The Road to El Dorado

The Road to El Dorado is a 2000 American animated adventure musical fantasy comedy film produced by DreamWorks Animation.

Plot
Two con-men (Kevin Kline, Kenneth Branagh) get hold of a map to the lost City of Gold, El Dorado. After stowing away onto one of the ships of the Spanish explorer Cortez, the pair escapes and eventually do find the city. There, a priest (Armand Assante) proclaims them to be gods in a scheme to win control of the city for himself. Meanwhile, they meet a beautiful girl (Rosie Perez) who helps them in their ruse.

Why It's Pure Gold

 * 1) The film has a very decent story about a pair of con artists ending up in a city where they're mistake for Gods by the residents of said town (with some other major plot points and supremely likable and humorous characters being added to kick the would-be thin story up and make it into a true extravaganza of a film).
 * 2) The animation is pretty good and that the gold looked like actual gold (not to mention how the film is absolutely filled with gold). The color palette for said animation is also very lively and bright, especially for El Dorado itself (which is remarkable given the fact that it's, quite literally, a city made of gold, but don't let that fool you, as it's actually filled from top to bottom with bright and eye-catching colors). And the animation itself is smooth in a similar manner to DreamWorks previous 2-D animated movies (e.g., Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron, Sinbad: Legend of the Seven Seas, The Prince of Egypt) and the characters' movements even have some slight hints of realistic human movement to them.
 * 3) *Another aspect about the animation that's truly remarkable is the fact that the animation for the backgrounds, characters, and settings all take influence from the art during ancient Mesoamerican times. Which really helps the city of El Dorado feel more like, well, El Dorado!
 * 4) Tulio, Miguel, Chel and Altivo, funny, likable, and memorable characters/ The former trait of which especially applying to almost every single cast member, particularly when it comes to the main duo.
 * 5) *Miguel is the more relaxed and easygoing out of the main duo who prefers to live in the present rather than look back-ahead of time. He comes to love the peaceful life in El Dorado and comes to see the city for more than just its gold.
 * 6) *Tulio is more of a strategic planner than his con-partner, Miguel, serving as the brains by being the one to come up with their schemes. He often becoming anxious and overthinking things.
 * 7) *Chel is a beautiful and snarky Mesoamerican woman from El Dorado who discovers Tulio and Miguel's con and decides to play along to get out from El Dorado. At first, she only tags along with Tulio and Miguel for the sake of adventure, but later ends up falling in love with one of them.
 * 8) *Altivo is Cortés' horse who befriends Tulio and Miguel who's pretty much "the Maximus from Tangled before there was Tangled". He also makes a lot of complex and even pretty comedic expressions throughout the course of the movie.
 * 9) **On the subject of the film's characters, Tzekel-Kan is a very intimidating villain (despite not pulling all of the big punches towards the main duo's chemistry being tested). As he is a high priest who is absorbed in the belief that the Gods were actually merciless beings and is determined to make the civilians of El Dorado live in fear because of them by continuously offering sacrifices. And unlike most other animated movies villains, his main goal isn't to gain more power, but rather he is motivated by his beliefs, which makes him a more interesting and even threatening antagonist.
 * 10) A lot of funny moments like:
 * 11) *Miguel and Tulio being stranded in the ocean on a rowboat with Altivo.
 * 12) *The bull chase scene.
 * 13) *An El Dorado warrior gets mauled, chewed on, and finally thrown to the ground by the jaguar statue.
 * 14) *Miguel and Tulio, upon seeing the giant stone jaguar, performing the best girly scream ever to be featured in a movie unison.
 * 15) *The main duo's excuse that they come up with for not sacrificing an innocent man to Xibalba.
 * 16) *Miguel and Tulio's first test as gods in El Dorado, involving the conveniently erupting volcano.
 * 17) *Pretty much any time Chel makes a snarky comment (which happens a lot in the film).
 * 18) Some of the songs such as "Friends Never Say Goodbye" and especially "It's Tough To Be A God" are pretty catchy.
 * 19) Amazing voice acting, especially by Kevin Kline and Kenneth Branagh as Miguel and Tulio respectively.
 * 20) The movie is highly quotable, to the same extent of Shrek. Quotes include "On the one hard, gold. On the other hand, painful agonizing failure!", "HOLY SHIP!" and "The stars are not in position for this tribute!"
 * 21) Some of Miguel and Tulio's dialogue was improvised, such as where Tulio asked "Where are the pickles?"
 * 22) Tobin Bell got to voice Zaragota in the opening before he became famous for Saw.
 * 23) Jim Cummings was a placeholder for voicing Cortes but his work is so good, the crew kept him as Cortes' voice actor.
 * 24) The innuendos aren't as jarring as Antz.
 * 25) Given how the main plot of the film is about Miguel and Tulio, a pair con artists, ending up in the City of Gold and being mistaken for Gods, it would likely be expected by some that the movie would follow the standard "liar revealed" plotline by having the two lie in order to stay in the city and then be forced to tell the truth and win by staying true to who they really are in order to save the day. But, on the contrary, that's not what actually happens. As instead, it focuses on Tulio and Miguel's relationship was one of the film's main plot points and how their relationship is tested over the course of the film, with a lot of obstacles being thrown in in an attempt to separate them, and to see if they are so close that they won't do so and find that they still care about each other.
 * 26) The emphasis of humor and wackiness is quite ahead of it's time given the success of the similarly themed Shrek.
 * 27) Kevin Kline and Kenneth Branagh got to record their lines together, making the characters' show some chemistry.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Some forgettable songs.
 * 2) Some of the humor is rather weak and unfunny.
 * 3) The plot, while decent, can get a bit thin at times.
 * 4) The scene in which Chel is making out with Tulio is very suggesting and really inappropriate for a children's movie, given the sexual innuendo behind it. And judging by Chel's position while having fun with Tulio, it seems that her face was behind Tulio's. Really, it looks that the censors decided to take the day off when they should have checked this scene.
 * 5) Tzekel-Kan's insistence to sacrifice many Mayans for their gods starts to look boring every time he brings it up, which makes Miguel firing him from his position very satisfying.
 * 6) The movie was DreamWorks Animation's first financial flop, causing the studio to start discontinuing traditional animation after 2003.
 * 7) The CGI is at its most obvious when looking at the gold during the climax.
 * 8) The film was badly marketed as an adventure film rather than a comedy, which resulted in the financial flop.

Reception
The Road to El Dorado received mixed reviews by critics and audiences alike upon it's release. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 48% based on 105 reviews and an average rating of 5.49/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Predictable story and thin characters made the movie flat." On Metacritic, the film has a score of 51 out of 100 based on 29 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.

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Trivia

 * Under the working title "El Dorado: City of Gold", the film was originally scheduled for release in fall of 1999.
 * The armadillo that follows Miguel and Tulio throughout is named Bibo, after co-director Bibo Bergeron.
 * Denis Leary and Jim Carrey were considered the role of Miguel while Antonio Banderas and Adam Sandler were considered the role of Tulio.
 * Tzekel-Kan's sacred book contains a picture of a man fishing from the moon, a take on DreamWorks' logo.