An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster
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| An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster | |
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 An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster |
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| Directed by | Larry Latham |
| Produced by | Larry Latham |
| Written by | Len Uhley |
| Starring | Thomas Dekker Robert Hays Susan Boyd Candi Milo Lacey Chabert |
| Music by | Michael Tavera |
| Distributed by | Universal Studios Home Entertainment |
| Release date(s) | December 9, 1999 (Germany) July 25, 2000 (USA) |
| Running time | 78 min. |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Preceded by | An American Tail: The Treasure of Manhattan Island |
| IMDb profile | |
An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster was the second direct-to-video sequel to An American Tail: The Treasure of Manhattan Island and last in the An American Tail saga of films, starring Thomas Alexander Dekker as the main character, the young Fievel Mousekewitz. This film was first released on December 9, 1999, in Germany and in the U.S. it was released in 2000. The ending of this film shows Fievel falling asleep which may mark that there wouldn't be another American Tail film.
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[edit] Plot
Fievel, his friend Tony and his sister Tanya (the female mouse pictured above), all get a job at the local newspaper, where the audience is introduced to Nellie, who wants to be an important reporter, but only gets small assignments, as if she were a secretary to Reed, the newspaper's editor. Throughout the film, Tanya tries to win Reed's heart, while Tony tries to get noticed by Reed and promoted to a reporter. Like in the previous movies where a mouse installation is directly below its human installation counterpart, the newspaper offices the mice work in is directly underneath the newspaper offices the humans work in.
Nellie gets a chance when she is assigned to report mice who disappear overnight into holes that open up on their floor all over New York. Reed makes up a, as Nellie calls it, "so-called monster" that lives under Manhattan and takes mice away during the night to add more excitement to the otherwise unimportant story, intending to sell more papers. The night monster creates fears among the readers, as could be expected. Fievel begins having nightmares that cause him to lose sleep because of his fear of the monster; the film opens up with Fievel having a dream about being chased by what he thinks the monster looks like. And when through Tanya he is assigned the job of following Nellie and drawing up interperatations of what the monster looks like based on witness testimony, this makes his insomnia all the worse.
A particularly suspicious miniature french poodle named Madame Mousey who has started living among the mice about this time appears at every crime scene, claiming to be a fortune teller. The heroes finally decide to investigate her by means of the "dog council" that meets at Central Park. They also search down one of the holes, which leads directly to a group of cats hiding in the sewers. Also, all the mice that had disappeared are being held in wood cages there, to be sold off to other cats and eaten.
The night monster itself, a mechanic device with ghastly flashing pictures and a circular saw, is revealed in full when it attacks the mice newspaper office and printing press to prevent them from printing the truth, which they had just discovered. A great chase scene takes place throughout both the mouse and the human newspaper offices. Reed reveals that he was in love with Nellie all along, much to Tanya's intense dismay. When all the cats seem to be under control, the "dog council" appears just as they're regaining consciousness and chase them all away, taking Madame Mousey with them.
The last scene takes place at the beach, where the audience is told that the "dog council" had chosen for the french poodle (the mastermind behind the night monster) a punishment worse than prison: returning her to her owner. Mrs. Mousekewitz, Fievel's mother, surmises saying that now that the mystery has been cleared up, Fievel may finally go to sleep, only to turn around and find him already asleep on the beach towel.
[edit] Animation style
In comparison with the two theatrical features in the American Tail series, both direct-to-video releases falter in quality, including shading and animation quality, as typical for TV cartoons, while the most notable difference is that both video features made use of interlacing even in their PAL versions. On top of that, Feivel's fur color was desaturated even though the rest of the Mousekewitz family have kept their original fur color.
[edit] Characters
- Fievel Mousekewitz (voiced by Thomas Dekker): A little mouse.
- Tanya Mousekewitz (voiced by Lacey Chabert): Fievel's sister.
- Mama & Papa Mousekewitz (voiced by Susan Silo and Nehemiah Persoff): Fievel's parents
- Yasha Mousekewitz (not voiced): Fievel's baby sister.
- Tiger (voiced by Dom DeLuise): The only cat friend of the Jewish-Russian mouse family.
- Tony Toponi (voiced by Pat Musick): Fievel's best friend.
Other Voices:
- Susan Boyd (Nellie Brie, a fictionalized mouse version of Nellie Bly)
- Robert Hays (Reed Dailey)
- Candi Milo (Madame Mousey, the meanest, witchiest miniature French poodle)
- John Mariano (Twitch, leader of the Outlaw Cats / Madame Mousey's manservant)
- John Garry (Lone Woof)
[edit] Trivia
- The film's character, Nellie Brie is similar to Sawyer Cat from the Warner Bros. motion picture, Cats Don't Dance.
[edit] Soundtrack
"Get the Facts" Performed by Susan Boyd and Thomas Dekker
"Creature de la Nuit" Performed by Candi Milo
"Who Will" Performed by Susan Boyd, Thomas Dekker, Pat Musick and Dom DeLuise
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
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