Once Upon a Forest (Essay)

Released June 18, 1993

Studio(s): Hanna-Barbera Productions, HTV Cymru, 20th Century Fox

Directed by: Charles Grosvenor (Land Before Time 5-12)

In the early 1990s, Fox released 3 animated features that got lost in the mix of the Disney Renaissance and other big-name fare (this was Jurassic Park's competition). I saw this as a kid and then, years later, spent probably 2 more years trying to remember if I had dreamed it or not. I know I had a badger pencil-topper from a movie with forest animals and something that flew, and I asked every video store worker I came in contact with if they knew what it was. Finally I found it and eventually got it on DVD; a movie called Once Upon a Forest.


Based on Welsh graphic designer Rae Lambert's characters created specifically for a feature film, Once Upon a Forest follows three "Furlings" as they travel through their forest to find herbs to help their friend. It's an environmental movie, as their friend who needs saving, Michelle (the pencil-topping badger), has been poisoned by gas leaked from a crashed semi. The gas has spread throughout the Furling's home of Dapplewood and has claimed the lives of Michelle's parents. When the gas reaches their homes, the Furlings run to the aid of their teacher, Cornelius, who is Michelle's uncle. He is the one who tells them the only thing that will cure his niece is two herbs: lungwort and eyebright, and they're only found in a neighboring forest far away.

The three lead characters are Abigail the woodmouse, who is brash and tomboyish; Russell the hedgehog, who is fat and slow but not cowardly; and Edgar the mole, who is a mama's boy and scared of everything. They're not particularly deep characters but it's not a particularly deep movie.

On their journey, the Furlings encounter the obligatory evil owl, a staple in all movies involving mice (a staple that never equals The Secret of N.I.M.H's Great Owl). They also meet something I've never seen in any other animated film I can think of: a group of gospel-singing birds. One of their own has been trapped in the mud by "Yellow Dragons" and even though he's still alive just kind of standing there, the community is already mourning him. Loudly. After the birds sing one of the film's three songs, the Furlings encounter the aforementioned dragons before reaching their goal. But they have one last hurdle to overcome, which leads them to build the Flapper Wing-A-Ma-Thing, an apparatus conceived by Cornelius that was one of the things I had remembered from watching it when I was 8. This contraption also allows the characters to get back home in a matter of seconds, where they are greeted by humans cleaning up the mess they created.


Once Upon a Forest didn't have the big name actors the Disney films (or even the other two Fox films) of the time had. The only notable one is Michael Crawford, who played the Phantom in the Broadway Phantom of the Opera. One of the films songs is sung by him, obviously, you don't cast a Broadway singer and not have him sing. The other notable name I suppose would be David Kirschner, whose name allowed the "From the Creator of American Tail" tag on the poster.

Not particularly well-received, the film made back only half its budget ($6 million) and has no postive reviews of the five it has on RottenTomatoes. However, it fared better on home video and DVD. The studio's predecessor, another environmental film, Fern Gully, performed much better and completely overshadowed Forest. It did, however, perform comparatively better than its successor The Pagemaster.

Overall, the film wasn't big and important to the industry or the style, but it wasn't meant to be. It was meant to be fun for kids and maybe teach them something. And then have them forget about it for 10 years until they go "Oh yeah..." and buy it on DVD.