''The Happy Cricket'' ( pt, O Grilo Feliz) is a 2001 Brazilian

animated Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most anim ...

fantasy film Fantasy films are films that belong to the fantasy genre with fantastic themes, usually magic, supernatural events, mythology, folklore, or exotic fantasy worlds. The genre is considered a form of speculative fiction alongside science fiction f ...

directed by Walbercy Ribas.

Plot

Christopher is a music-loving

cricket Cricket is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams of eleven players on a field at the centre of which is a pitch with a wicket at each end, each comprising two bails balanced on three stumps. The batting side scores runs by striki ...

who spends his days playing his magic stringless guitar for his friends. But, his peace is interrupted when the tyrannical

tegu Tegu is a common name of a number of species of lizards that belong to the families Teiidae and Gymnophthalmidae. Tegus are native to Central and South America. They occupy a variety of habitats and are known for their large size and predator ...

King Wartlord bans music. Making matters worse, Linda the Night Star falls from the sky. Making matters worse, Wartlord, having mistaken the star for a diamond, is also searching for her. Thus, it's up to Christopher and his friends to rescue the night star and stop Wartlord.

Production

The title character was first seen in local commercials for

Sharp Electronics is a Japanese multinational corporation that designs and manufactures electronic products, headquartered in Sakai-ku, Sakai, Osaka Prefecture. Since 2016 it has been majority owned by the Taiwan-based Foxconn Group. Sharp employs more than 50 ...

in the 1980s. The film spent over 20 years in development, and 30 months in production. The team of approximately 70 illustrators, indenters, and colorists drew around 375,600 frames and 201,600 layouts that where later placed in the digital coloring phase using

Silicon Graphics Silicon Graphics, Inc. (stylized as SiliconGraphics before 1999, later rebranded SGI, historically known as Silicon Graphics Computer Systems or SGCS) was an American high-performance computing manufacturer, producing computer hardware and soft ...

softwares, including mixing the use of CGI. The film was transferred onto

Exabyte The byte is a unit of digital information that most commonly consists of eight bits. Historically, the byte was the number of bits used to encode a single character of text in a computer and for this reason it is the smallest addressable unit ...

to Record tapes and transferation of 118,080 files of the 82 Minutes of film onto the 35MM film recording boards that were made at

Cinesite Cinesite Studios (also known as Cinesite VFX or simply Cinesite) is an independent, multinational business which provides services to the media and entertainment industries. Its head office in London opened for business in 1994, initially offe ...

London London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...

. The English-language dub is dedicated to one of its voice actors, the late

Bob Papenbrook Robert DeWayne Papenbrook (September 18, 1955 – March 17, 2006) was an American voice actor. Career Fellow voice actors often nicknamed him "Pappy". He was very well known in the worlds of anime and video game voice-overs for his voice acting o ...

Sequel

In early 2009,

20th Century Fox 20th Century Studios, Inc. (previously known as 20th Century Fox) is an American film production company headquartered at the Fox Studio Lot in the Century City area of Los Angeles. As of 2019, it serves as a film production arm of Walt Dis ...

released a CGI sequel, ''O Grilo Feliz e os Insetos Gigantes'' ('' The Happy Cricket and the Giant Bugs'').

Cast

Original version

*Vagner Fagundes - Grilo *Araken Saldanha - Maledeto *Régis Monteiro - Faz Tudo *Fátima Noya - Bituquinho *Letícia Quinto - Juliana *Nelson Machado - Sapo 1 *Renato Master - Sapo 2 *

Antonio Moreno Antonio Garrido Monteagudo (September 26, 1887 – February 15, 1967), better known as Antonio Moreno or Tony Moreno, was a Spanish-born American actor and film director of the silent film era and through the 1950s. Early life and silent fi ...

- Sapo 3 *Camila Bullara - Pouco Grilo *

Jorge Barcellos Jorge Luiz Barcellos Martins (born 17 April 1967) is a Brazilian football manager. Career Barcellos was the head coach of the Brazil women's national team at the 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup, 2008 Summer Olympics and 2012 Summer Olympics. He ...

- Caracol velho / Geral *Emerson Caperbat - Pai *José Soares Maya - Tucano * Isaura Gomes - Saranha *Rita de Almeida - Caracolino *Marli Bortoletto - Bacaninha *Rodrigo Andreatto - Rafael *Úrsula Bezerra - Moreninha *Tatiana de S. Parra - Linda Estrela Da Noite *José Luiz Burato - Grilo (singing voice)

English version

Sam Riegel Samuel Brent Oscar Riegel, sometimes credited as Jack Lingo, is an American voice actor, director, and writer. He is a regular cast member of the web series ''Critical Role'', in which he and other fellow voice actors play ''Dungeons & Dragons' ...

- Christopher *

- King Wartlord *

Cindy Robinson Cindy Robinson is an American voice actress who voices in animations and video games. Some of her major roles are Makoto Nanaya and Gii from the ''Blazblue'' series, Betty Boop in commercials, Queen Beryl in '' Sailor Moon'', Chitose Nanbu in ...

- Honeydew / Spidora *Peter Doyle (actor) - Magic Toucan / Soldier 1 *

Bob Buchholz Robert Buchholz is an American voice actor, writer, story editor, and voice director. He has provided voices for anime and video games. He is the owner of Spliced Bread Productions. Filmography Anime * '' Akira'' - Ryu (Animaze dub) * '' A Whis ...

- Barnaby / Sergeant *

Dave Mallow Dave Mallow (born October 19, 1948) is a retired American voice actor. Biography Mallow's father worked in radio and television and was a 30-year on-air veteran at Chicago's WGN. After graduating from Maine South High School, Mallow attained a ...

- Buffuno *

Steve Staley Steve Staley, also known as Steve Cannon, is an American voice actor known for providing voices for Japanese anime and video games. Some of his notable roles include Shūhei Hisagi and Tōshirō Hitsugaya in '' Bleach'', Daisuke Aurora in '' ...

- Leonardo *

Neil Kaplan Neil Charles Kaplan is an American voice actor, audiobook narrator, entertainer, and comedian. Biography Kaplan got his start as a comedian doing impressions of presidents such as Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon. He also impersonated a little-k ...

- Toad 1 *

Dan Woren Dan Woren is an American voice actor who is known for providing voice work for anime, television, and video games. His role was voicing Roy Fokker in the ''Robotech'' series in the 1980s. Other major voice roles include Jagi in ''Fist of the N ...

- Toad 2 *

Grant George Grant George is an American voice actor who is known for voicing characters in anime dubs and video games. George is best known as the voice of Izuru Kira from the internationally acclaimed ''Bleach'' anime series, the Warrior of Light from ''F ...

- Father / Toad 3 *

Stephanie Sheh Stephanie Sheh is an American voice actress, ADR director, writer and producer who has worked for several major companies, including Cartoon Network and Sony. She is often involved with work in English dubs of anime, cartoons, video games and fi ...

- Little Christopher / Sneally * Steve Kramer - Old Snail / General *

Mona Marshall Mona Marshall is an American voice actress, known for her work in a number of cartoons, anime shows, films and video games. Her major credits include ''South Park'', where she voices many of the female characters on the show; '' Fraggle Rock: The ...

- Cartibella *

Philece Sampler Debra Philece Sampler (July 16, 1953 – July 1, 2021) was an American film, television and voice actress. She got her start on the soap operas ''Days of Our Lives'' as Renée DuMonde and '' Another World'' as Donna Love Hudson. In addition to ...

- Isabella *Tatiana de S. Parra - Linda The Night Star (singing voice)

References

External links

Official sites (Flash required)

Official franchise site

Official site of Clever Image Studios

Other

* 2001 animated films 2001 films 2000s adventure films Animated musical films Animated films about insects Brazilian animated films Animated films about lizards Brazilian children's films Brazilian fantasy adventure films 2000s children's animated films 2000s Portuguese-language films {{fantasy-film-stub