The Land Before Time (film)

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Sequels and spin-offs

The movie generated many direct-to-video sequels, but the reaction to these have not always been favorable, with most fans of the original expressing annoyance at the superfluous addition of musical numbers (something even Disney had abandoned) and more transparent lessons of morality. Don Bluth and his animation studio have attempted to explain to their fans that they have no connection with these sequels. One Rotten Tomatoes reviewer wrote that The Land Before Time was suffering from the "excessive sequel syndrome," with films that were "pure formula." [5]

According to the Internet Movie Database, a television series based on the films is set to air in 2007.[6]

Films

The following is a list of the films in the series:

Film Release date
The Land Before Time November 18, 1988
The Land Before Time II: The Great Valley Adventure December 12, 1994
The Land Before Time III: The Time of the Great Giving December 15, 1995
The Land Before Time IV: Journey Through the Mists December 10, 1996
The Land Before Time V: The Mysterious Island December 9, 1997
The Land Before Time VI: The Secret of Saurus Rock December 1, 1998
The Land Before Time VII: The Stone of Cold Fire December 5, 2000
The Land Before Time VIII: The Big Freeze December 4, 2001
The Land Before Time IX: Journey to Big Water December 10, 2002
The Land Before Time X: The Great Longneck Migration December 2, 2003
The Land Before Time XI: Invasion of the Tinysauruses January 11, 2005
The Land Before Time XII: The Great Day of the Flyers February 27, 2007

Voice cast

Crew

Release dates

Technical data

Home video release history

Sing-Along-Songs VHS

  1. You're One of Us Now (from The Land Before Time II: The Great Valley Adventure)
  2. When You're Big (from The Land Before Time III: The Time of the Great Giving) (Note: Hyp's voice is different when he sings this song.)
  3. Kids Like Us (from The Land Before Time III: The Time of the Great Giving)
  4. Peaceful Valley (from The Land Before Time II: The Great Valley Adventure)
  5. Who Needs You? (from The Land Before Time IV: Journey Through the Mists)
  6. Standing Tough (from The Land Before Time III: The Time of the Great Giving)
  7. Grandma's Lullaby (from The Land Before Time IV: Journey Through the Mists)
  8. Eggs (from The Land Before Time II: The Great Valley Adventure)
  9. It Takes All Sorts (from The Land Before Time IV: Journey Through the Mists)
  10. If We Hold on Together (from The Land Before Time) (Littlefoot and Ducky's version)
  1. The Lone Dinosaur (from The Land Before Time VI: The Secret of Saurus Rock)
  2. Big Water (from The Land Before Time V: The Mysterious Island)
  3. Bad Luck (from The Land Before Time VI: The Secret of Saurus Rock)
  4. Friends for Dinner (from The Land Before Time V: The Mysterious Island)
  5. When You're on Your Own (from The Land Before Time VI: The Secret of Saurus Rock)
  6. Always There (from The Land Before Time V: The Mysterious Island)
  7. Get the Facts (from An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster)
  8. Creature de la Nuit (from An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster)
  9. Who Will (from An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster)
  10. Anywhere in Your Dreams (from An American Tail: The Treasure of Manhattan Island)

The Land Before Time in popular culture

  • At the beginning of Beethoven's 3rd, there are VHS covers for the first five films in The Land Before Time film series seen in the background of the video store. Later, there are shots from The Land Before Time VI: The Secret of Saurus Rock.
  • The trailer for one of the other Universal Pictures/Amblin Entertainment animated films We're Back! A Dinosaur's Story features music from The Land Before Time.
  • The plot of the Disney film Dinosaur (a multi-species herd must work together to search across a barren wilderness for a verdant valley safe from carnivores) was extremely similar to the plot of The Land Before Time.
  • Also similar to the original 1988 film was the 1989 cartoon Dink, the Little Dinosaur. A multi species herd of dinosaur children (which includes an Apatosaur leader, a duckbill girl, and a Pteranodon) live together and have adventures in Dinosaur Valley while looking out for Tyrannor the Tyrannosaurus. One episode also showed a ghostly Apatosaur, perhaps inspired by Littlefoot's mother. The makers of The Land Before Time film series may have been aware of Dink when they created Archie the old Archelon for The Land Before Time IV: Journey Through the Mists, a character similar to Dink's Crusty the Turtle. (Both are old cave dwelling turtles that lecture the young dinosaurs.) By coincidence, however, Nancy Cartwright has provided voices for both Dink (TV.Com credits her as "Additional Voices") and for The Land Before Time VI: The Secret of Saurus Rock as Dana, Cera's nephew.

Trivia

  • It was George Lucas's idea to make Cera a girl.[1]
  • Steven Spielberg and George Lucas originally wanted the film to have no dialogue, like the Rite of Spring sequence in Fantasia, but to make the film appealing to children, they abandoned this idea and got actors and actresses to do the voices.[2]
  • The film featured a hit song by Diana Ross: If We Hold on Together.
  • Because they were deemed as too frightening or could even cause psychological damage to young children, about 19 scenes of full animation, mostly pertaining to the Tyrannosaurus rex, and the five characters in mild peril or distress was cut or trimmed. Don Bluth was unhappy with the cuts, and fought to keep the footage, but felt like he had to do so, making this film only 69 minutes, one of his shortest.[3]
  • When this film was first released on VHS and laserdisc, it started with the Pizza Hut commercial and ended with a video trailer for An American Tail.
  • In his review for The Land Before Time, Roger Ebert states that "perhaps the kids in the audience won't find it strange to learn that dinosaurs lived for many generations in the green valley - even though Littlefoot is earlier described as the last of his species." [4] This is inaccurate. While the end narration states that Littlefoot and his friends "grew up together in the Valley," we are told that he was the last child of his herd, not the last of his species.
  • Fred Gwynne was considered the narrator of the film before being replaced by Pat Hingle.[citation needed]

Terminology

Due to the film being set in a presumably pre-Linnaean time, the movie's characters tend to refer to various animals not by Greek or Latin "scientific names" but rather by names noting those animals' conspicuous characteristics. Places are not referred to as common terms but as their own characteristics, like the animals. A list at some of the terms used throughout the series.

Inaccuracies

  • The dinosaurs featured existed in different time periods. Apatosaurus and Stegosaurus existed in the late Jurassic period, while Triceratops, Pteranodon, Saurolophus and Tyrannosaurus existed in the late Cretaceous period. Therefore, the period where this film takes place is unspecified.
  • As far as we know, some of the dinosaurs might not have cared for their young, particularly Apatosaurus.
  • Pteranodon ate fish and lived near beaches and coastal areas, and didn't have teeth.
  • Tarpits did not form during the age of the dinosaurs, they formed during the cenozoic era.
  • A Dimetrodon appears once in the film, which would have been extinct before the dinosaurs appeared.
  • Tyrannosaurus did not stand up straight, and we are not sure if they actually hunted other dinosaurs.

References

  1. ^ The Animated Films of Don Bluth - [1] by Jon Cawley
  2. ^ The Animated Films of Don Bluth - [2] by Jon Cawley
  3. ^ The Animated Films of Don Bluth - [3] by Jon Cawley
  4. ^ Chicago Sun-Times review [4] by Roger Ebert

External links

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