The Peanuts Movie

‘It was a dark and stormy night…’ is the opening line of the melo- dramatic novel that Snoopy, that brilliant Beagle, writes. As depicted in the comic strip by Charles M Schulz, Snoopy sits on top of his kennel furiously working on a typewriter. The line is actually the opening of a much mocked 1830 novel called Paul Clifford, written in turgid prose by Edward Bulwer-Lytton, and Schulz used his incorrigible dog to satirise the big literary clichés and terrible prose that would often be inflicted upon readers.

Without doubt, Snoopy is the most self-confident character in the Peanuts world, and his imaginary encounters with the ‘Red Baron’—ace pilot of World War 1, whose real name was Manfred von Richthofen—make up the action scenes in this movie version of Peanuts. Snoopy dances, reads (trash), writes (trash) and yearns to attend the same school as Charlie Brown, but is always ejected, even in disguise as a schoolboy.

By contrast, Charlie Brown is under-confident. He is, by nature, a defeatist, assuming that he has little talent or ability, and is doomed to a life of mediocrity, perhaps even failure. What Schulz did was create an ‘everyman’ character in a post war, ultra capitalist America, full of ambitious ‘baby boomers’ who grew up feeling that success was their birthright but then discovered that unreal expectations could lead to bitter disappointment in their work and personal lives.

This film version takes a few incidents from the life of Charlie Brown, largely revolving around his efforts to impress the ‘Little Red-haired Girl’, a new girl in his class whom he has developed an almighty crush on. Lucy van Pelt, the bully, who is freelancing as a psychotherapist (‘a dime per consultation’), advises Charlie that women are impressed with ‘success’ and so he should aim for that.

Unfortunately, the first two school events that he participates in to achieve this success end in what he considers humiliation. The third attempt to impress the Little Red-Haired Girl is the most charming. In the school ‘Book Report’ assignment, Charlie decides he wants to review ‘Leo’s Toy Store by Warren Peace’ because Peppermint Patty, the cleverest girl in class, has told him that it is the greatest novel ever written. When he discovers that the selected book is actually War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy—1,400 pages long—he realises he is in big trouble.

This film offers simple and striking two-dimensional sketches of Schulz as he envisions the life and times of Charlie Brown. So, apart from the scenes depicting the aerobatics of Snoopy’s vivid imagination, which are designed in the trademark 3D style, the movie strives for verisimilitude to the original.

This is a noble effort, but has a side effect. For a younger generation that always expects state-of-the-art digital technology—something which could enhance the work of a great American cartoonist—this movie will prove to be a disappointment. The film targets an older generation of people who have identified with a character who looks at life largely as a disappointment interspersed with rare moments of happiness.

Or, as Charlie says, “I think I’m afraid of being happy, because whenever I get too happy, something bad always happens.”

About The Author

Ajit Duara