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Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles - The Original Movie
Actor(s): Judith Hoag, Elias Koteas, Josh Pais, Michelan Sisti, Leif Tilden
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Binding: VHS Tape
Creator(s): Producer David ChanProducer Gary PropperProducer Graham CottleWriter Bobby HerbeckWriter Kevin EastmanWriter Peter LairdWriter Todd W. Langen
Director(s):
EAN: 9780780607286
Format(s): Closed-captionedColorDolbyLiveOriginal recording reissuedNTSC
ISBN: 0780607287
Label: New Line Home Video
Language(s): English Analog Original LanguageFrench Original Language
List Price: $9.98
Manufacturer: New Line Home Video
Number Of Items: 1
Package Dimensions:
Height: 1.12"
Width: 4.19"
Length: 1.12"
Weight: 0.38 lbs.
Product Group: Video
Publisher: New Line Home Video
Release Date: 2000-03-28
Running Time: 93minutes
Studio: New Line Home Video
Theatrical Release Date: 1990-03-30
UPC: 794043412134
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com:
You can chalk it up to good timing and a heavy dose of video-game synergy, but this 1990 hit remains the box-office champ of independent films, with a total gross of $135 million. Of course the Turtles began as a phenomenally successful Nintendo video game, so it was a given that the movie would be a hit with its target audience of rabid young video addicts. This is what comic books fans call "the origin story," in which we learn how a foursome of small turtles were mutated by a green radioactive goo and turned into human-sized turtle crime fighters. Their large rodent mentor, Splinter, teaches them to master the martial arts. They're also gifted pop musicians, by the way (think of them as amphibious Spice Guys), so they can rock the house while they're cracking a crime wave with the help of their cute friend and television reporter April O'Neil (Judith Hoag). The script is terrible, of course, but countless millions of children don't seem to care, as long as the Turtles keep ordering pizza and dispensing their wisecracking brand of justice. --Jeff Shannon
Customer Reviews Average rating - 4.5
Rating - 1 Date: 2008-12-11
Content: This movies gets a 5/5, but not the dvd. Recently Steve Barron (director) offered materials for a special edition, but Warner bros wasn't interested! It's almost the 25th anniversary of TMNT and because they're "not interested" they re-release the same old garabage in a 25th anniversary packaging! If anyone cares about this movie join me and stop buying warner bros dvds!!!!
Summary: Needs Special Edition!!!! Not a re-release!!
Rating - 5 Date: 2008-09-29
Content: Great movie, my brother loves it :)
Shipping bit too expensive however i did get the movies alot quicker then expected.
Thanks :)
Summary: TMNT-Classic
Rating - 5 Date: 2008-08-19
Content: I'll admit that I was at first only a reluctant fan of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoons back in the late 80's and early 90's, if for no other reason than I was pretty much forced to watch it by the simple fact that my brother and sister both watched it while they babysat me. But as time got on I did grow to genuinely enjoy the series. I mean, who can watch the show and not laugh at the bumbling antics of Shredder and his goons as they try to gain the advantage against the turtles? So when I heard that a TMNT movie was in the works (it came out as I recall in the summer of my tenth year back in 1990), I was at least willing to give it a whirl.
It should be noted that in quite a few important ways the movie is as unlike to the cartoon as night from day. The actors aren't even the same, for one thing. Not that this detracted from my enjoyment of the film or its two sequels, it didn't. But certain elements of the characters' past, Splinter and Shredder's in particular, were altered, more I think to be more true to the comics than anything. Splinter goes from being the mutated form of a Ninja warrior named Hamato Yoshi to being the pet of said Ninja. Raphael, who in the cartoon was always the wsecracker of the group, becomes a much more solitary, angry character often given to acts of rashness that nearly cost him his life. This behavior almost creates a rift in the turtles at one point, but they reunite in an effort to save their beloved master from Shredder. There's another character much changed from his cartoon persona. Gone is the often petulant, whiny villain, to be replaced by a sinister and ruthless criminal mastermind with an ominous voice. In short he changes from someone to be laughed at to a man to avoid at any cost.
All in all I was very impressed with the movies. I only wish I still had my VHS copies, but then again I so rarely watch those anymore that it seemed more advisable to get them on DVD, which I intend to do next month if finances permit. So if you haven't already seen them, pop on over to your local video rental and pick up the three TMNT films. I personally liked the first one best, but Secret of the Ooz was close behind. The third one took a bit of getting used to but I eventually did conclude that I liked it just as much as the others.
Summary: I liked it when it was on VHS and i'm buying the DVD three-pack as soon as I can.
Rating - 4 Date: 2008-06-26
Content: This movie, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, should go down in history as one of the truly grandest achievements in this epoch of human civilization. This is about as close to perfection as can be reached when telling a story about turtles.
Wanna know how to make a movie? THIS is how you make a movie. Specifically a movie of the comic book/superhero genre. Let me explain exactly why this works, and exactly why the following movies in this genre fails.
--Failures:
Transformers // Spider-Man 3 // Superman Returns//Elektra // The Punisher // The Crow // Star Wars Episodes 1-3
All horrible movies. There's more to this list but I'm gonna limit it to these since I've written reviews on most of them, and my opinions are already explained.
Wanna know what all those other movies have in common? They share one or both of the following traits: they either 1) cater too much to kids, or 2) lack characters with realistic emotions.
Trying to make a comic book/superhero movie that's catered to kids is synonymous with making it for MORONS. You go out of your way to cater it to simple minds, and you have a simple, moronic movie lacking all the fundamentals on what constitutes a STORY with characters. It means that all bets are off, and you're no longer carefully crafting art. Any semblance of our reality is out the door, and all you're left with on screen are empty entities moving around, making sounds, and doing actions arbitrarily (e.g. every movie I named above, and unfortunately the two sequels to this movie).
NINJA TURTLES part 1 is a movie that can be enjoyed by kids, but they didn't completely dumb it down and insult their intelligence, that's why even watching it now I can enjoy it. If someone described a movie to you as being dark, and featuring complex characters, a movie with talking turtles may not be the first guess. The turtles may as well not even been turtles, this could've been a movie about four human brothers, and it would've worked the same way because of the great characterization. That's how you know a movie is good, when it doesn't rely on its "gimmick" to get by.
3 points that jump out at me:
--Splinter. I'm in complete absolute amazement at how UNCHEESY he was. The most amazing thing about his character were his LINES. I mean, this dude says some of the most profound things I've ever heard in my life, let alone in a movie, LET ALONE from a disheveled, talking rat puppet. Everything he said had such weight and substance. He was not stereotyped as some elderly martial arts master with trite, cliché "wise man" phrases. This was truly an endearing character.
--Raphael. Look at the list of movies that I wrote up top. Combine all the atoms that make up each individual character from those movies, and they still wouldn't hold a candle to the weight and complexity that just a single molecule that Raphael carries. End of story.
--The rooftop fight. Remember the part where Shredder has Leo on the ground, and tells Donny, Raph, and Mikey to throw away their weapons? If you've read any of my other rants, you'd know that a big thing for me is for characters to react realistically in situations. This scene here epitomizes what I mean. After Shredder tells them to throw their weapons away, they specifically had Raph ponder it for a quick second, then begrudgingly throw his weapon away with a grunt, followed by Mikey (who also grunts, a subtle touch) and Donny. This perfectly shows the dynamics of their relationship to each other at work here, because in this type of situation you would hesitate and wait to see what your leader does. It's just like if you and two co-workers are doing something, and then a CEO type person who you've never seen before walks in and makes a comment/questions you three, most times you would let the default leader among you (whether that assignment is subjective due to personality type, or more tangible, such as job position) do the talking for you. And that's what happened here. Mikey and Donny had no clue whether to surrender their weapons or not, their leader and brother is on the ground, about to get killed, so they had to wait to see what their other older brother would do, and then follow suit. This was a great example of great writing, and I love the subtle touch of having Mikey copy Raph's grunt, just like a younger brother would do.
Action movies of today can learn from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. If you have good characters, the story almost doesn't matter, as it pretty much writes itself. All the viewer cares about at this point is to see if the characters all make it out ok. There's no need to concoct some over the top plot line as a means of being interesting or original, if we don't care about your characters, we couldn't care less on where the story takes these 1-dimensional caricatures.
Summary: a LEGENDARY classic
Rating - 5 Date: 2008-04-28
Content: TMNT really delivers on all fronts, good story, great acting, great directing and amazing action from guys in animatronic rubber suits.
This movie is a perfect blend of the dark atmosphere of the original comics and the zany fun of the cartoon series, all the while maintaining a feeling of reality which takes it to the next level.
The voice characterizations are right on and the acting from April and Casey Jones gives the validity to the story that it was really in need of.
The first confrontation between Casey Jones and Raph in the park is one of the more memorable moments, while the Foot ninja attack on April's apartment is an amazing fight scene even by today's standards.
I almost wouldn't consider this a kids movie, even though that's how it's marketed. It's more along the lines of Spider-Man, than say, Power Rangers. It got some "Damn It's" and the violence it pretty intense at times.
Really a great movie and worth your money.
Summary: TMNT: Reality with talking turtles, who knew?
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