Meet the Feebles


Meet the Feebles is a 1989 New Zealand adult puppet musical black comedy film directed by Peter Jackson, and written by Jackson, Fran Walsh, Stephen Sinclair, and Danny Mulheron. The plot follows a stage troupe of anthropomorphic animals in a perverse comic satire. In contrast to the positive innocence and naïve folly of The Muppets, the Feebles largely present negativity, vice, and other misanthropic characteristics.
The film is the first Jackson co-wrote with his future partner Fran Walsh, with the two collaborating on all his subsequent films. The film also marked the beginning of Jackson's collaborations with Richard Taylor and Wētā Workshop, as created by Taylor and Tania Rodger, who all worked on Jackson's subsequent films.

Plot

The Feebles Variety Hour theatre troupe is rehearsing with hopes of finding success through being chosen for a syndicated television series. Star performer Heidi the hippopotamus is insulted by pornographic rat director Trevor and complains to her boss and lover Bletch, a sleazy walrus, unaware that he's having an affair with a Siamese cat named Samantha.
Robert, a hedgehog and the troupe's newest member, arrives and immediately falls in love with a poodle named Lucille. He successfully serenades her with encouragement from Arthur, the show's worm manager.
During the leadup to the show, different members of the troupe experience their own personal troubles. Sid, an elephant and animal trainer, is visited by his ex-fling Sandy, a chicken, who is filing a paternity suit against him after birthing an elephant-chicken hybrid named Seymour. After a confrontation with Samantha in which she bitterly reveals Bletch's infidelity with her, Heidi tearfully gorges on cake while flipping through her scrapbook of her fame and youth and reminisces on her first meeting with Bletch.
Harry the rabbit is told by his duck doctor, Dr. Quack, that he caught a terminal disease after a threeway, which tabloid reporter F.W. Fly overhears and publishes in the newspaper. Wynyard, a drug-addicted frog who suffers from intense PTSD from his experiences in the Vietnam War, is desperately looking for money in order to obtain more drugs. Trevor drugs and rapes Lucille in order to entice her into being his new actress for his pornos, causing Robert to think that she's being unfaithful and dump her. Bletch, while playing golf with his henchman Barry the bulldog, initiates a confidential drug deal with a Scottish-accented warthog named Cedric and his Australian-accented Wolfhound henchman, Louie.
After a disastrous rehearsal, Heidi is berated by Sebastian, the show's gay Arctic fox director, for overeating after a piece of Black Forest gateau in her cleavage, causing her to run into Bletch's office to vent to him again - only to catch him receiving oral sex from Samantha, upsetting her twice as much and resulting in her trashing her dressing room.
Bletch, realising that Cedric provided him borax, decides that he, along with Trevor and Barry, go to the docks and obtain the drugs themselves after using the borax to kill a perverted, panty-sniffing Aardvark named Dennis and then Louie. But before they leave, Bletch is informed by Sebastian that the show is off as Heidi is refusing to perform, but he successfully persuades her by feigning lust for her and they briefly have sex.
At the docks, Bletch, Trevor and Barry obtain the drugs after killing Cedric, his whale boss Mr. Big, and several crab henchmen, but Barry is decapitated by a giant black widow spider in their the ensuing escape. On their way back to the theater, Bletch learns of Harry's disease in the newspaper and kills F.W. for gossiping about it. During the show, Sebastian tells Bletch that they were chosen for a syndicated series by the network.
As Bletch celebrates in his office, Heidi attempts to seduce him, only for him to harshly reject her, insult her and tell her that he intends to replace her with Samantha as the star. Humiliated and heartbroken and after experiencing hallucinations of the troupe laughing at her, Heidi decides to commit suicide; after failing to hang herself, she prepares to kill herself using an M60 machine gun in Bletch's office. But before she can do so, Samantha enters to retrieve her purse, spots Heidi and taunts her again, causing Heidi to snap and shoot Samantha dead in response.
Meanwhile, the show gradually goes awry: an ailing Harry vomits all over the stage, Sid is accosted by Sandy in front of the audience, an intoxicated Wynyard accidentally kills himself during his knife-throwing act and Sebastian performs a musical number about sodomy in a desperate attempt to save the show.
Heidi goes on a violent rampage throughout the theater, killing many troupe members, including Harry, just after Dr. Quack informed him that his illness wasn't terminal after all, and Sandy, before shooting Sid in his kneecaps. Before she can kill Lucille, Robert swoops to her rescue, saying that he still loves her, with Lucille revealing what Trevor did to her earlier. Before Heidi can kill Bletch, he tries to calm her down by claiming that he still loves her, but this proves to be a ruse to make Heidi lower her guard so Trevor can kill her. Suddenly, Robert attacks Trevor, allowing Heidi to retrieve her gun and kill both Trevor and then Bletch. Arthur regretfully informs Heidi that he has just reported her to the authorities and Heidi, accepting her fate, requests that he plays her song one last time before she is arrested.
A photographic postscript reveals what happened to the survivors following the massacre: Sid became a struggling horticulturalist with Seymour following his kneecap surgeries, Arthur received an OBE and retired to the countryside, Sebastian wrote an autobiography about the incident and is negotiating the film rights, Robert and Lucille got married and had two children and Heidi, after serving ten years in a female penitentiary, was rehabilitated into the community and now works at a large supermarket under a new identity.

Cast

Puppeteers

  • Danny Mulheron as Heidi
  • Jonathon Acorn - Supervising puppeteer
  • Ramon Aguilar - Supervising puppeteer
  • Eleanor Aitken
  • Terri Anderton
  • Sean Ashton-Peach
  • Carl Buckley
  • Sarah Glensor
  • George Port
  • Ian Williamson
  • Justine Wright

    Voices

  • Donna Akersten as:
  • * Lucille
  • * Samantha
  • * Dorothy
  • * Female Rabbit #1
  • * Chorus Girl #2
  • * Fitness Tape Voice
  • Stuart Devenie as:
  • * Sebastian
  • * Madame Bovine
  • * Sandy
  • * Cedric
  • * Eight Bal
  • * Seymour
  • * Female Rabbit #2
  • * Chorus Girl #1
  • Mark Hadlow as:
  • * Heidi
  • * Robert
  • * Barry
  • * Chorus Girl #3
  • Ross Jolly as:
  • * Harry
  • * Dennis
  • * Abi Bargwan
  • * Mr. Big
  • * Pekingese
  • * Crab 2
  • * Vietnamese Gopher
  • Brian Sergent as:
  • * Trevor
  • * Wynyard
  • * F.W.
  • * Dr. Quack
  • * Jim
  • * Chuck
  • * The Spider
  • * Vietnamese Soldiers
  • Peter Vere-Jones as:
  • * Bletch
  • * Arthur
  • * The Baker
  • * Newspaper Mouse
  • * The Announcer
  • Mark Wright as:
  • * Sid
  • * The Masked Masochist
  • * Louie
  • * Guppy
  • * Poodle
  • * Snake bartender
  • * Crab 1
  • * Chorus Girl #4
  • Fane Flaws as Musician Frog

    Production

The film was originally conceived as part of a television series and only belatedly became a feature after Japanese investors proposed expanding it; as such, the script was hastily re-written. The dialogue was recorded before shooting began. Made on an extremely low budget considering the time-consuming process of working with puppets, the film went over budget and schedule. The feature was filmed in Wellington, with the majority of the scenes being filmed on multiple constructed sets places, in an abandoned railway shed at the dockyards. Some scenes were filmed outside the goods shed, such as a few external and internal scenes that were filmed at The St. James Theatre. During filming, some scenes, including the Vietnam flashback, were funded by members of the film crew, and filmed secretly under the title Frogs of War. The Vietnam flashback includes a game of Russian roulette as a parody of The Deer Hunter. An initial application for Film Commission money was rejected by executive director Jim Booth, who a short time later became Jackson's producer. The Commission eventually granted the production two-thirds of its $750,000 budget, though relationships between the funders and the production soured and the Film Commission removed its credit from the film.
It is often mistakenly stated that there are no human characters in the film; the character Abi is a human. However, there are no real-life human characters in the film-- like the animal characters, Abi is a puppet. Director Jackson has a cameo as an audience member dressed as an alien from Bad Taste. Every vehicle seen in the film is a variation on the Morris Minor, including a specially constructed limousine. Morris Minors also appear in Jackson's Bad Taste and Braindead. By presumed coincidence, one of the characters, Harry the Hare, shares a name with the title character of James B. Hemesath's short story "Harry the Hare", written for Harlan Ellison's anthology Again, Dangerous Visions in 1972.

Soundtrack

The film's music was composed by Peter Dasent. The soundtrack was released in 1991 by Q.D.K. Media.
;Track listing

Release

The film was marketed in some countries with the tagline: "From the director of Bad Taste, comes a movie with no taste at all!"
Meet the Feebles was given its public premiere at a fantasy film festival in Hamburg, in April 1990.
From then on, the film was released theatrically in Japan ; Portugal ; Australia ; Sweden ; Germany ; France ; United Kingdom ; and the United States.
The film was banned in Ireland and remains banned as of 2023.

Reception

On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 72% based on reviews from 25 critics, with an average rating of 6.5/10. The site's consensus reads "Dark and vulgar, Meet the Feebles is a backstage comedy featuring puppets that offers proof of Peter Jackson's taste for sheer outrageousness, even if it often lapses into pure juvenilia."
During a limited theatrical release in North America in 2002, critic James Berardinelli touched on aspects of the film which likely helped ensure it limited release in cinemas. "The stories of these... characters are told in a disgustingly graphic, obscenely offbeat, and caustically funny manner. Meet the Feebles is for those with a strong stomach and a seriously warped sense of humor. The film is so off the beaten track that it makes Monty Python seem mainstream." Janet Maslin of the New York Times gave it 2 out of 5 and wrote that it was "Destined to stand as an unfortunate footnote to Mr. Jackson's career."

Legacy

Despite being a commercial failure on release, the film went on to develop a cult following, gaining new fans after the success of Jackson's The [Lord of the Rings |The Lord of the Rings trilogy]. During his acceptance speech at the 2004 Academy Awards, Jackson joked that both Meet the Feebles and Bad Taste had been "wisely overlooked by the Academy."
The titular Feebles are briefly mentioned in the seventh episode of the 2023 television series The Muppets Mayhem during a cameo by Jackson. Floyd Pepper notes the Electric Mayhem had not crossed paths with Jackson "since that night in Wellington...when we met the Feebles," with Jackson remarking that two Feebles were now in witness protection, and the remainder in prison.