“Transistory, or a cruel satire on the consumer society” Well, I will briefly outline everything that awakened in me the viewing of this still unchildish, or rather, not quite a children's film. Why is that? There are clearly elements of “adulthood” here – a TV on which the “16+” shows, some features of the characters’ behavior, for example, controlling a motorcycle and a car, and, finally, lyrics. The last thing that upset me the most was that I didn’t hear the wonderful song “Maria, Mirabel...” which was the theme of the first film. Well, come on, however, there is no shortage of songs in the second film, they, with some exceptions, are quite melodic and melodic, remembered and even liked the musical themes of the astringent grandmother, as well as the song of Kwaki and the love theme of Skipirich and Omide. As it seemed to me for some reason, the Romanian language is somewhat similar, oddly enough, with Portuguese, some words common to both languages slip through ("misteriosa from the first song, "lagrima" from the theme of love, etc.).
This is probably all that can be said positively about this project. I specifically use the word “project” because I personally do not consider this film a full-fledged work, and certainly not a continuation of the story of the wonderful, magical and cute sisters and their friends-animated animals. It seems that the creators just wanted, so to speak, to go on the popularity of the first film, but things did not go as expected, and the result was appropriate. The film cannot be called childish because of the above-mentioned features; adult themes are touched upon, and quite relevant, such as the society of people in the non-existent country of Transistory, shaky and ephemeral, but so frighteningly real and reminiscent of the notorious society of the “common welfare, common dream, universal consumption” that has developed in the western part of our hemisphere and threatens to spread its deadening, crushing and anti-human influence to the rest of the world. People in such a "state" are not human beings, but only shells: there is a body, but no mind, no thought, no living desire for anything. Especially acutely and ominously in the memory of the words from the half-sleep-half song: “We accept everything – Good and Evil, because the main thing is that we are always lucky...” I don’t know about you, but I just had a frost on my skin from these words – it is so reminiscent of the way of life, or rather of existence, and the way of thinking of people in the countries of the “golden billion”. God forbid that people in the whole world become like this, it would be too terrible and disastrous for humanity. This part of the film, in a sense, you can say, succeeded.
I won’t say anything about the main characters, because I can’t decide whether I like them or not – rather, something in between: they seem to be the same, even in appearance and type similar to the original Maria and Mirabel, but the essence is still different, maybe just the depth was not enough. In this second film, more attention is paid not to girls, but to animated creatures, the Frog Kwaki, the firefly Skipirich and the butterfly Omide, who are not at all like the original, especially Kwaki, maybe just because another actor voiced him here. Here, they are just animated pictures from the wall, not quite real, albeit painted characters with understandable and quite human characters from the first story. In general, the main characters turned out to be if not a complete parody, but rather a tracing from their predecessors, and rather pale and not too convincing.
The most important thing, in my opinion, is that the first film is still a fairy tale, a children's, yes, but understandable, simple and understandable story, which will be pleasant to watch both children and adults, and better - parents together with their children as a good and cute "fairy tale for the night." The second film is not a fairy tale, at all, in my opinion, it is a grotesque phantasmagoria, in some ways theatrical, in some ways chamber, quite heavy, dark (most of the time there is darkness in the frame, and bright colors quite noticeably cut the eye) and a story that does not convey the main idea. Although, I cannot but admit that morality is derived here, despite the seemingly rather clumsy embodiment. For myself, I decided that to accept this film as a continuation of the original fairy tale, you should not take it literally, because the characters here, although they have original names, but completely different in their images, although there are similar features and characteristic features. No, the point here is different: it is necessary to consider, albeit somewhat difficult, that two films belonging to different eras (early and late 1980s) have only one, but a decisive and unifying whole: faith, boundless faith in the good and creative principle in a person - friendship, faith in oneself and one's own strengths, love for one's neighbors and relatives, hope for the best, mutual assistance will help not only to crush and overcome the evil kingdom of Transistory, but also to overcome one's own fears, complexes, doubts, to cultivate in oneself a personality, not just one's own well-being, but one's own self-belief, not just one's own, but one's own well-belief.
This film, although shot in the late 1980s, and we in the USSR shown already in 1990, in some ways much wiser and, I will not be afraid of these words, deeper and more meaningful than those films and cartoons that followed and continue to be a continuous conveyor to the present time, leaving in children’s souls nothing but emptiness, spirituality and again, the spirit of consumerism. Here, unlike the first film, this topic is touched upon, alas, too (Kwaki’s song that he is a movie star, popular culture, etc.), but then it was not so obvious and convexly shown and there was no such imposition of stereotypes that crosses every second Hollywood cartoon / film, designed for a young audience. Let me be called whatever you want, I do not care, I am grateful to this film for the fact that I saw a passage from it in my childhood, about 15 years, but rather 20 years ago (Kwaki’s song was remembered and transformed into people too, the rest passed by, due to just a young age, it seems), wanted to find the original now and discovered the “wonderful” world of two pure souls and hearts of sister girls – Maria and Mirabela and their little friends.
Based on the above, my assessment
7 out of 10 is absolutely adequate and generous, because I did not have inflated expectations, and there is nowhere to overstate, but I do not consider myself entitled to underestimate the film, he left some mark in my soul and heart, rather positive than negative, despite his numerous shortcomings.