The Longest Daycare (2012) Reviews

• Very good short featuring my favorite Simpson

  llltdesq2014-01-16

  This short was nominated for an Academy Award. There will be spoilers: This short, which is without dialog, takes place at The Ayn Rand School For Tots. Maggie is left there by Marge and is incorrectly labeled of average intelligence. Of course, she spends the rest of the short proving she's anything but that, as she safeguards a caterpillar through its various stages from the predations of the unibrowed Gerald, another baby and her enemy from time to time. There's a chase scene and lots of very nice visual touches throughout the short. The ending is perfect and allows Maggie the opportunity to chew the scenery, like any good ham actor would. Well crafted short which is well worth watching. Most recommended.

• Great to see The Simpsons on the big screen again,please keep this up,

  lesleyharris302012-07-02

  The Longest Daycare is a fantastic short that shows before Ice Age 4.I t was great to see these characters on the big screen again,even if it was just Marge and Maggie.Matt Groening has confirmed that there will be more Simpsons shorts in the future,and I'm delighted to hear this and I hope its gearing us towards a sequel to The Simpsons Movie.I enjoyed how we saw Maggie as the main role in this because it was silent and it reminded of Charlie Chaplin and the old Mickey Mouse cartoons. Marge sends Maggie off to the daycare for the day and Maggies enemy,Gerald,the baby with one eyebrow,is cruising butterflies for fun.Maggie friends a butterfly that resembles her blue bow,and must free the butterfly before Gerald gets near it.

• I pretty much enjoyed watching The Simpsons: The Longest Daycare before the latest Ice Age movie

  tavm2012-08-11

  Just watched this Simpsons short in 3-D before the latest Ice Age movie with my movie theatre-working friend just now. In this one, Maggie is dropped in daycare with the "nothing special" toddlers especially one baby boy who likes to stomp on things. It's there that Maggie bonds with a caterpillar who she tries to protect from that same boy...This was quite funny with many clever sight gags including one involving Ayn Rand. Since only mom Marge is the only other one from the family that appears here, this was dialogue-free. Liked the use of some classical music in the scoring and seeing some of the other kids from the series in some scenes. So on that note, The Simpsons: The Longest Daycare was worth it watching before the main feature.

• Good, but short

  neil-4762012-07-20

  This is a short (5 minutes) film featuring Maggie at her daycare centre: denied the stimulus of contact with the brightest kids, she is placed with her nemesis, the thuggish monobrowed baby who, in this story, kills butterflies. There is no dialogue, just a simple story, loaded with sight gags, and with a terrific payoff. It is in the familiar Simpsons animation style, albeit in 3D which is reasonably effective but far from essential. It works well, as an ice-breaker (pun deliberate) for the 4th Ice Age movie, which it precedes. A minimal, but welcome, addition to the Simpsons canon.

• To the Simpsons' haters, here's a "pacifier"...

  ElMaruecan822017-12-22

  I generally don't indulge to Top Ten lists, but it won't take much time to see the film, so there's no need to make a thesis about it. The short is brilliant and here's why you should give it a try. Lesser said, the better. Ten Reasons to Watch "The Longest Daycare": 1/ It's about Maggie Simpson. I think we can count the Maggie Simpson-related episodes with two hands, she's the least represented and developed character, which also makes her the freshest and most original to some extent. We just can't get enough of Maggie, anything that puts her under the spotlight is welcome. 2/ Short cartoon is the right format. While she's a member of the most iconic TV family, she can't carry over her frail little shoulders the weight of a long narrative, but four minutes are perfect to tell a poignant and whimsical story with a proper beginning, middle act and ending. As they say, brevity is the soul of wit. 3/ It is silent, which is also fitting for her character, who only speak in non-canon episodes of for the sake of some inspired gags. Here, we speak her non-existent language, made of raises shoulders, jump scares, running, toddling and frowned eyebrows. We see the world through the perspective of a little baby with all the joys, fears and thrills induced by her small size. The silent format also allows the film to exude some Golden Age vibes (the opening screen shot is similar to Donald Duck's cardboard) and work like something Chaplin would have endorsed, I mean it. 4/ There's a heart in the story from its positive attitude toward animals and a brain through its sharp comment on human methods (especially to detect intelligence in children), both mix perfectly with comedy, the drama works on an emotional level, the comedy on an intellectual one. As they always do. 5/ The film has a bad-ass villain and consecrates Baby Gerald's finest hour, needless to say that the final word belongs to Maggie and she's as heroic as Gerald was naughty. 6/ There's a clever Checkov Gun's in the film and without spoiling it, I'll say the story makes good use of one of Maggie Simpson's trademarks and it's not the one you think, and it's one you don't see coming, say no more and don't try to anticipate, let the story unfold. 7/ The animation is top notch without being too sophisticated, but it also shows that the Simpsons universe is so rich and multi-layered it can work on every format, feature film, TV episode, an episode of a TV episode. If the series ever stopped, I can't see what would prevent them to get back to their roots. 8/ The ending. A short is generally as good as its ending and this one doesn't disappoint. 9/ The run-time again, at four minutes, it's pretty short even for a short but at least it doesn't try to add new material or stuff up the story for the sake of it, we get right to the point, the middle-act leads to a great culmination, and with an emotionally rewarding ending, and a wonderful "A-ha" moment one's not ready to forget. 10/ It was nominated for an Oscar, that should tell you how at least worthy of your attention it should be. That's all, folks, enjoy your short. Unlike Maggie with her pacifier, it doesn't suck! More seriously, I know this review is preaching a choir, but I wish someone who's not a fan of the series will read this, because the merit of this little gem is that it doesn't depend on any appreciation of the show, it's a standalone little masterpiece.