A review of "Hey Arnold! The Movie"

NERD NOSTALGIA: A review of “Hey Arnold: The Movie”

By: Brian Cotnoir

A Whale of a Fail!

During the 1990’s-early 2000’s Nickelodeon released a number of films in theatres—many of them based off of their own popular TV shows. I remember going to see films in theaters that Nickelodeon made such as “The Rugrats Movie”, “Rugrats in Paris”, and “Snow Day”, and even though I liked these films when I saw them as a kid, I will admit that now when I compare them to their shows, I can honestly say I enjoyed the shows a lot more than the movies.  One film that Nickelodeon released in theatres that I never saw until just recently was “Hey Arnold! The Movie”. “Hey Arnold!” was one of my favorite cartoons that was on Nickelodeon.  For a children’s cartoon this show certainly did have a lot of fun and unique adventures.  It was a show that taught us all that you didn’t need to go far to have an adventure; you can have all sorts of amazing adventures in your neighborhood.  Unfortunately for this film, the same adventures and stories from the show did not carry over that well into the film.  

So the film opens up in a similar way to the actual TV show, we get some glimpses of the city and Arnold’s neighborhood and we see all the same characters we’ve all grown to know and love, but unfortunately the film doesn’t waste any time on them and would rather be flushing out background stories to characters

we’ve never seen on the show before just to piss us off (I think?).  The stories central focus is around Arnold discovering that a man named Mr. Scheck (voiced by the super-talented Paul Sorvino) and his company Future Tech Industries has purchased most of the property in Arnold’s neighborhood and plans to tear down all the

My thoughts on the Film Exactly, Helga

businesses and houses and build a giant mega mall on the land.  We later find out that the reason why Scheck wants to destroy the neighborhood is because his ancestors used to be loyal British subjects who owned the land where Arnold’s neighborhood is until the American Revolution when the angry colonists revolted and drove his family out, and ever since then it has been his dream to take vengeance on Arnold’s neighborhood for the humiliation it caused his family all those years ago.  Once Arnold finds out Scheck’s true motives, and decides that it’s up to him and his best friend Gerald to stop Scheck and save the neighborhood.             

 

And Arnold commanded to Scheck
"LET ME PEOPLE GO FREE!"

Wow, I just like how the only person in this film that shows any initiative and motivation is a 9-year-old!  Seriously, everyone else in the neighborhood has given up and is ready to sell their property off to Scheck, but then Arnold gives a heartwarming speech about how great the neighborhood is, and then everyone decides to put all their faith and futures in the hands of a 9-year-old, who they all seem to be following blindly.  Seriously, Arnold is like Jesus of the neighborhood, all he has to do is make a speech and everyone is willing to do whatever he says.  This is quite a stretch, not only for a Nickelodeon film, but for any children’s film.  Throughout the film Arnold & Gerald are constantly getting into danger, but miraculously manage to escape scot-free every time!  There’s even a scene where they contact a super-secret spy agency run by a woman known as Bridget, and ask for their help, and Bridget complies.  She gives Arnold and Gerald access to all of their expensive spy equipment for no charge!  Is this the worst spy agency ever or what?  What kind of spy agency would trust all of their special equipment in the hands of two 9-year-olds?           

Why Christopher Lloyd?  Why????

Also, another problem with this film is that they spend almost no time on the characters we know from the show.  We get introduced to these new characters like Scheck, Bridget, and the creepy city coroner (voiced by the Great Christopher Lloyd).  For crying out loud the bus driver, who had maybe 5 lines the entire span of the show, even got a background story, and so does his ex-girlfriend, Mona, who we do not see on screen until the last 5 minutes of the film!  That’s way too much time to waste on characters we’ve just met!                        

"Wow, Arnold...that film was pretty bad"

I’m not surprised this film was a failure.  I don’t know why they chose this story for the Big Screen film release, when they could have gone with much better stories.  Like how about a film where Arnold finds out that his parents might be alive and goes out to find them or they actually come back and want to move away and now Arnold must decide whether or not to go with his parents or stay with his grandparents in the neighborhood?  Those would have been way better film stories to go with than the piece of monkey excrement story they went with for “Hey Arnold! The Movie”.  So if you are a fan of the show, do yourself a favor and avoid this film at all costs; it’s just not worth it to see a piece of your childhood get shot in the face over and over again.