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PanoramaEntertainment Dinosaur's tale an animated film Splftay Parties at tlte Movie Review D4 Asbury Park PressFriday, November 1 8, 1 988 nit By ELEANOR O'SULLIVM Press Movie Writer 1 "THE LAND BEFORE TIME," featuring the voices of Pat Hingle, Gabriel Damon and Candy Hutson, opens today at area theaters. Don Bluth directed from a screenplay by Stu Krieger. A Universal Pictures release. Rated G. i Asbury Park Press Have your Holiday Party with a view of The N.Y.

Skyline. We're decorated for an Old World Christmas and there'll be music for your ears. Dinner includes Soup, Salad, a choice of Prime Rib, Chicken or Weiner Schnitzel, Dessert Coffee. 301 Scenic Atl. Highlands 5 yrv I.

sj fS A (201) 291-0224 MUSK SIM tnilMOKS OPfft Ml I SIM. II tM. Don Blulh, Disney studio defector, and writer Stu Krieger have reworked the Bambi story in "The Land Before Time," and while certainly not eclipsing the classic cartoon, they have created a sound animated entertainment. In reshaping the tale, they have set the story in prehistoric times and made the protagonist a brontosaurus named Little Foot. This serves to educate the audience ever so gently; we learn that the earth's earliest land creatures belonged to herds that died off from starvation as much as battles with predators.

Which introduces the crux of Little Foot's problem: orphaned in childhood, Little Foot must find what his dying mother calls the Great Valley. There, Little Foot will be reunited with his grandparents they are separated in what one character calls an "earth shake" and live in a land of plentiful food, water and love. "The Land Before Time" spends most of its time following Little Foot on his odyssey to find the Great Valley, a rather obvious but acceptable symbol for living happily ever after. Before Little Foot begins his joumey, he mourns his mother with such feeling (she has died from injuries sustained defending him), adults as well as youngsters may be moved to tears. The musical score, long on weeping by four adorably ugly prehistoric animals, the most fetching being Ducky, another dinosaur.

The least winning is Sara, a doggedly independent animal called a "three-horn," but who looks like a precursor to a rhinoceros. Sara will win no kudos from women weary of unpleasant female characters, but Krieger at least gives her a full-bodied personality and, after her hubris is deflated, the sense to admit her foolhardiness. Candy Hutson does a grand job with Sara, especially when called upon to let loose deafening screams. However, since the weight of the film lies with Little Foot, it is essential his portrayer be convincingly sweet, playful and touching. Gabriel Damon is up to the job; he does a lovely job as our hero.

And Bluth and his enormous team of artists have done an exceptional job, drawing you into a world forbidding and, in the expected happy ending, enchanting. ZU VJT DORIS ED'S Little Foot makes a lot of interesting discoveries on his journey to the Great Valley in "The Land Before Time." violins, heightens the effect of Little Little Foot happily need not make Foot's grieving. his journey alone. He is accompanied Don Bluth draws on research for movie 4'fSiS 1985, 1986, 1987 AWARD of EXCELLENCE Wine Spectator Magaxine SEAFOOD BY THE SEASIDE 348 SHORE DRIVE HIGHLANDS 20 1 -872-1 565 OPEN LATE FEBRUARY THRU DECEMBER, WEDNESDAY THRU SUNDAY. FOR COCKTAILS AND DINNER NEW JERSEY MONTHLY But, in a way, that movie did pay off.

Director Steven Spielberg contacted Bluth. "Steven called and said he thought 'NIMH' was a beautiful film and said that he would like to do a picture with me," Bluth remembered. It took them two years to find a story they both liked, but together Bluth and Spielberg created "An American Tail," released last year. "And that movie made more money in its initial release that any animated film in history," Bluth said. left the Walt Disney studios in 1979 to make his own cartoons, the classical kind with smooth animated movements, subtleties of shading and carefully crafted story lines.

Bluth's first feature film, "The Secret of the NIMH," didn't do very well at the box office. "At first I felt so bad for a while. I thought I'd made a bad picture. Then I decided that it just hadn't been marketed well. It takes a very good marketing program to sell a film like that." "I had to do lots and lots of research because I never was fanatic about dinosaurs as a kid," Bluth said.

"But in many ways it became a fictional fantasy because it's about these young children who are taught to hate each other, anyone who is different from him. When they are separated from their parents these five little children have to learn to get along with each other for survival. So there is a bit of a moral in it, too." Bluth, a one-time Disney animator, Knight-Ridder Newspapers When Don Bluth was a little boy he was not a dinosaur fan. But all that changed when the animator joined with Steven Spielberg and George Lucas to create the new animated feature "The Land Before Time." The film was produced by Bluth and his collaborators Gary Goldman and John Pomeroy. For home delivery of The Asbury Park Press anywhere in Monmouth or Ocean counties, call toll-free 1-800-822-9779.

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