Caravan of Courage (1984)

 

Because Star Wars was a massive hit and 'The Return of the Jedi' closed off the trilogy, it only felt natural to try and keep things going. So because the Ewoks from that film were obviously a big hit with kids all around the globe, Lucasfilm figured it would be a great idea to capitalise on this by making a film centred (sort of) around the residents on the forest moon of Endor. 

Sounds great on paper, a little less so in execution, alas.

Fortunately the Ewoks are the same ones as in 'Return of the Jedi' and they also still speak Ewokese. But you get a human family that crashed on the planet and the parents are abducted by a giant called Gorax. The Ewoks discover the two kids, Mace and Cindel, and take them in. Mace is a bit of a prick and just wants to get away and find his parents, even though he knows nothing of the planet and the Ewoks have been nothing but kind to him and his sister. But Cindel is pure at heart and it is she who convinces the Ewoks to help, even if it kills them. So they set out with a band (well, pretty much all of Deej's family and two others) for a rescue mission. 

That is the plot. Simple, easy to follow and you could do fun things with it. But the execution does falter in several respects.

The film moves at a snail's pace, which is weird, because in the final 20 minutes or so (at Gorax' castle/mountain/hideout) it feels as though they realised they had to end the story, so then it suddenly races to the end. But the buildup is slow, the journey is slow and the events that happen are rather underwhelming. Cindel's horse runs off and she has to be rescued by lumberjack Chukha-Trok. Not as exciting as you might think. Mace almost drowns and has to be rescued by Wicket: again underwhelming in execution. Mace and Cindel being chased by a massive creature called a boar-wolf is a little better, but it comes to a screeching halt all of a sudden when the Ewoks dispatch of the beast with a single poison dart. It's really weird: here you have this fierce beast, and after getting shot with a single dart, it just drops dead in 'not the best stop motion manner' you can think of. 

But that would be okay, as long as they kept it all focused on the Ewoks, who are more likable than you would think (even if they have expressionless faces that can look enormously creepy). But you get a pointless narrator at times. I mean, really. He's the equivalent of seeing a person turn on the lightswitch, who will explain in his voice-over that the person will turn on the lightswitch. You can easily infer from the motions of the Ewoks at one point that Wicket is too young to join his father for something, yet the narrator spells it out, just because they assumed we were all idiots. 

And to add insult to injury: Mace is the most annoying kid ever. Even the whiny kids from early Gamera-films got nothing on this guy. I legitimately wanted something to kill him early on, instead of hearing him whine and complain the whole time. 

Oh, and his acting is atrocious too. 

Cindel is fine. Sure, her acting is iffy as well, but Aubrey Miller was like 6 at the time and she has that innocent charm, so she gets a pass. But Mace? Kill him with fire. And them kill him again. 

It's weird that the Ewoks have so little expression in their faces, yet the actors inside the fur manage to convey emotion through their stance and movements. So well done there. It's weird, but the person playing the Gorax actually has the most expression of anyone in this film, just through the eyes in an otherwise fairly stiff mask. He is also shot from low angles and in another frame rate, so that conveys the idea that this is a big guy (literally) quite well. He does get dispatched in rather silly fashion though. 

So, for little children, this might be okay. The Gorax is a little scary perhaps, but it might be a fun adventure, but as a film, this is slightly less than mediocre.