The BFG (1989)

The BFG is a 1989 British animated made-for-television film produced by Cosgrove Hall Films, based on the 1982 novel of the same name by Roald Dahl. It was directed by Brian Cosgrove and written by John Hambley. The film was shown on 25 December 1989 on ITV in the UK.

The film was dedicated to animator George Jackson, who had worked on numerous Cosgrove Hall productions prior to his death in 1986. This film is also the last role of Ballard Berkeley (voice of Head from the Army), who died in 1988.

Plot
Sophie is a young orphaned girl living in the orphanage of the cantankerous and abusive Mrs. Clonkers. One night, Sophie wakes up and looks out of her window to see a cloaked giant blowing something through a trumpet into a bedroom window down the street; whereupon the Giant Man notices her and snatches her through the window, carrying her away to a mysterious realm known as "Giant Country".

In his cave, the Giant identifies himself as the Big Friendly Giant (or BFG for short) who blows dreams into the bedrooms of children at night, while all the other nine giants are vicious, bestial child-eaters. Not wanting to eat or steal from humans, the BFG subsists on eating "snozzcumbers"; revolting vegetables which are all that grows in Giant Country. He explains that he took her so she couldn't tell anyone that she had seen him and start a giant hunt. Sophie and the BFG quickly become friends; but Sophie is soon put in danger when a gruesome giant known as the Bloodbottler intrudes and unknowingly comes dangerously close to eating her. After the Bloodbottler leaves, the BFG makes her a new dress out of her blanket to replace her heavily soiled nightgown and treats her to a delicious and remarkable drink called "frobscottle".

The next morning, the BFG takes Sophie to Dream Country to catch more dreams. In Dream Country, the BFG demonstrates his dream-catching skills to Sophie and teaches her to fly; but the BFG mistakenly captures a "trogglehumper", the worst kind of nightmare. Upon arriving at his Dream Cave, the BFG shows Sophie all the dreams he has captured already and locks away the nightmare in his cavern of lava in a tiny chest, and takes Sophie to watch him on his dream-blowing duties; but this is cut short when they spot the Fleshlumpeater (the biggest of the evil giants) devouring a little boy whom the BFG had previously given a pleasant dream. The BFG flees with her to prevent her from being in danger again.

Afterwards, the grief-stricken Sophie convinces the BFG to stop the evil giants. They develop a plan to expose the evil giants to the Queen of England. Using dreams from his collection, the BFG creates a nightmare, blows it into the Queen's bedroom, leaves Sophie on the Queen's windowsill to confirm the dream and retreats into the palace gardens when Sophie calls him. Because the dream included foreknowledge of Sophie's presence, the Queen believes her story, and speaks with the BFG. The British Army and Air-Force follow the BFG to Giant Country where the giants are tethered and taken prisoner. However, the Fleshlumpeater is the only one to evade capture. He furiously confronts and attacks the BFG for his betrayal and then goes after Sophie but, with the help of the terrible nightmare he caught earlier, the BFG is able to subdue the Fleshlumpeater, who is captured as well.

All nine of the evil giants are then all transported via helicopters to London, where they are imprisoned in a deep metal pit and forced to eat snozzcumbers for the rest of their lives. Contrary to the book's ending, the BFG stays in Giant Country instead of moving to England, and Sophie becomes his assistant at the distribution of dreams.

Why It's Scrumpdiddlyumptious

 * 1) Though low-budget looking, the animation is very nice for 1980's standards. In fact, the art style looks like a complete throwback to classic Disney films from the 60's to 70's, Tom and Jerry classic shorts from 1940's, Hanna Barbera cartoons from the 1960s (particularly Scooby Doo, Where Are You?), anime TV shows from the early 80's and especially Warner Bros. cartoons from the 1940's to 1960s (or if you want to be more accurate, a mix of Bob Clampett, Chuck Jones and Friz Freleng).
 * 2) The characters are likable and memorable, especially the BFG himself, Sophie and every other human character.
 * 3) The musical numbers are timeless, such as the Whizz-popping song and Sometimes, Secretly.
 * 4) The Fleshlumpeater is an unforgettable antagonist and Don Henderson does an outstanding job voicing him.
 * 5) Many memorable moments, such as the scene where the BFG snitches Sophie out of her bed.
 * 6) It follows the source material with a few of its own creative adjustments to make it more for Cosgrove Hall standards.
 * 7) The BFG and Sophie share a very heartwarming relationship with each other.
 * 8) The ending is incredible as the BFG stays in Giant Country instead of moving to England, and Sophie becomes his assistant at the distribution of dreams.
 * 9) Excellent score from Keith Hopwood and Malcolm Rowe.
 * 10) The storyline is pretty well written.
 * 11) The comedy is very on point.
 * 12) Even the author of the source material Roald Dahl enjoyed this movie.
 * 13) It spawned a Blu-ray release in 2012.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) The main problem with this movie is that it can be a little too scary for younger viewers. For instance:
 * 2) * The BFG's ghost in a black cloak appears, and comes straight towards Mrs Clonkers' orphanage.
 * 3) * The Bloodbottler tries to eat Sophie, although she's hiding in the snozzcumber.
 * 4) **Believe it or not, if you had a nightmare as a kid and you dreamed of being eaten by giants, you would be pretty terrified.
 * 5) The animation, while impressive for 1980's standards, surprisingly hasn't aged very well. The pacing in particular can feel somewhat rushed. Take the shot where The BFG flies right near the moon in the sky at the night time for example. What's really surprising is that the animation there seems to have been rather rushed and drawn on fours, not only making it look like it's in an anime, but also creating confusion for people who have never seen a movie based on the beloved Roald Dahl classic and making them assume it's a Japanese anime, which is obviously false.
 * 6) *On the side note, the infamous flipped edit on the 2012 onwards releases in the Frobscottle scene. Fortunately, this was fixed in the TV release, when it first aired on ITV.
 * 7) The score, while impressive for late 1980's standards, does have moments where it's low-pitched, or normal pitched, which is incredibly confusing considering the fact that The Wind in the Willows from 1983 was never like that, but to be fair, the film had a few mastering faults which is the reason why the score is like that.
 * 8) The plot, while pretty well written, can feel somewhat predictable.
 * 9) The film has a little bit of underage nudity for its target audience. Luckily, the people involved in the film production didn't purposely overdo it.

Reception
The film currently has a 65% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with an average rating of 3.3 out of 5.

Writing in The Sunday Times before its broadcast, Patrick Stoddart called it a "delight", and wrote that it "puts its already celebrated British animators, Cosgrove Hall, into the Disney class". It has since gone on to be a cult classic.

In 2016, Louisa Mellor, of the Den of Geek website, warmly appraised the film in comparison to Steven Spielberg's then just-released adaptation, saying, "Cosgrove Hall's twenty-seven year old animated feature may be less of a technical feat than the latter and was certainly made for a fraction of the budget, but that doesn't make it any less a whoppsy-whiffling, razztwizzling tribute to a terrific story."

Roald Dahl's reaction
This film was one of the few adaptations of Dahl's works to get praise from the author himself. Cosgrove said that after Dahl sat through a screening of the film, he stood up and applauded in delight."When we finished, we ran a screening in Soho, and Dahl and his family came along. They were sitting at the back, and when the film finished they stood up and applauded. He could be quite vocal, Dahl, if he didn't like something. He didn't like Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory at all, the 1971 Gene Wilder one. So it was a real relief that he liked our film."

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