That settles it. I’m certifiably insane.

How else could you explain going with a group of six or seven of your peers to see the new VeggieTales movie when the entire group is college age or older, and no one in the group is a parent? Keep in mind that not only did we rush out to see this movie on its opening night, we planned to do this at least a month in advance. What gives? Isn’t VeggieTales a children’s series?

The answer to that question is yes, but over the years, Big Idea’s series of videos featuring computer-animated vegetables that tell Bible stories has earned itself an inexplicable following of college students and young adults. Call it the Christian version of “Animaniacs” if you will - there’s something to be said for a kid’s series that takes special care to also entertain the adults that will have to watch it with their little ones, incorporating enough zaniness and randomness to easily please a sleep-deprived undergraduate, but also shedding light on Bible stories in ways that educate children (and sometimes even adults), without being so contrived and preachy that non-Christian parents are turned off to letting their kids watch it. For all of its silliness, Big Idea has a huge accomplishment on their hands - it’s extremely rare for a TV or video series to make its way out of the Christian bubble and into the mainstream. Generally speaking, when that happens, I feel the need to go investigate.

Now I’m not a hardcore VeggieTales freak or anything - I’ve seen one, maybe two of their videos all the way through, because a friend thought they were funny and forced me to sit down and watch. I normally run screaming from any form of children’s entertainment, but I had to admit the characters and their remarks were amusing - sometimes even their silly songs. I never expected that it would come to this - a feature-length, big budget adaptation of the story of Jonah and the whale. Part of me wondered, how many people would actually show up to see this on its opening night? Hence my plan to drag a bunch of my friends along and find out.

I’ll be upfront - “Jonah” is no “Toy Story”. It’s mostly designed to amuse, rather than to amaze. The animation, while not mind-boggling, is capable, doing its best to place our beloved Veggie characters into both Biblical and modern landscapes. There’s a certain suspension of reality required considering the fact that not a single vegetable has appendages of any kind - watching a cucumber play the guitar seemed particularly strange to me. But then, that’s all part of the charm. I’m not into these films for the technology - I loved “Toy Story” because it was hilarious, and while I wouldn’t quite classify “Jonah” in that category, I’d say it provides a good mixture of solid, laugh-out-loud moments while maintaining the plot and the moral lesson behind the plot.

What’s most important about “Jonah” is how it’s paced - after all, this is a 90-minute film and that could be difficult for some kids to sit through, especially without the usual “Silly Songs with Larry” break in the middle. The beginning of the movie finds us in Bob’s van (he’s a tomato, in case ya didn’t know), driving a few rowdy kids to a Twippo concert. They’re all in the back singing along to their favorite Twippo songs (here’s where the arm-less guitar playing comes in), and after a while this generates into arguing about who’s Twippo’s biggest fan and so forth (one of the children has a ticket to see him backstage and insists on rubbing it in - I can‘t help but wonder if this is a subtle jab at the misguided fandom some Christian musicians experience, given the VeggieTales‘ general acceptance in the CCM world). Long story short - the ruckus causes an accident, and next thing you know, they’ve gone off the road and they’re in a van DOWN BY THE RIVER!!! (Sorry, couldn’t resist making an SNL reference there.)

Anyway, most of the humor is slapstick up until this point - the kind of stuff I’d laugh at if I were 5, but it took a little while for things to really start getting witty (I was worried my friends were starting to have second thoughts). Fortunately, our protagonists soon stumble across a seafood restaurant run by a pair of French peas (don’t ask), and while waiting for a tow truck, the kids run into a trio of lackadaisical restaurant employees who seem to be rather bored. This trio turns out to be The Pirates Who Don’t Do Anything (TM), and when prompted by the question of why items like “compassion“ and “mercy“ are on the menu, they end up telling the kids a story about one of the rare times in their lives when they actually did something.

Of course, this is where it all gets good, as we are taken into the crux of the story - back to Biblical times, where we meet a rather stuffy, eyepiece-wearing asparagus named Jonah. You see, Jonah is a prophet - an occupation which is neatly explained for the kids as being sort of like God’s mailman, and through a song that starts off rather cheesy but eventually becomes very funny, we are given an example of the types of messages Jonah is told to bring to various towns - mostly commandments that draw from Christian morals, Old Testament Jewish laws, and a little bit of general silliness. However, it soon becomes clear that for all of Jonah’s piety, there’s one place he doesn’t want to go - Nineveh. After all, the Ninevites are eeeee-vil people who lie, cheat, steal, and worst of all, slap each other with fishes. (You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.)

I’m sure y’all know what happens next. But half the fun is seeing how the writers and animators bring Jonah’s disobedience to light - and I don’t want to ruin too much of that for you. Suffice to say, Jonah suddenly becomes a nervous shell of a man (I love that the movie is so careful here to show us that Jonah clearly knows he’s disobeying God), and in trying to get his mind off of it, he tries to book a cruise to the farthest point away from Nineveh that he can get (this provides a wonderful chance for a Biblical geography lesson, as we find out that at “the other end of the world” is a city called Tarsus, which appears to be somewhere near where Marseilles, France is now. I didn’t know that!) The travel agent won’t take him up on the offer, and so Jonah decides to employ a less reputable ship to get him where he needs to go… and I think you know whose ship I’m talking about!

Yes, The Pirates Who Don’t Do Anything (TM) play a central role in this movie, which I thought was a treat, just because they’re such amusing characters who clearly have their priorities all mixed up. Of course, they have no trouble prioritizing money in their list of needs (after all, “not doing anything“ doesn‘t pay very well), and Jonah gives them plenty of that, in return for which they do… well, nothing. Nothing other that sail the boat off in the general direction of Tarsus and then promptly kick back. As for Jonah, he relaxes in his quarters downstairs, where he promptly meets the most out-of-place character ever to grace a VeggieTales feature - a half-caterpillar, half-worm named Kahlil. Kahlil brings a good amount of comic relief to the screen (though his main catch phrase tends to get old fast) - interestingly, he’s got a Middle Eastern (or possibly Indian) sort of accent, and out of either ignorance or forgetfulness, Jonah keeps calling him “Carlisle”. (Hmmm… maybe one day the caterpillar will emerge from a cocoon and give him butterfly kisses? Anyway…)

The music also adds a lot to the film - there’s something amusing about watching the VeggieTales with an occasional theatrical score to back then up - even more so when then theme is based on the Pirates’ theme song! The songs would likely get on my nerves with repeated listening, but they fit in well with the whimsical mood of the film (I left the theater with “Jonah was a prophet, oooh, oooh” stuck in my head). Christian music aficionados will be tickled when they recognize the voices of the angels that appear before Jonah when he’s trapped inside the whale’s belly. Some of the songs might be a bit more difficult for kids to sing along with (especially the Gospel number that the angels perform!), but then, that might save you parents a little bit of your sanity.

I don’t want to ruin any more of the film’s comedic elements. Suffice to say, the story of Jonah was a difficult one to adapt into the Veggie world, in terms that kids could understand, but I think Big Idea pulled it off like no one else could. Sure, we all know the part about Jonah getting swallowed by a whale and spit up on the beach after three days - we always remember the elements of Bible stories that strike us as scientifically impossible. But it’s what happens after Jonah is given his “second chance” that really matters - and I have to commend Big Idea for a surprising conclusion to the story. A few other people have complained about that ending - frankly, I think it shows them (and me) how much we don’t really know our Bibles. I can accept that maybe some of the concepts are tougher for kids to grasp than those presented in the video series - but I don’t find that problematic per se. I think it means that if you bring kids to see this movie, they’ll have a lot of “Daddy, why”s and “Mommy, how come”s as you’re on your way out of the theater. But kids are supposed to be curious, especially when it comes to the Bible - how many of us adults have lost that curiosity altogether when it comes to Scripture? This movie challenged me to think in some ways. Movies that can teach children fundamental concepts such as mercy and compassion while giving adults a thing or two to chew on are an extreme rarity in a day and age where many filmmakers tend to take the easy way out.

“Jonah” isn’t a perfect film by any means. I’m sure that Big Idea could have done a lot more with it, and that they likely had to leave a lot of the storyboard on the cutting room floor, but it was a necessary price to pay to keep the attention span of their primary audience from running out. As it stands, there are a few jokes that little kids are never gonna get in a million years, and a few scenes run a little long. As mentioned before, the lack of a break for “Silly Songs” will probably frustrate some children who look forward to that part of every episode. If your kid isn’t really old enough to grasp the lessons presented in the videos, but you let him/her watch them just because he/she is amused by the vegetables running around and bumping into each other and singing songs, then you might want to pass on this one and rent it when the kiddo’s a little older.

Whatever the case, “Jonah” should be a movie you discuss with your kid(s) after watching it - not just a convenient way to babysit them for an hour and a half. If you don’t have any kids, don’t worry - I think you’ll get something out of it too. Even if your friends think you’re insane for watching computer-animated food.


Recommended: Yes