"Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck team up with an aspiring stuntman and a studio executive in order to rescue the stuntman's missing father and locate a mythical diamond before the head of a major conglomerate uses it for his own wicked deeds." 

OUR REFLECTION:

Nostalgia is a fickle thing, making us think the world was better when we were younger, when we didn’t have the responsibilities that we do today as full-grown adults, as if those responsibilities didn’t exist for our parents. A symptom of nostalgia is, of course, thinking the media we consumed as children were better than they actually were, when we didn’t know how to think critically and rated movies, in our own ways, based purely on vibes. Nostalgia is, unfortunately, the reason why Space Jam gets latterly regarded as a cult classic, receiving a cash-grab nostalgia-bait sequel, while Looney Tunes: Back in Action, for the time being, is left nearly forgotten to time.

I want to start this retrospective by talking about the unfortunate circumstances one must face when acquiring this film. Joe Dante’s Looney Tunes: Back in Action is only available on no-longer-printed VHS and DVD, not yet receiving a blu-ray or 4K or available to stream on any of the usual services. It is, thankfully, available on VOD through the usual suspects, and in HD! So, uh, Warner Bros… Release a blu-ray, please?

It’s a shame, too, because Back in Action is a punch above a solid experience. Not only is it mesmerizing to witness the awe-inspiring craftsmanship of how the 2D characters are implemented in the live-action world, using a ton of practical effects to make the 2D characters feel tangible, it’s also a lot of fun to see Joe Dante adapt cartoon logic to live action. The film toys with the medium in ways that makes the adventure as fun and breezy as the older short cartoons, while also adding small nuances to the script to generate a pathos just strong enough to make the feature-length runtime engaging without losing sight of the fun. It may feel weird to give an archetype like Daffy Duck a character arc, but Larry Doyle’s script pulls it off without taking itself too seriously. It’s a technique he uses even in his more recent work, Command Z.

Brendan Fraser’s character and performance both grounds and leads the tone of the film, his action and comedy chops firing on all cylinders. Joan Cusack’s small appearance as Mother is iconic in its own right and a nearly unrecognizable Steve Martin unbottles what feels like a storage of silliness he’s kept packed in since birth. All this reigned by Joe Dante, who incorporates background gags and throwaway lines in a fashion Phil Lord and Chris Miller seemed to be inspired by in their own work.

Looney Tunes: Back in Action is lightning in a bottle, for better and worse. Better because of the amount of raw creativity it manages to contain, and for worse because, by the end, it’s kind of a nothing movie. As soon as the credits roll, the experience is over with not much to mull over. Despite that, it’s one hell of a viewing experience with a personality we don’t see much these days. Hopefully The Day the Earth Blew Up can help fill the gap, because the current Warner Bros. leaders sure as hell aren’t going to release Coyote vs. Acme anytime soon.