Ivan the incredible (or otherwise known as Gummi T or Jelly T) is a 2012 psychological horror documentory directed by a 'who the fuck knows' and produced by "who the hell cares" based off a 1975 danish children's book as a means for a money laundering scheme while also apparently playing into some marvel cinematic universe reddit shit with some other films but that isn't important.
This is not a normal movie.
This movie is just so incomprehensible to the human mind nonetheless to a little 7 to 8 year old me who was exposed to this at an after school daycare, I quickly soon forgot this movie at all only remembering things that happened in the beginning and end of the movie till my memory of this movie was re awakened from a convo with a friend who just so happened to have also watched this movie from a young age. Upon rewatching and also just recently also rewatching the entirety of the Gummi T cinematic universe, all I get left is more questions, not helped with the fact that upon first viewing of the movie after all these years the upload of it was in it's native language danish yet the subtitles were delayed and made everything else more confusing (which I think is the only way to watch this movie at all to be honest). Gummi T is truely something out of this world either positively or negatively but it cannot be undone. There will truely never ever be another piece of film or media in general like the CGI 2012 Danish animated movie "Gummi T"
Beginning with my most vivid memory of this movie which was a scene in the very beginning of the movie and the ending alongside snippets and pieces of th film scenes. Biggest example I can think off is once again in the beginning where the main antagonist/bully character of the movie is introduced who proceed to bully Ivan for being a loser, also just mentioning it now this movie and honestly film trilogy is just also really obsessed with spitting atleast with the main bully/antogonist characters. Ivan gets dragged into the school bathroom and gets dunked into a running sink so it looks like he pissed himself before being thrown into a toilet and it being spat on by the bully as shown with the gif below.
Another scene I most vividly remember is the ending where Ivan goes back to normal after everything there happened in the movie and his love interest of the movie being glad about that an d finally standing up for him when the bullies realize they can pick on Ivan again in which they both get dunked in the sink but that's alright #lovewins.
There's also just another final scene I vividly remember of Ivan going into this secret arts room esc hide out area he had and just making and playing pretend with what he created there which I will have to give the movie credit at least for the scene genuinly actually being cute atleast compared to the rest of this movie.
Now this far in the page I probably sound like a deranged lunatic and you don't even know what the fuck this actual movie is about (unless you're that one percent who like me was randomely exposed to this as a goo goo ga ga baby child)
Ivan the incredible/Gummi T as we've been calling it so far is once again a movie based of the danish children's book "Gummi/Jelly Tarzan", since I don't have the book and from what it seems it hasn't been translated from danish to english I have no clue on whether this book is movie accurate or not and either way I don't really care enough (sorry to the Gummi Tarzan enthusiasts). As mentioned before after rewatching this with a good friend a couple of times this whole movie is just fucking bizaare, the whole movie essentially feels like what a lot of the complaints about the movie "Chicken Little" were except actually true to this movie. I honestly would like to give a quick plot summary to this whole thing but to be honest I feel like if you're that curious on what this is you should just watch (and ONLY) watch the version off Gummi T on the site Wcofun.com or just... I don't know read the bare bones wiki page for it.
Gummi T's plot centers around our (sometimes) titular character Ivan and in the latter part of the movie, his dad (which I do not know the name of so we while just call him dad/Ivan's dad). Something you'll note right away just watching the first few scenes of this movie is this: Ivan's dad is a fucking asshole, not even in a "oh he's overbearing/just isn't aware he's maybe hurting his son in some way" he's just straight up mean to Ivan, obviously not in an actually "oh god jesus" way luckily which would've just made the movie way worse but first thing this fucking guy does is just run and start screaming and talking abt how great Tarzan is and what great shit he is. Few scenes later and whoop de doo Ivan's dad has now thrown out literally all the furniture including Ivan's bicycle just because and starts a "coaching" business which obviously gets him no where. One of the most assholish thing Ivan dad does to Ivan is where the main conflict begins where to advertise his coaching tuition he forces Ivan to climb up a tree infront of the whole town and then when Ivan epic fails and falls off the tree which now makes him the town's number one laughing stock what does his dad do? He gets mad at Ivan and leaves, funny considering once Ivan gets his super awesome powers to literally do everything and not fail now his father likes him and not only uses Ivan's powers soley for his business and money but starts neglecting Ivan as the fame starts getting to his head while egging Ivan to start beating up people who were kinda mean to him for him which is what makes Ivan not like his powers especially after losing the girl of his dreams to it. Ivan instead decides to do what his dad did to him and force him to climb up the tree since he's always bragging about being so good at Ivan's age and he fucking cries like a baby which suddenly now makes Ivan sad and regret what he did. Apart from the scene where Ivan shows his dad the art room he had not a single actual scene is shown of Ivan's dad trying to make it up to his son for literally using him for profit when he was proven "usefull" or for embarrassing him infront of the whole town, not even a single half-assed "I'm sorry" it's actually baffling, I know I probably sound like a 2016 cartoon reviewer with their avatars in the crossing arms position but it's genuinely unreal how they couldn't even just pull that in the last duration of the movie.
Apart from his dad, literally no body in this goddamn town is nice yo Ivan apart from his crush who returns mutual feelings towards him and even then she doesn't have that much personality or character beyond "girltina character love interest" also I'll just say rn atleast for the original voice in the danish version her voice actress sounds way to old to be playing a child character. Back to the point of literally everyone making fun of this fail child, no exxageration literally everyone hates him. He already gets bullied enough by the saliva bully antagonist and her gang and his father but they all make fun of him when he gets forced to climb the tree and becomes resident boo boo the fool of the town and this kid is like goddamn 10 alongside what honestly feels like Ivan having a schizophrenic episode in class so not only does he get made fun of for that he gets bullied for being iliterate, literally nothing goes right for this kid till he gets his awesome powers.
Speaking of his awesome powers, it's established in the Gummi T cinematic universe magic just casually exist which ok yea sure let's not think too much this is a goddamn children's franchise. Ivan gets it from this old witch character who's shown in the movie to be quite eccentric and have magical powers which seem to grant anyone's wishes, with this he asks for the witch to make him perfect which she agrees but accidentally forgets the last potion which basically balances all his powers and later comes back with said last potion so Ivan isn't op anymore. Honestly apart from the love interest who at best is just a bland piece of cardboard and the two old grandmas who I like to just think are a lesbian couple, the witch is arguebably one of the (only) good characters of the movie starting off with just she's not a complete dick to Ivan for no reason. Plus she has the awesome mobile train.
Now another thing that I'm going to talk about now is another thing that becomes very obvious if you even see the posters for this movie, it kinda looks like shit. Now to not be completely cynical I'll list some things I feel could have been done better if put with more experience hands, backgrounds and sets for the movie and other movies in the same universe actually look pleasant especially in the 3rd and finale to the trilogy, at worst they're just kinda generic sets pieces but it works alright here. Character movie and such is basic enough not the worst thing in the world but definetely not the best either especially considering what was being put out in 2012 even by more indie/smaller studios, it's just what you'd expect for a straight to dvd CGI film. Worst things in the movie tbh would just have to be the character models themselves, more specifically the hair, they honestly could've tried going the route of making the movie try and emulate the feel of a stop motion film to kinda solve that problem, other than that just looks really weird on the characters especially for certain characters who's hair is not on their head like arm hair and especially in the first film in the trilogy. Models themselves are fine, I'm all up for more wacky exxagerrated body types especially in a medium like animation, at worst some of the kid models are just kinda generic but atleast different enough so you aren't actually confusing who's who.
Another more miscellenous thing I just wanted to add here is another positive which is the movie's soundtrack, most parts honestly it isn't that present in the movie but the beginning song for each film of the franchise is honestly a banger.
My conclusion would have to be that this is honestly just a really mediorce if not very baffling and strange movie atleast through my perspective movie with a lot of plot issues like kinda slow pacing, really unlikable characters and questionable resulotions to the plot and also just looks not the best which may already be a turn off for people in general. In a sense this movie kinda reminds me of the czech also CGI animated movie called "Goat story" which you may be familiar with if you've ever watch that one youtuber, Drew Gooden's video on it and it's sequel, honestly would be entertaining if someone of that I guess reach/popularity? ever covered this film trilogy like sabespark or something. But yea in general could've been alright if it was put through more competant hands or had better writing/pacing and if you're going to watch this movie don't really expect it to be good and expect to only watch it for a quick laugh.
