's lair, where Ermintrude frees Dougal from captivity. Zeebad gives chase, but Zebedee arrives to face him in a duel. In the end, Zeebad defeats him, freezing Zebedee on a cliff and causing it to collapse, sending him plunging into the abyss.
Though saddened, Dougal and his friends press on to retrieve the diamonds from a volcano edged with lava and an ancient temple guarded by evil skeletons. But Zeebad seizes them, leaving the gang's only hope of stopping Zeebad by reaching the roundabout first. Aboard Train, they are pursued by Zeebad in a drill-like locomotive and overhears their plan. Crashing into a buffer stop, they are launched into the snow, injuring Train, and forcing them to leave him behind as they trek back to the village through the freezing wasteland. Zeebad, after abandoning an injured Sam in the snow, arrives at the now-frozen village ahead of them, but unable to find the third diamond. Realising his true duty is to guard the roundabout, Sam rides in on the moose to face Zeebad, but is overpowered and fatally wounded. Discovering that Sam was part of the roundabout, Zeebad learns that the diamond is hidden within him, and removes it, ending Sam's life.
As Zeebad begins to freeze the sun with the three diamonds, the gang rushes back to the village, reclaiming the diamonds and placing them on the roundabout until only the third diamond remains. Zeebad snatches it back, seemingly reclaiming his victory, but a healed Train arrives just in time to knock it free, giving Dougal the chance to redeem himself by slotting it on the roundabout. The diamonds' power re-imprisons Zeebad, thaws the world and the sun, and restores the Magic Roundabout. Zebedee, having survived the fall, reunites with his friends. Those trapped on the roundabout are freed, and Dougal revives a comatose Florence. When they try to ride again on the roundabout, they find that it is non-functional due to Sam being deceased. Zebedee restores Sam to his inanimate form, returns him on the roundabout which now functions again. Dougal comes to understand the true value of friendship, along with selflessness, courage, and humility.
Voice cast Character France United Kingdom (original) United States (Doogal) Pollux/Dougal/Doogal Henri Salvador Robbie Williams Daniel Tay Margote/Florence Vanessa Paradis Kylie Minogue Zabadie/Zeebad Michel Galabru Tom Baker Jon Stewart Ambroise/Brian Dany Boon Jim Broadbent William H. Macy Train N/A Lee Evans Chevy Chase Azalée/Ermintrude Valérie Lemercier Joanna Lumley Whoopi Goldberg Flappy/Dylan Eddy Mitchell Bill Nighy Jimmy Fallon Soldier Sam Gérard Jugnot Ray Winstone Bill Hader Zébulon/Zebedee Élie Semoun Ian McKellen Elk/Moose N/A Kevin Smith NarratorN/A Judi Dench Basil Unknown Ediz Mahmut Eric Robinson Coral Unknown Daniella Loftus Heidi Brook Myers Mr Rusty Unknown Jimmy Hibbert Cory Edwards Mr Grimsdale Unknown John Krasinski Skeleton Guards Unknown Cory Edwards John Krasinski
Production Development In 2000, Andy Leighton started working as a managing director at bolexbrothers. There he learned that the studio's financial income was drying up, and decided to start building a feature film slate. Associate producer Bruce Higham had a link with Kodak and was friends with Nick Collinson, who worked for Canal+. Collinson told Higham that Pathé were one of the big successful French companies in terms of film distribution and financing, so Higham, in turn, mentioned this to bolexbrothers. Director Pascal Rodon of Action Synthese in Marseille and producer Laurent Rodon of Les Films Action in Paris had acquired the rights through Serge Danot's wife Martine to produce a film adaptation of The Magic Roundabout. The Rodon brothers had not done any films before and needed someone to do the storyboards and script, so they turned to director and editor Dave Borthwick, actor and writer Paul Bassett Davies and Leighton. The show was a huge hit in France and the United Kingdom, so they were looking for a UK partner, which led to Leighton having meetings with Pathé UK. Leighton got in touch with Trevor Horn's wife Jill Sinclair and told her that bolexbrothers was making the film, at which she joined in as an executive producer. With more than 140 people contributing, the development started in May 2000 and lasted until December 2001. Around the same time, Action Synthese decided to wait until they had developed all the characters along with the animation tests before they managed to get Pathé to finance the film production. Pascal Rodon described Pathé's financing of the production as, "A perfect fit. They are the biggest cinema owner in Europe with about 60 percent of French cinemas, and have interests in the UK."
During 2002, the film was in pre-production until the actual production commenced and lasted for 33 months. According to Leighton, the film had a slightly darker tone than the show; bolexbrothers wanted to take the action away from the Magic Garden, with their story starting there, but then having the characters go on a globe-trotting adventure around the world. Raoff and Stephane Sanoussi made an attempt to write a story for the film. Because they did not have any experience of writing extended narratives, their first script was strongly reminiscent of the show's usual 3-5-minute episode format. Davies was hired and brought in to help develop the narrative. When he first went over to Paris for a week, he and the Sanoussi brothers got along well. At one point, they were asked to create a backstory for the film. Davies began to contribute his ideas, and because of the Sanoussis' inability to do extended narratives, someone suggested that they create an origin story for Zebedee. So Davies and the Sanoussis created two characters for the film, Zeebad and Soldier Sam. Nobody asked the writers if they were going to make the film for children or acknowledge that it would appeal to adults like the show. This was because a lot of animated films in the 2000s, such as DreamWorks Pictures' Shrek and Disney and Pixar's Monsters, Inc., attempted to hit two demographics to include elements that would appeal to both adults and children. However, the producers at Pathé UK, including Tad Safran, asked Davies to write a draft of the script. Davies wrote three drafts, removing the narrative structure of the original script before other people were brought in to polish it off. The Sanoussi brothers disliked this because it was not their vision. The film adaption was done by French producer Jean-Pierre Carasso. Davies stated, "Essentially, Pathé UK and all the other producers had to do a certain amount of mollifying to various parties, by giving the people a credit. And gradually, over the course of a year, they became disillusioned, they became hostile towards me. Probably with reason, because... as a kind of representative of everything that was coming in and taking their project away from them. And that's the result when suddenly the budget goes into the millions and millions."
Borthwick was hired to oversee the storyboards and scripts, but went through a personal crisis during the pre-production and was sidelined as a result. The producers at Pathé UK lost confidence in him, so Borthwick brought in his student Frank Passingham, who took over. Les Films Action also hired Jean Duval to create and supervise their graphic charter for the development of future Magic Roundabout productions. At the end of 2003, Laurent Rodon asked Duval to participate in the final storyboard of the film. Duval went to Marseille, where he met Pascal Rodon. In 2004, the Rodon brothers offered him the position of co-director.
Animation Unlike the show, which was presented with stop-motion animation, the film was mainly animated in computer-generated animation, which Pascal Rodon was very much into. Whereas British animators and studios such as bolexbrothers specialised in stop-motion or traditional animation, Paris was, in Leighton's words, "kind of the leaders [of computer animation]", since they had about three or four universities that were teaching it, being more advanced than the UK was. Based in Bristol, bolexbrothers had a good reputation for their awards that they had won at film festivals with their short films, commercials and their previous feature film, The Secret Adventures of Tom Thumb. According to Frédéric Bonometti, the director of animation, the animators chose to animate the characters with key-framing instead of motion capture as they did not want the animation to be too close to reality, and they used real movements as inspiration when animating the characters. They first started using 3D Studio MAX, although it was used to develop the characters, but the interface was not fast enough for the animators as they struggled to animate. Instead, they chose to switch to Softimage XSI which was much easier for the animators in working conditions and saving time in development.