Chirphymium
It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional
Verity Robins
Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.
Billy Ollie
Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable
kbb6497
This could be, by far, the worst animated foreign film ever made. Surely it's the worst I've ever seen in a long time.Why would the Germans try to tell a story about Christopher Columbus? This is insulting to history, insulting to children's intelligence, and, worst of all, insulting to Columbus and his crewmates. This is actually so bad I can't even put it in paragraphs. How bad is this movie? How is it misguided? How is it so insulting to history? Here's a quick checklist:01. A Talking Bookworm Named Pico (Corey Feldman, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) 02. A Princess Firefly Named Marilyn (Irene Cara, Fame) 03. An Evil "Swarm-Lord" 04. Pico Telling Christopher Columbus (Dom DeLuise, The Secret of NIMH) That the World Is Flat When In Reality Columbus Figured It Out Himself 05. Columbus Going To The King & Queen To Tell Them His/Pico's Idea Of Finding The New World When In Real Life It Was The King & Queen Who Told Columbus To Find the New World 06.Stereotypical Crewmates07. The Most Corny-as-Hell Dream Sequence Where Columbus Pulls A Spyglass Out of His Penis 08. The Crewmates Trying To Hang Columbus When In Reality It Never Happened 09. Talking Beavers Helping Pico and Marilyn Defeat the Swarm-Lord 10. Columbus Using A Sock-Puppet To Get The Long-Found Gold. Again, It Never Happened. 11. Stereotypical Natives In The New World 12. The Most Sugar-Coated Ending In Which the Natives Honor Columbus, Columbus, Pico and Marilyn All Heading Home Alive and Safe and Columbus Talking About How The World Will Improve Within the Next 2,000 Years. There's Not Even An Epilogue That Tells How Several Of Columbus's Crewmates Were Killed By the Natives.See how bad this movie is? Not only that, it rips off Jim Henson's "The Dark Crystal" and "Labyrinth", as well as Don Bluth movies like "The Secret of NIMH", "All Dogs Go to Heaven" and "A Troll In Central Park" (and I thought THAT movie was bad.). The only saving graces of this movie are Dom DeLuise and Irene Cara. Other than that, it's loud, rude, and TOTALLY disrespectful to history.** out of **********
TheLittleSongbird
I saw The Magic Voyage as a big stickler for animation. The Magic Voyage is a terrible movie and somewhat pointless as well. On the other hand to its credit, it does succeed in what it set out to do, to inform and entertain the young audience, so I can't entirely hate on it. Although I realise the movie is really poor after many years of not seeing it, I loved it as a kid, hence what I said about what the film tried to accomplish.The animation is really quite bad. The colours are okay-ish, but the background art is lifeless and the character designs especially the noses are odd. I liked the songs as a kid, I was shocked at how forgettable the melodies were and how inane the lyrics were as a young adult(19) though, and how little they do in telling the story or moving it forward. The story is unfocused and made up of overlong and disconnected scenes, while the writing is both laughable and bizarre.The characters are also unmemorable and unengaging. The title character sometimes doesn't even feel like a title character, while Pico is very annoying. I do like the voice cast as in actors in general, but I just found them really bland here, yes even Dom DeLuise. So all in all, terrible but because of what it aimed to do I can't be too overly hard on it. 1/10 Bethany Cox
sitonpickle
This is a movie that is supposedly the story of how Columbus discovered America with his famous voyage across the Atlantic Ocean. We all know the story of how Columbus discovered that the earth is round, but not many of us are stupid enough to think that a wood worm told Columbus this revolutionary idea. There's even a scene in which Columbus says to a ship crew man, "this isn't an ordinary wood worm, this is the word worm that told me the world was a'round! Did you know the world was round, amigo!"Not only that, but there's a lot of other historically accurate characters, such as a giant swarm of bugs called "The Swarm Lord" and a fairy named Marilyn from a fairy land called "Moon Twilight".It shouldn't surprise anyone that this movie was made by German film makers. It's unbelievable how little the makers gave a crap about history. The movie is directed by Michael Schoemann, who more then likely read the introduction on a history book about Columbus, closed the book, rolled it up into a giant cigar and smoked his brains out with marijuana and said "Hey, you know what this story needs? Swarm Lords, a talking wood worm and fairies!!!"Like many people on IMDb, I saw this movie while I was a child and loved it. By the time Columbus and his crew get on the ocean sailing, the movie goes sugar high insane with Columbus going crazy in his dreams, singing a song and a strange climax after the arrival in America and bugs attacking. There's apparently more to fear then just the edge of the world. I found the movie to have some pretty hilarious moments in it's idiotic premise, such as the horrible dubbing which most of the time goes along lips that aren't even moving, a few lines from crazy Columbus and an argument concerning the ship running over a fish.
billgh4
I have given this film five stars because it is worthy of both a one and a ten.It deserves one star because it is one of the lowest, most ill-conceived, pathetic films I have ever seen. But it deserves ten stars as well. Because in being one of the sloppiest and most absurd films ever made, it is certainly one of the most comical.I had remembered this film from my childhood, but after viewing it at the age of seventeen, I gained an entirely new perspective of this film. I purchased it with the interest that it might bring back memories. But it is now a gem in my collection, one of the most entertaining motion pictures I have ever witnessed or ever will witness.It would be a misconception to clump this film with other films labeled 'so-bad-it's-good.' Rather, what makes this film enjoyable is its utter preposterousness; it crosses the boundaries of a typical children's film into the bizarre and surreal. One user hit the nail on the head when commenting on this film, saying that the viewer is led to ask the question: 'Why?' The dialogue is clumsily splattered all over the place. Every other line is something that could easily be thrown out, some of which touch into some realm of absurdity never to be revisited throughout the film. At other times, entire segments of dialogue seem completely unnecessary. It seems as if the voice actors were not only poorly improvising the script, but were also clueless as to what the story involved.The characters are completely senseless. Columbus, in particular, is hardly a character at all. Though they initially portray him as an ambitious explorer, the character gradually goes downhill as the film progresses, until the end of the film, at which point he has transformed into a raving madman running around in his underwear. 'Gold! Gold!!' he shouts gluttonously, his eyeballs shifting into all sorts of phantasmagorical shapes. One moment, he is clambering through the forest in search of gold, and the next moment he is paralyzed with fear, offering the other characters meaningless quips and puns. Meanwhile, he scrambles through the forest screeching maniacally, adding nothing to the plot save for absolute chaos.Generally, the film seems to dismantle as it goes on. The events within the plot grow more useless with every scene. By the fiery climax of the movie, it has all been reduced to pitiful bedlam. All that can be heard are the angry bellows from the evil 'Swarm Lord,' and the incessant wailing of Columbus. While the film seems to draw toward the dramatic demise of the evil 'Swarm Lord,' it is all ended when Columbus plummets down and inadvertently squashes the great swarm of bugs with his 'gold.' A squishing noise is heard; 'Hey! You squished the Swarm Lord!' says 'Bob the Beaver' in his Eeyore-like voice, since this abrupt turn of events would be completely undecipherable without such an explanation. The conflict has ended suddenly and unexpectedly.Without a doubt, it is a ridiculously poorly-made film, but those who are fond of absurdity are sure to love it. Moments of senselessness amount to great moments of comedy. Therefore, I recommend this film to anyone who is not a small child, and who feels ready for some laughs. If you begin to watch this film, and it does not seem promising at first, all you have to do is wait; watch as a seemingly innocent children's movie turns into a boiling pot of mayhem.
