On vacation in Los Angeles, Walter, the world's biggest Muppet fan, and his friends Gary and Mary from Smalltown, USA, discover the nefarious plan of oilman Tex Richman to raze the Muppet Theater and drill for the oil recently discovered beneath the Muppets' former stomping grounds. To stage The Greatest Muppet Telethon Ever and raise the $10 million needed to save the theater, Walter, Mary and Gary help Kermit reunite the Muppets, who have all gone their separate ways: Fozzie now performs with a Reno casino tribute band called the Moopets, Miss Piggy is a plus-size fashion editor at Vogue Paris, Animal is in a Santa Barbara clinic for anger management, and Gonzo is a high-powered plumbing magnate. - skip ad - Genres: Sequel, Comedy, Kids/Family and Musical/Performing Arts Release Date: November 23rd, 2011 (wide) MPAA Rating: PG for some mild rude humor. Distributor: Walt Disney Pictures Cast And Credits Starring: Jason Segel, Amy Adams, Chris Cooper, Zach Galifianiakis Directed by: James Bobin Produced by: James Bobin

How do you reboot an entertainment juggernaut that began to fade before most of its young audience was born? In the case of the Muppets, you make a leap of faith and hope that the charm of these Jim Henson creations, which once flooded children’s television and movies, remains irresistible.

Realizing the potential for consumer burnout, you overlook that the later Muppet movies disappointed at the box office. (Maybe it was time for a break.) You trust that if you do it right, Generation X moviegoers, for whom the Muppets are the near-sacred equivalents of the baby boomers’ Howdy Doody troop, will welcome them back with open arms and misty eyes and take their children.



And so you have “The Muppets,” Disney’s endearing, silly, smiley-faced movie directed by James Bobin (“Flight of the Conchords,” “Da Ali G Show”) and arriving on a marketing tsunami. The happy news is that it has been done just about right, which means conceptually and technologically left alone.

These are the same old, adorable Muppets, as sweetly innocent and likable as ever. Winking at itself, the movie is casually, amusingly self-reflexive. In one joke Kermit the Frog considers telephoning President Carter. “The Muppets” makes no attempt to match the wisecracking hipness of the “Shrek” movies. If it doesn’t provoke belly laughs, it elicits many affectionate chuckles.

The score features more than a dozen songs, including the inevitable “Rainbow Connection,” done as a banjo-laced singalong. There is a rap number, and Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” arranged as a barbershop quartet. New songs by the musical director, Bret McKenzie, include a ballad that asks, “Am I a man or am I a Muppet?” The answer to that rhetorical question, whether you are human or a Muppet, is, of course, both.

To resurrect the franchise, Disney enlisted Jason Segel, the star of “Forgetting Sarah Marshall,” and that movie’s director, Nicholas Stoller, as screenwriters. Mr. Segel, an outspoken Muppet devotee, plays Gary, an overgrown child who shares a house in Smalltown, U.S.A., with his brother, Walter, a puppet so obsessed with his famous TV counterparts that he dreams of becoming one of them.

With his flailing body language, Mr. Segel’s gawky and naïve Gary recalls Pee-wee Herman. To celebrate his chaste 10-year relationship with his girlfriend, Mary (Amy Adams), he decides to take the three of them to Los Angeles to visit the Muppets’ studio.

What used to be a thriving entertainment factory has fallen into such disrepair that it resembles a creepy, abandoned museum. Itching to buy the place, tear it down and drill for oil is Tex Richman (Chris Cooper), wittily played as a hissable archvillain and Muppets hater with a reptilian squint.

To save the place, Gary and Walter decide to round up the dispersed Muppets and do the old Mickey-and-Judy thing of putting on a show to raise the $10 million needed to buy the studio and save it. Kermit, whom they discover in a Bel Air mansion, leads the roundup. Fozzie Bear is found in a Reno, Nev., dive, performing with a second-rate Muppets tribute band, the Moopets. Gonzo, a plumbing magnate, and Animal, who is taking a course in anger management, follow, as do the rest. Plans are laid for a reunion telethon, but no network is interested.

“In this market you guys are no longer relevant,” declares a snippy TV executive (Rashida Jones), who voices the challenge facing Disney. She changes her tune when an emergency leaves a hole in the schedule, and the Muppets are given a short deadline to fill in the gap.

The most reluctant recruit, Miss Piggy, now the editor of French Vogue, is still miffed at Kermit’s shyness toward her. Their stalled romance parallels the courtship of Gary and Mary, which almost ends when he forgets their anniversary.

For the final telethon the Muppets kidnap Jack Black, who is not especially well used in the movie, to be their celebrity host. At the last minute the stage-shy Walter, pressured to perform, discovers his special talent as an operatic whistler and wins his place in the Muppet clan, and the movie lays on the inspirational shtick.

If the reboot achieves commercial liftoff, which seems likely, there will be a lot more to come, and the rather bland Walter may develop a more defined personality. But the flaws are minor. The rainbow connection is a smooth, unbroken arch.