The Rugrats Movie

Plot

Didi Pickles is pregnant with a second baby, which everyone believes will be a girl. Didi goes into labor during the baby shower and her friends rush her to the hospital. While this is happening, the kids crawl off and explore a nursery area before being found by the other parents. When the baby is finally born after a montage of past lives, it is actually a boy and they name him Dil.

Dil quickly becomes a very spoiled baby, crying non-stop for attention, keeping all of the toys for himself, and refusing to share with Tommy. After a particularly nasty fight between Tommy and Dil over Tommy's teddy bear, Stu has a conversation with Tommy about being a big brother and the responsibility he now has, assuring him that one day he will be happy to have Dil as his little brother. He also gives Tommy a locket with a picture of Tommy and Dil taped together and a watch inside, which he calls his "sponsitility" (his term for responsibility).

When Dil pushes the other babies too far, they decide to take him back to the hospital despite Tommy's disapproval, and end up driving recklessly through the streets in a Reptar Wagon which Stu had built for a contest. Along the way, Dil secretly steals Angelica's Cynthia doll, which prompts her to take Spike and they embark on a quest to find the babies.

The babies eventually crash in the woods, where they realize that they are lost. They spot a ranger's cabin where they believe a "lizard" (a mispronunciation of wizard) lives, and decide to go there, believing that it can take them home. After an encounter with a gang of runaway circus monkeys, Dil is taken away by them. Tommy vows to find Dil by himself, because Chuckie, Phil, and Lil agree they are better off without him.

Meanwhile, the parents find out that the babies are missing and try to find them. However, it becomes a media sensation with numerous news reporters constantly asking the adults questions; one of these reporters is Rex Pester, who irritates Betty to no end with his insensitive comments on the status of the babies, and intentionally enrages Drew into attacking Stu by telling him Stu lost Angelica.

Tommy eventually finds Dil during a storm, and are forced to take shelter under a tree. But as Tommy tries to take care of him, Dil selfishly drinks all of the milk and keeps the large blanket for himself, which leads to the blanket tearing in half and Tommy falling into a puddle of mud. Tommy finally snaps and very nearly pours banana baby food on Dil for the monkeys to take him away, but Tommy's rage and the storm's lightning and thunder scare Dil so much that he sees the error of his ways. They reconcile and sleep peacefully.

After the storm, the other babies find Tommy and Dil, and after running into Angelica and Spike they make their way to the "lizard". While on a bridge, they are confronted by the monkeys, but are then scared off by a wolf has been hunting down the babies since they arrived in the woods. Spike intervenes and fights the wolf until they both fall from the bridge. Meanwhile, Stu, who has been looking for the babies via an aircraft he made, finally finds them, but crash lands into the ranger's cabin. Believing he is the "lizard," the babies wish for Spike back instead of going home. Stu falls through the bridge and finds Spike, who actually survived the fall. The babies are then reunited with their families, and the monkeys with their circus owners. The monkeys attack Rex Pester, much to Betty's amusement. The families return home and the babies accept Dil as one of the group.

In a post-credits scene, Grandpa Pickles is sleeping in the Reptar Wagon when Grandpa Boris' goat kicks it, sending both the wagon and Grandpa down the street, presumably starting another adventure all over again.

Cast

Guest stars

Baby singers

Production

Rumors about a possible Rugrats film started since the beginning of the series. The first attempt of bring Rugrats to the big screen, was in 1993, when Nickelodeon made a deal with 20th Century Fox to make films based on Rugrats, Doug and The Ren & Stimpy Show, but the contract expired in 1995, with no movies produced.

Two months before the release of the movie, in September, an episode prequel entitled "The Family Tree" was aired as the final episode of the fifth season. The film's beginning and final is a parody to Paramount and Lucasfilm's Indiana Jones film series. This would later inspire the second segment of the episode "A Tale of Two Puppies / Okey-Dokey Jones and the Ring of the Sunbeams", that aired during the show's eight season.

Two songs were cut from the film during production. The first sequence revolved around Stu and Didi in a nightmare sequence where Dr. Lipschitz criticizes their parenting through song. The other sequence occurs as the Rugrats are pushing the Reptar Wagon through the woods, debating what to do about Dil in army chant style. These two scenes were cut from the theatrical version and the VHS and DVD releases. However, they were already animated at the time, and the scenes are shown on CBS and Nickelodeon television airings of the film as the uncut version is only available on television. These scenes were present in the print novelization.

The film was released in theaters with a CatDog short titled "Fetch", in which Cat wins a radio contest, and attempts to answer the phone as Dog chases down his tennis ball. This short was later broadcast in CatDog Episode 21. However, the home video VHS and DVD release contains a different CatDog short, "Winslow's Home Videos".

Home video

The Rugrats Movie was released on VHS and DVD on March 30, 1999, by Paramount Pictures; Paramount Home Video also released the film on Laserdisc. In 2011, the film was re-released in a three-disc trilogy set alongside its sequels, in honor of Rugrats' twentieth anniversary.

Soundtrack

The Rugrats Movie: Music From the Motion Picture was released on November 3, 1998. The enhanced soundtrack contained thirteen tracks, bonus CD-ROM demos and commercials. Amazon.com's Richard Gehr praised the CD for "[bridging] demographics as nimbly as the [original] show itself [did]" and for songs "fans of all ages will love".

Entertainment Weekly's David Browne rated the Music From the Motion Picture with a C.

Browne noted that, while the soundtrack is enjoyable for children and does "[make] concessions" for parents, adults may dislike the amount of rap. Allmusic's William Ruhlmann reviewed the soundtrack positively, saying "the result" of the singers and songs "is a romp in keeping with the tone of the show and the film".

Music From the Motion Picture spent twenty six weeks on Billboard 200, peaking at #19.

Video games

Video games were released for Game Boy and Game Boy Color titled The Rugrats Movie and Rugrats: The Movie respectively, with the former being released on June 19, 1998 and the latter on March 12, 1999. Both games were developed by Software Creations and released by THQ. They were side-scrolling video games and featured 8 levels, with the plot revolving around finding a replacement for Dil after he disappears. IGN's Peer Schneider graded the Game Boy Color game with an overall score of 5 out of 10.

Schneider states that the game doesn't have much "to hold the attention of older gamers", but that "kids will love the easy gameplay, recognizable characters and memorable Rugrats tunes". He closes with saying that "unless you're looking for something to entertain and challenge at the same time, parents can't go wrong in buying the game for their kids." Writing for GameSpot, Cameron Davis gave the Rugrats: The Movie a mixed review, stating that it wasn't "groundbreaking or innovative", but that the game "does what it sets out to do well".

Davis noted that the game was aimed at children and praised the "difficulty level" as being "set just right", so that "younger players can explore the levels in comfort thanks to the good collision detection and responsive controls, while those with a bit more Game Boy experience can use the generous time limits to ferret out hidden objects". The game overall was given a 6.2 by the critic. On aggregator site GameRankings, The Rugrats Movie is rated as a 55% while Rugrats: The Movie earned a 61.75%.

A computer game inspired by the film entitled The Rugrats Movie: Activity Challenge was developed and published by Brøderbund and released on September 14, 1998. It features six games and a bonus level that can be attained if a certain item is obtained in a game.

Books

Several books were released by Simon & Schuster's Simon Spotlight branch and Nickelodeon inspired by The Rugrats Movie. Tommy's New Playmate and The Rugrats Versus the Monkeys were also released on October 1, 1998, authored by Luke David and illustrated by John Kurtz and Sandrina Kurtz.

The Rugrats Movie Storybook, released on the same date and using the same illustrators and publishers, was written by Sarah Wilson. The same date saw the release of The Rugrats Movie: Hang On To Your Diapies, Babies, We're Going In!: Trivia from the Hit Movie!, a trivia book written by Kitty Richards.

A novelization of the film written by Cathy East Dubowski was published on October 1, 1998, by Tandem Library. The following month, a 144-page guidebook, The Making of The Rugrats Movie: Behind the Scenes at Klasky Csupo, was released on November 1, 1998, by MSG. In May 1999, Hal Leonard Publishing Corporation released a book titled The Rugrats Movie.

Box office

The film was released on November 20, 1998, and made US$27,321,470 in its opening weekend, from 2,782 theaters, averaging about $9,821 per venue and ranking as the #1 movie that weekend. In total, The Rugrats Movie made US$140,894,675, $100,494,675 from the domestic market, and $40,400,000 from its foreign release.

The film was released in the United Kingdom on March 26, 1999, and topped the country's box office for the next three weekends, before being dethroned by The Faculty.

Critical reception

The Rugrats Movie holds a 59% rating on the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes: 29 positive reviews and 20 negative reviews. The consensus is: "Charming characters; loads of fun for kids and adults."

Roger Ebert gave the film 2 stars out of 4. Ebert wrote that the film's target audience was primarily younger children, and that, while he as an adult disliked it, he "might have" liked it if he were younger and would recommend it for children. The New York Times's Anita Gates reviewed The Rugrats Movie positively, calling it a "delight".

Lisa Schwarzbaum of Entertainment Weekly graded the film with a B. Schwarzbaum praised the movie for its appeal to both adult and child audiences, "juxtaposing the blithely self-absorbed parallel universes of small, diapered children and their large, Dockered parents". However, other Entertainment Weekly reviewer Ty Burr gave The Rugrats Movie a B−, criticizing that the film's issues sprung from it being "bigger" than the original series, thus it having more cultural references, out-of-place CGI scenes, and "[going] into scary territory". Despite these faults, Burr did praise the "escaped circus monkeys" for being "scary in a good way", as well as a joke that was accessible to younger audiences.

Sequels

Two sequels have been released: Rugrats in Paris: The Movie, which was released on November 17, 2000, and Rugrats Go Wild, which was released on June 13, 2003.