Horton Hears a Who! (2008): A Review
The entire plot of “Horton Hears a Who!” (2008) can be neatly summarized by paraphrasing a song by Vysotsky about “yellow, hot Africa,” where social unrest began simply because a giraffe used its naturally far-sighted vision. In this case, the giraffe is replaced by an elephant, whose heightened hearing causes him a series of problems. Horton, a cheerful elephant, hears SOS signals coming from a passing speck of dust while flapping his large ears in a fit of joy. This is no ordinary speck of dust. Upon closer inspection, or rather, “listening,” it turns out to be a whole city called Who-ville, inhabited by microscopic Whos.
The tale of an elephant saving a speck of dust was originally conceived by Theodor Geisel, the American equivalent of Chukovsky, known to the world as Dr. Seuss. Now, two debutant directors have brought his vision to the screen. One of them previously worked as an animator on “Monsters, Inc.” (2001), “Finding Nemo” (2003), and “Toy Story” (1995). Seuss amplifies the glaring disparity in scale between the dust speck and the elephant into an absurd allegory: Horton and the endangered Who-ville can hear each other perfectly, while all other creatures of intermediate size stubbornly ignore the dust speck and bully the elephant. In the computer-generated 3D version, the invisible dust speck is transformed into a fluff, placed inside a clover bud. Horton, the talkative elephant, spends the rest of the movie in lively negotiations, clutching the flower in his trunk.
A World Turned Upside Down
It’s understandable that an elephant with acute hearing, engrossed in conversation with a flower, could cause as much upheaval in the animal kingdom as a giraffe falling in love with an antelope. New ideas are contagious, and soon a crowd of animals with flowers, each imagining something exciting within, follows Horton. One example is “wonderful ponies that eat rainbows and poop butterflies” – the most eccentric idea, which caused squeals of delight from the youngest viewers at the premiere. Kangaroo, a community activist, decides to rein in the elephant, whom she sees as corrupting the youth, with the help of a gang of obedient monkeys and a mangy vulture named Vlad Vladikoff – fearsome on the outside but kind on the inside. In the story of Horton and the dust speck, Dr. Seuss scattered many Aesopian allusions to Senator McCarthy, but it seems that their esoteric nature has only deepened over half a century.
Parallel Struggles
Parallel to Horton’s predicament, the mayor of the dust speck faces public condemnation. He is the only citizen of Who-ville who has established contact with the otherworldly elephant. The Whos want to celebrate the centennial of their city’s founding, but the mayor urges them to postpone the festivities until the elephant moves Who-ville to a safe location. Tensions rise. The microscopic city, clutched in the elephant’s trunk, is shaken (literally) by natural disasters and political confrontation. The jungle is rocked by a heated debate over whether an elephant has the right to talk to a flower. The climax of the interaction between the two worlds is reached in a striking scene where Horton performs circus acrobatics, crossing a chasm on suspension bridges, while the mayor of Who-ville, where things are also going awry, has his teeth treated in a dentist’s office.
A Healthy Dose of Madness
From a sober perspective, the story of the Whos and the elephant undoubtedly gives the impression of a well-documented hallucinatory trip. In general, a healthy dose of madness is essential in all talented fairy tales for the very young: to attract the attention of such an audience, you can only make the neurons work a little askew. Fortunately, those who undertook the adaptation of Seuss played by the same rules, did not compromise, and even added some madness of their own. The result is not quite “SpongeBob,” but adults, who usually languish with boredom at children’s sessions with talking elephants and giraffes, will certainly not be bored here. And one more thing: upon leaving the hall, the usually uncomfortable feeling that a huge elephant is watching you from the sky will no longer cause panic, but a surge of positive energy.
That’s a good result, too.