Platoon of monsters Cinema has repeatedly tried to collect cult monsters and monsters in one place, turning not rarely such a spectacle into farce and comedy, which Tartakovsky successfully does with this cartoon. Going on a safe vacation from evil people, all sorts of monsters are arranged in the hotel of Dracula, until his 118-year-old daughter finally finds her lover ... man.
Yes, a modern lone tourist accidentally ends up in a hotel full of real legendary monsters. That's just to be afraid just not him, for monsters more terrible than man there is no one in the world, except that the most superficially inscribed in the plot of the character - the main villain Hunchback with an unforgettable funny rat Esmeralda (already funny!). A worn hunchback only dreams of preparing a fresh little man, and while the tourist pretends to be the nephew of the Frankenstein monster, the freak is looking for him all over the castle.
Honestly, if not for the love story inside the plot, the cartoon could turn into something like “Bachelor party in Transylvania”, all these sauna gatherings of experienced mummies with family large werewolves, full of tedious “adult” grumble on life topics are very much detached from the general comedic spirit of the work. There are several winding scenes-attractions in the spirit of wandering through basements or flying on tables, delivering moments of true delight and the loudest bouts of laughter, but the plot and there intends to make a roll in the next child-parent relationship and play with the daughter of the heroine not only the story of first love, but also a teenage drama about growing up.
Containing much more than the cartoon is required, Tartakovsky regularly changes accents, mixes genres and from a potential comedy hit with a bunch of monsters, he directs this very platoon of monsters into the framework of a too banal family drama, and as soon as humor again manages to take over, everything is covered with pink-love tones. And the potential of the "Hotel Transylvania" remains to the end significantly not disclosed.
Of course, the main advantage of the cartoon is the charm of its characters! While the absolutely creepy and nightmarish "Carolins", "Monster House", "ParaNormans" and other nasty things are breeding around, "Monsters on Holiday" came out really cute, funny and charming! The only horror-themed cartoon product you can actually watch! No matter what monster appears on the screen, whether it is Hydra, or Mummy, or Bigfoot - they always turn out to be incredibly funny, give joy and positive humorous and cheerful scenes, making a set of secondary cartoon characters incredibly colorful!
Ommages to cult horror stories are present in a huge abundance, in addition to the Man-Fly and the "Martian" flying brains, there will even be a grandiose banter over "Twilight" - the main modern disgrace of vampire themes, against which even the smiling Dracula-Sandler looks serious and frightening.
It is surprising that the main and main idea of the cartoon director builds outside of all family, parental and love themes, designed to fill this monstrous lawlessness with eternal values. The main idea of the picture is left for later, almost to the very finale, when the horror carnival begins in the city in the light of day and modern people, in contrast to the medieval “Inquisition” welcoming real monsters and true monsters, showing a modern attitude to the characters and helping Dracula to stay in the shadows on the way to the airport. The scene turned out to be the deepest, most intelligent and most touching for the entire plot, while the rest slides into banality, apparently always retaining current motives and wandering from cartoon to cartoon.
"Monsters on Holiday" gives everything that they promised, a fun children's cartoon based on characters from horror films and horror stories, full of charm, humor and exciting spectacular scenes. Despite the many banality, the cartoon looks fun and not boring, perfectly entertaining the audience and charging a positive mood. Well, for older viewers there, sort of, in Hollywood were going to do a remake of “The Monster Squad” with the same idea, and in extreme cases, the original of 87 will do.
7 out of 10
Original