The Road to El Dorado

The Road to El Dorado is a 2000 American animated adventure musical buddy slapstick comedy film directed by Eric "Bibo" Bergeron and Don Paul, with additional sequences by Will Finn and David Silverman, starring Kevin Kline, Kenneth Branagh, and Rosie Pérez, and produced by DreamWorks Animation. The soundtrack features songs by Elton John and Tim Rice, as well as composer Hans Zimmer.

The movie begins in 16th-century Seville, Spain, and tells of two men named Tulio and Miguel who, when playing dice, win a map that supposedly shows the location of El Dorado, the legendary city of gold in the New World. However, when it is discovered that they are using loaded dice they attempt to escape, only to end up as stowaways on Hernán Cortés' fleet to conquer Mexico. They are discovered, but manage to escape in a boat with Cortés' prize war horse and eventually discover the hidden city of El Dorado, where they are mistaken for gods. The film received mixed reviews from critics and was a box office bomb, but has developed a cult following.

Plot

In Spain 1519, two con artists, Tulio (Kevin Kline) and Miguel (Kenneth Branagh), win a map to the legendary City of Gold, El Dorado, in a rigged gambling match. After their con is discovered, the two evade capture and hide aboard one of the ships to be led by Hernán Cortés (Jim Cummings) to the New World. During the trip, they are caught as stowaways and imprisoned, but manage to break free and take a rowboat with the help of Cortés' horse, Altivo (Frank Welker).

Later, they land at an unknown shore at the edge of Mexico, and Miguel begins to recognize landmarks from the map, leading them to a totem marker near a large waterfall. They see a native woman being chased by guards, but when the guards see Tulio and Miguel riding Altivo as depicted on the totem, they treat the two as gods, and along with the woman, escort them under the falls and into El Dorado, a city truly made of gold. They are brought to the city's elders, kind-hearted Chief Tannabok (Edward James Olmos) and wicked high priest Tzekel-Kan (Armand Assante). Tzekel-Kan, seeking to seize the city from Tannabok, insist the two demonstrate their powers. Tulio and Miguel bicker between themselves, while a nearby volcano begins to erupt. When Tulio yells at Miguel to stop pestering him, the volcano suddenly stops erupting, and the citizens take this as proof of their godhood. Celebrations are held, and the two are showered with gifts of gold, and given luxurious quarters to stay, along with charge of the woman, Chel (Rosie Perez). Chel is aware the two are conning the people but promises to remain quiet if they take her with them when they leave the city.

Tulio convinces Tannabok to built them a vessel that will allow them to leave the city with all the gifts they've been given, which will take a few days. Chel convinces Miguel to explore the city, which allows her to get romantically closer to Tulio. Miguel comes to appreciate the peaceful life the citizens seem to enjoy, and joins in with some of their activities. When Tzekel-Kan sees Miguel playing a ball game with children, he insists that the gods demonstrate their prowess against the city's best players in the same game. Tulio and Miguel are far outmatched, but Chel is able to substitute the ball with an armadillo named Bibo, allowing them to win; the two spare the ritual of sacrificing the other team, much to the crowd's approval. During the match, Miguel received a small cut, which Tzekel-Kan sees and realizes the two are not gods. Tzekel-Kan conjures a giant stone jaguar to chase them through the city. Tulio and Miguel manage to outwit the stone jaguar, causing both it and Tzekel-Kan to fall into a giant whirlpool, thought to be the entrance to Xibalba, the spirit world. When Tzekel-Kan comes to, he finds himself facing Cortés and his men, and offers to lead them to El Dorado.

With the boat completed, Miguel states his intention to stay in the city. Tulio and Chel board the boat, loaded with the gifts, when they see smoke on the horizon and realize Cortés is close. Tulio concocts a plan to use the boat to ram rock structures under the waterfall to collapse the main entrance to El Dorado, preventing Cortés from finding it, but requires the citizens to pull over a statue in the boat's wake to give it enough speed to ram the rocks. As the statue starts to fall, Tulio has difficulty in preparing the boat's sails, and Miguel, riding Altiva, jumps onto the boat to unfurl the sails, assuring the boat clears the statue in time. Tulio's plan works, though the boat and their gifts are lost. Tulio, Miguel, Chel, and Altiva end up near the totem and hide as Cortés' men and Tzekel-Kan arrive. When Tzekel-Kan finds the entrance blocked, Cortés has him taken prisoner as they return to their boats. Tulio and Miguel, though disappointed they lost their treasure, takes off in a different direction for a new adventure with Chel, unaware that Altivo still wears the golden horseshoes he was outfitted with in the city.

Cast

• Kevin Kline as Tulio, one of the con artists who pretend to be gods so they can get gold. He is the planner who wanted to leave El Dorado with the treasure.
• Kenneth Branagh as Miguel, one of the con artists who pretend to be gods so they can get gold. He is the fun-loving one who wants to stay in El Dorado.
• Rosie Perez as Chel, a young native from El Dorado who discovers Tulio and Miguel's con and decides to play along.
• Jim Cummings as Hernán Cortés, the merciless and ambitious leader of the expedition to find the empires of the New World.
• Armand Assante as Tzekel-Kan, the fanatically vicious high priest who has a religious fixation for human sacrifices.
• Edward James Olmos as Chief Tannabok, the kind chief of El Dorado who welcomes Tulio and Miguel.
• Tobin Bell as Zaragoza, a sailor on the voyage to the new world of El Dorado and the original owner of the map, which he loses to Tulio and Miguel when gambling with them. Tulio nicknames him Pee Wee.
• Frank Welker as Altivo, Cortés' horse who ends up teaming up with Tulio and Miguel.

Production

Under the working title El Dorado: City of Gold,^[4][5] the film was originally scheduled for release in fall of 1999.^[6] During production, the filmmakers drew much inspiration for the characters of Miguel and Tulio from those of the Bob Hope and Bing Crosby Road to... films. "The buddy relationship [between the duo] is the very heart of the story. They need each other because they're both pretty inept. They're opposites — Tulio is the schemer and Miguel is the dreamer. Their camaraderie adds to the adventure; you almost don't need to know where they're going or what they're after, because the fun is in the journey", remarked one of the film's producers, Bonne Radford. Unusually for an animated film, Kline and Branagh recorded their lines in the same studio room together, in order for the two to achieve more realistic chemistry. This resulted in a good deal of improvised dialogue, some of which ended up in the film.^[7] However, it also made work more difficult for the audio team.

In late 1996, Tim Rice and Elton John were asked to compose seven songs, which they immediately worked on. In February 1999, before the release of Elton John and Tim Rice's Aida, it was announced that ten songs had been composed for El Dorado. It was also announced that the release date had been pushed to March 2000.^[4]

The creation of the film was a challenge for the studio because DreamWorks Animation had devoted most of its creative efforts to its previous animated film, The Prince of Egypt.

Release

Critical reception

The film received mixed reviews from critics; it holds a 48% "rotten" rating out of 104 reviews at Rotten Tomatoes, with 50 positive reviews, making this the first DreamWorks animated film to earn a "rotten" rating; the consensus states: "Predictable story and thin characters made the movie flat."^[8] Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 top reviews from mainstream critics, calculated a score of 51 based on 29 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews".^[9]

Paul Clinton of CNN wrote, "The animation is uninspiring and brings nothing new to the table of animation magic," praising the Elton John/Tim Rice songs, but noting the weak plot.^[10]

In contrast, Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film a thumbs up and commented that it was "bright and zesty," having enjoyed it as a simple comedic farce,^[11] while Joel Siegel, on Good Morning America, called it "solid gold," claiming the film was "paved with laughs."

Box office

The film earned $12,846,652 on opening weekend at #2, behind Erin Brockovich's third weekend.^[12] The film closed on June 29, 2000, after earning $50,863,742 in the United States and Canada and $25,568,985 overseas for a worldwide total of $76,432,727. Based on its total gross, The Road to El Dorado was a box office bomb, unable to recoup its $95 million budget.^[13]

Home media

The Road to El Dorado was released on DVD and VHS on December 12, 2000.^[14]

Accolades

Soundtrack

The Road to El Dorado is an album released by singer Elton John to accompany the DreamWorks animated motion picture The Road to El Dorado. The songs were composed mainly by John with lyricist Tim Rice, with score contributions by Hans Zimmer and John Powell. John, Rice and Zimmer had previously collaborated on the soundtrack to The Lion King, another animated movie. Zimmer had also previously composed the music score to The Prince of Egypt.

In some instances (such as "The Trail We Blaze"), the songs have been altered musically and vocally from the way they appeared in the film. A "Cast & Crew Special Edition" recording of the soundtrack exists, but was never released to the public. It includes the theatrical versions of the songs, including "It's Tough to be a God" recorded by Kevin Kline and Kenneth Branagh, and several of the score tracks by Hans Zimmer.

Backstreet Boys provided backing vocals on "Friends Never Say Goodbye",^[17] but were uncredited due to record label problems. The group is "thanked" by John following the credits in the CD booklet. Eagles members Don Henley and Timothy B. Schmit are credited as background vocalists on the song "Without Question".

Track listing

Video Game

Gold and Glory: The Road to El Dorado was the video game tie-in, released on PlayStation, Game Boy Color, and PC.^[18]

The PlayStation & PC version of the game is drastically different to the Game Boy Color version. The main difference between the two games is that the PlayStation & PC version is a 3D adventure game with similarities to Resident Evil, while the Game Boy Color version is a more traditional 2D side-scrolling platformer.^[18]

Versions of the game were intended to be released for the PlayStation 2 and Dreamcast, but were eventually cancelled.^[19][20]

Gold and Glory: The Road to El Dorado received mixed reviews. Aggregating review website GameRankings and Metacritic giving the PC version 60.40%,^[21] the Game Boy Color version 59.20%^[22] and the PlayStation version 51.89% and 34/100.^[23][24]

Notes

References

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to: The Road to El Dorado

• Official website archived from the original on May 10, 2000
• The Road to El Dorado at the Internet Movie Database
• The Road to El Dorado at the Big Cartoon DataBase
• The Road to El Dorado at AllMovie
• The Road to El Dorado at Box Office Mojo
• The Road to El Dorado at Rotten Tomatoes