One of the worst movies I've ever seen

A Major Disappointment

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Now this feature length animated film is a real blast down memory lane, in fact I'm confident many won't have even heard of this. The film is an adaptation of another classic children's book of the same name by Norton Juster and very much along the same lines as 'Alice in Wonderland' or 'The Wizard of Oz'. In fact you could say all three stories are a trilogy of uber classic fantasy tales but like I said I don't think many folk have heard of this one.This cutesy little tale follows Milo, a young schoolboy, with a drab boring life...or so he thinks. One day after school he starts chatting on the phone to his friend about how dull life is when a strange box appears in his room. This box speaks to Milo and eventually reveals itself to be a tollbooth, a tollbooth that apparently leads into another world. Reluctantly Milo decides to venture through the booth and winds up in a surreal yet colourful world inhabited by odd creatures and wacky people. Milo is soon lead on an adventure to save a couple Princesses from a strange castle in the sky along with a few companions he meets along the way.Produced by the legendary Chuck Jones who was at the peak of his greatness coming off a string of massively successful Looney Tune cartoon shorts and 'Tom & Jerry' (amongst other things). Watching the movie you can clearly see Jones influence on the overall visuals with many backgrounds and structural designs being highly reminiscent of his Looney Tunes work. Not only that but a few of the characters look a bit familiar too, almost a little too familiar, even going so far as to throw in the same ideas from his back catalog. For example the character of Chroma the conductor not only looks like a chubby conductor from the Bugs Bunny cartoon 'Long-Haired Hare', but at times their facial expressions are identical also (I think it was that Looney Tunes toon).Speaking of Bugs Bunny its no great shock to find that the awesome Mel Blanc was also utilised here too. He provides voices for three characters in the film and its pretty easy to work out who they are because they all kinda sound like Bugs Bunny. Most of the other characters are voiced by people I don't know admittedly (very different era), but the lead character of Milo is portrayed by Butch 'Eddie Munster' Patrick in the live action sequences and voiced by him in the animated sequences. The film is bookended by live action sequences in the real world, the present day (1970's San Francisco). At the start we see Milo moping around until the tollbooth pops up. This is a very brief yet highly enjoyable sequence as we see Milo leaving school and travelling home through urban Frisco. The scenery is really lovely and just shows how pleasant Frisco would have been to live in at that time...at least for me being a Brit. The sequence where Milo meets the tollbooth is also really great fun and always got me excited as a child. Its so very charming and adorable plus it really captures the moment perfectly with some really neat effects and those wholesome vivid 60's visuals which always look so good. There is another great little moment where Milo discovers he appears in cartoon form once crossing the tollbooth barrier which is typically Chuck Jones, again its simple but effective. From there on as Milo goes through the tollbooth the film crosses over into full animation and doesn't go back to live action until Milo comes back across the barrier.This isn't just any old silly fantasy filled with monsters and heroes oh no, like the source material its actually very smart. The reason being because everything within the 'Kingdom of Wisdom' is a play on words...puns, idioms and metaphors galore. Most of the characters and evil creatures are named by simple word plays or puns such as The Spelling Bee which is a bee that has a large extended vocabulary, Dr. Kakofonous A. Discord who likes to make loud noises and unpleasant sounds or The Terrible Trivium, a demon that lives in the mountains of ignorance and wastes your time with trivial meaningless tasks. The same goes for various locations like the Doldrums where all the slimy lifeless creatures live in a constant state of inactivity, tiredness and depression and their surroundings are swamp-like, murky and colourless.Some characters are more normal looking but all appear to be for educational purposes I guess, yet they all still have there clever amusing quirks. King Azaz the Unabridged who rules Dictionopolis (words) for instance...you get it? Or his brother The Mathemagician and ruler of Digitopolis (numbers). Together they both battle and argue over what is more important in life...words or numbers. I especially liked King Azaz's advisors...the Duke of Definition, Minister of Meaning, Count of Connotation, Earl of Essence and the Undersecretary of Understanding...all of whom looked exactly the same. Its not just the characters and locations either, the dialog is top heavy with the same kind of wit also. Such as Milo enjoying a feast with King Azaz where they all tuck in and eat their own words.The visuals are passable by today's standards but a little sketchy admittedly, its nice to see hand drawn animation and its all very Chuck Jones. The similarity to the classic Warner Bros. Looney Tunes visual style assists for sure but its still not the same quality and way behind the likes of Disney. I must also add that the film can be a little scary in places I think...for younger kids. The monsters towards the end are quite horrendous looking considering its aimed at kids, plus the animation style used for them adds to the scare factor. The Terrible Trivium always did give me goosebumps when I was young with his emotionless faceless mannequin-like head.Whilst the plot is rather mundane (saving two Princesses from some generic evil) its the witty dialog and visuals that make things interesting. Whilst the story holds all the magic and wonder that will enthrall kids of various ages it will also teach them a bit about Maths and English...maybe. At the same time its also a solid watch for adults too with its word trickery, it would take many viewings for kids to grasp everything they see, if they can look beyond the colourful creations on display. I tend to think of this as a poor man's 'The Sword in the Stone' (Disney)...a touch of music, a dabble of fear and a wheelbarrow full of imagination.6.5/10

Fruit snacks have all the fun and yumminess and prettiness of candy, but are a little more beneficial due to being made with real fruit. Same thing with this movie. A fun-filled, colorful, whimsical fantasy, with some educational benefits mixed in with the fun.The animation is beautiful, with bright candy colors and fun zingy patterns. Viewers feel that they are accompanying bored tween Milo on his adventure, and the music is awesome, especially the Bacharach-esque opening and closing theme sung by a band reminiscent of the 5th Dimension, the Cowsills, Spanky and Our Gang, and the Free Design combined.I put this in the pantheon of great contemporary fantasy films, right up there with The Point, The Neverending Story, and Labyrinth

This is why we have cable. Our sons (now 25 and 27) discovered this on a "family" cable channel over 20 years ago, and loved it. Their sister arrived a few years later and did, as well. For parents, the familiar San Francisco scenery, late 60s childhood fashions and impressively clever lyrics made the few slow scenes bearable. For the kids, it was all a joy. The aforementioned sons even dressed as Tok, the "watch"dog, once in a while (footie jammies + toy clock...). We videotaped it and watched often, until the tape broke! Now planning to buy, as we miss it so. The Doldrums might be my favorite, and even now I tell my students how impossible and very, very wrong it is to be bored. The Castle in the Air, the feud between Words and Numbers, all are a perfect manner for children to begin CRITICAL THINKING. Of course the book is a treasure and not to be missed however as another review mentioned we prefer the strong Milo in the film... and his theme song still brings me to tears with nostalgia. Next we buy this and introduce this to the girlfriends...

I am a big fan of Chuck Jones, and I had heard of "The Phantom Tollbooth" in various contexts as an animated feature, so when I saw it on the cable schedule, I made sure to reserve the time to watch it. Hmmmm. I decided that this wasn't bad for an first foray into feature length territory, and that if Jones had a chance to learn from his mistakes and try a couple more times, he would have probably come up with a real classic. But "Phantom Tollbooth" wasn't it, and deserves its place in semi-obscurity. Problem: Too much heavy handed moralizing. I was surprised that people as sneakily funny and subversive as Jones and his crew would be satisfied with the "tone" of the dialog and the exposition here. No matter that the target audience was young; Even Disney in the early years was never this blunt and cheesy in their subtexts and allegories. (From what I've read, the original text wasn't this unsubtle either. Or else what works in a 20 word blurb on the page doesn't always work at length in a live medium). More problems: About half of the songs are, um, pretty lame, at least to my sensibilities. The ones that yammer away about the virtues of earnestness, duty, hard work, etc. And Butch Patrick was a pretty good kid actor, but he was no singer - all he ever does is pipe along with the lyrics as if they were the musical version of The Pledge Of Allegiance. Worse yet, some of the animation is 2nd rate. Oh, sure, the main characters - the Watch Dog, the Humbug, Milo, the Mathemagician - are done as well as you expect from a Jones flick, and some of the backgrounds are suitably trippy, but most of the monsters and supporting cast (including Rhyme and Reason) are slapdash and badly conceived and look like another crew of 2nd unit apprentices did them. Still, the movie has its moments. The scene in the Doldrums had a nice sinister edge to it. It was nice to hear Blanc and Foray and Tremayne and the rest do what they do so well, even if they had trouble selling some of the dialog. And I am sure that the kid I was back in 1970 would have enjoyed more than I do now - although not as much as One Hundred and One Dalmations, or "The Sword In The Stone". I really wanted to like this movie as much as I do those two (which sport a similar style of character animation) and I want to overlook its faults, because it has a good heart. But as I said, it is undercooked enough that it really doesn't match up to the classics from that era.