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The time before sequels
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The Land Before Time (1988) is an adventurous story of five youngsters separated from their parents on the long journey to the Great Valley, a green, luscious place that has been untouched by fire, earth-shakes or drought. The long necks are migrating there in search of food and family. Littlefoot (Gabriel Damon) has been born on the way and he is introduced to the only family he knows, his mother, grandmother and grandfather. He meets some other dinosaurs along the way. There is the proud Cera (Candace Hutson), a three horns who is headstrong and fearless; a flyer named Petrie (Will Ryan) who can’t exactly fly; Spike (Rob Paulsen), a stegosaurus who slept through his family’s departure and a swimmer named Ducky (Judith Barsi), yep yep yep! He also comes across the most dangerous dinosaur of them all, a sharp tooth. When they all get separated from their herds, it is up to Littlefoot to lead them to the Great Valley. A journey so dangerous and a sharp tooth at their heels, will they learn to work together and find their families?
A great childhood classic! It isn’t the happy, sing-song sequels that have been made since this one (18 total to be exact). This tells of a dark world, crumbling from earthly destruction and death. The young dinosaurs are kids at heart, even with the daunting task ahead of journeying to the Great Valley. They aren’t even sure if the place exists. To make matters worse, Cera doesn’t like to be told what to do. The group sways back and forth between Cera’s and Littlefoot’s leadership and the two butt heads constantly because of it. If the action seems to be over your child’s head, there is a narrator (Pat Hingle) who kindly simplifies the storyline and only adds to the value of this film. The storyline leans towards cooperating and working with each others differences and opinions.
This was director Don Bluth’s 4th animated film. Steven Spielberg and George Lucas were executive producers. Originally the film was called “The Land Before Time Began” but the last word was eventually dropped. Spielberg wanted the film to have no dialogue, but realized that without speaking characters the film would not appeal to kids. Bluth’s final version of the film was deemed too violent and stressful for children by the executive producers and they cut 19 fully animated scenes, a total of 10 minutes of film which mostly consisted of the Tyrannosaurs Rex (“sharp tooth”) chasing after the dinosaurs and sequences showing the main characters in peril and distress. Of course, the scene with Little Foot’s mother dying from her wounds was slated for the cutting room floor, but Bluth argued that without it there would be no explanation of why Littlefoot has to journey alone. To settle the matter, the scene was shown to psychologists to determine the type of emotional and traumatic effect this would have on the audience. With their feedback, the animators were able to come up with the character of Rooter (Pat Hingle) who adds a little wisdom to soften the blow. Some of the screams were also re-recorded with milder enthusiasm. Bluth was unhappy with the changes. He fought with his producers and lost, settling for his shortest film with a running time of only 69 minutes.
The film was a gigantic hit. It grossed $48 million dollars and beat Disney’s Oliver & Company released at the same time. It topped out at nearly $84 million worldwide. It was more successful than Bluth’s previous triumph, An American Tail, but only slightly. The theme song If We Hold on Together was sung by Diana Ross became a hit single and was a number 1 hit in Japan.
It remains one of the best childhood films out there. A must have for dinosaur lovers, girls and boys alike. If you don’t want your kids to know about the 18 direct-to-video sequels, just tell them that they became extinct after the first one.
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