Books on screen

The Smurfs and the Magic Flute

The original Smurfs books, and especially this first story, are surprisingly different from the cartoon of the 80's. In fact, the Smurfs are secondary characters in this story which focuses on Johan and Peewit (renamed John and William in the British dub of the film). For the most part, the film follows the plot of the book fairly closely. A few scenes are combined or altered to improve the flow of the movie and a couple of songs are added (probably to pad the movie length a little). These songs serve little purpose in terms of the plot and one of them (about the Smurfs' personalities) was so irritating I could barely stand to listen to it. The humor and story-telling style are more reflective of the comics than of the cartoon. Strictly speaking, this movie is strong representation of the original book. As a movie, it's not exactly the most entertaining though. If you're a real Smurf fan, give this one a watch. Everyone else could probably skip it.