Astérix le Gaulois (1967)

Growing up on a steady diet of comics, there was one series I regularly returned to, because it was written so cleverly. That was 'Asterix the Gaul'. Sure, the drawings were fun and the adventures did manege to teach you some things about life during the Roman occupation, but the dialogue was always the best part, with lots of jokes, anachronisms and just very well written stories. 

So naturally, they had to make this an animated film.

This one is based on the very first comic in the series, instead of trying to skip ahead. That also means it is rather short, at barely 60 minutes of runtime. 

This really is a complete setup of the world in which Asterix and his companions live. After Gaul was conquered by the Romans, there is only one small village in Armorica that manages to keep the Roman legions at bay. This is of course thanks to the magic potion their druid Panoramix makes, which gives them uncanny strength. They don't become invincible, though. Enter our protagonist Asterix, a pint-sized warrior who is by far the smartest in his village. He forms a duo with Obelix, a big, lumbering menhirsculptor, who makes up in strength what he lacks in brains. Together, they are the prime reason why the village is pretty much unharmed, even though there are several Roman encampments nearby. 

In this story, Roman centurion Caius Bonus wants to discover the secret to their power and kidnaps the druid. Asterix goes in after him and together they plan to teach the Romans a lesson they'll never forget... 

This is the very first outing of Asterix in animated form and it shows a little. They clearly had a small budget, which is why the animation is fairly basic. Very often, they recycle and reuse character models and even though they are clearly drawn as in the comics, the lack some expression. They also only animated four fingers on each hand because that cut costs: less digits to animate makes it all go a little faster and thus cheaper. I've only ever seen this in the dubbed Dutch version, but the voice cast is sparse and three or four actors do nearly all the voicework. But that is not really something I hold against them, as they do try to vary in their renditions. 

As in the comics, at times this one is hilarious. Especially when Asterix and Panoramix go ahead and fool the Romans, it becomes very, very funny indeed, but most of the time it's a little boring. Maybe that is because the first comic in the series wasn't the strongest to begin with and it is clear it mostly serves as an introduction. Heck, Obelix isn't even in this film a whole lot, something which would be rectified in later installments.

See, that is my main gripe with this one: it is a little dull, even for a film that is only 60 minutes long. It goes by at a snail's pace and even though younger kids will like it a lot more, it just isn't that good. Future animated films in this original run will fare a lot better (as they go for better stories), but this one is okay, but nothing more.