A magical compass transports Tom and Jerry back in time and space to the Gold City in the “Far East”, where they fall in with gods and monsters and must team up with gargoyles and exiled deities to keep a compass away from the dastardly Mega Rat.
There is a school of thought that Tom and Jerry are godlike beings, locked in a battle that can never truly end. No matter how often either is flattened, blown up or electrocuted, they cannot abandon one another. They are the immovable force and unstoppable object of philosophical exploration; their struggle is every being’s struggle for ease and security and being neither beaten nor eaten alive. Clearly, that’s something that the makers of their latest film, Tom And Jerry: Forbidden Compass, wanted to emphasise, because it feels like a fight for survival just to sit through it.
The opening is upbeat, pop-soundtracked nonsense, like a thousand other kid films, as Jerry makes his way across Manhattan (for some reason) to visit a museum where Tom stands guard. But very quickly the pair are magically shifted via an item on display, the titular compass, to Gold City in the “Far East”, according to extensive introductory subtitles. This enlightened settlement is under attack from Mega Rat but its guardian, Phoenix Master, is focused on earning his way back into heaven. Both are keen to get their hands on the compass that Tom now wears around his neck, and so begins a relentlessly scored running battle with no ebb and flow, and no sense of real pace, that goes on for most of the film.
You can’t be this loud, for this long, and yet leave people this sleepy.
Tom and Jerry are technically present throughout, but barely involved in any of the major moments. It’s really about showcasing Chinese design and characters, with the two visitors largely reduced to onlookers and occasional sources of (barely needed) extra chaos. Given their cartoon’s popularity, following extensive airing on Chinese TV in the ’80s and ’90s, this begins to look like cultural appropriation of the two Americans, shoehorned into a local story with no real contribution to make.
The character design of the titular pair doesn’t work in this 3D style, and some of the other characters, notably Mega Rat, are ugly but not in a way that feels purposeful — just inept. The animation and environments are pretty enough, and it might make you want to go on holiday to China, which may have been the principal aim. But the storytelling is simply bad. You can’t be this loud, for this long, and yet leave people this sleepy. These two forces of absolute chaos deserve better. They deserve to create mayhem that matters.
A relentless mess of a film. Other short-form animation works at feature length, but even children would have to be pretty undemanding to enjoy this Tom and Jerry.
