An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster

An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster
DVD cover
Directed by	Larry Latham
Produced by	Larry Latham
Screenplay by	Len Uhley
Based on	Characters Created by David Kirschner
Starring	Thomas Dekker Robert Hays Susan Boyd Candi Milo Lacey Chabert John Mariano Nehemiah Persoff
Music by	Michael Tavera
Distributed by	Universal Studios Home Entertainment
Release date(s)	July 25, 2000
Running time	75 minutes
Country	United States
Language	English

This article does not cite any references or sources. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (October 2009)

An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster was the second direct-to-video sequel to An American Tail: The Treasure of Manhattan Island and the 4th and last film in the An American Tail tetralogy, starring Thomas Alexander Dekker as the main character, the young Fievel Mousekewitz. This film was released on July 25, 2000. The ending of this film shows Fievel falling asleep which may mark that there wouldn't be another American Tail film.

Plot

Set in between the third film (Late 1880s) and second film (1892), Fievel, his friend, Tony and his sister, Tanya all get jobs at the local newspaper, where the audience is introduced to Nellie, who wants to be an important reporter, but only gets small assignments, as if she were a secretary to Reed, the newspaper's editor. Throughout the film, Tanya tries to win Reed's heart, while Tony tries to get noticed by Reed and promoted to a reporter. Like in the previous movies, where a mouse installation is directly below its human installation counterpart, the newspaper offices the mice work in is directly underneath the newspaper offices the humans work in.

Nellie gets a chance when she is assigned to report mice who disappear overnight into holes that open up on their floor all over New York. Reed makes up a, as Nellie calls it, "so-called monster" that lives under Manhattan and takes mice away during the night to add more excitement to the otherwise unimportant story, intending to sell more papers. The night monster creates fears among the readers, as could be expected. Fievel begins having nightmares that cause him to lose sleep because of his fear of the monster; the film opens up with Fievel having a dream about being chased by what he thinks the monster looks like. When, through Tanya, he is assigned the job of following Nellie and drawing up interperatations of what the monster looks like based on witness testimony, this makes his insomnia all the worse. A particularly suspicious miniature French poodle named Madame Mousey, who has started living among the mice about this time, appears at every crime scene, claiming to be a fortune teller. The heroes finally decide to investigate her by means of the "dog council" that meets at Central Park. They also search down one of the holes, which leads directly to a group of cats hiding in the sewers. Also, all the mice that had disappeared are being held in wood cages there, to be sold off to other cats and eaten.

The night monster itself, a mechanic device with ghastly flashing pictures and a circular saw, is revealed in full when it attacks the mice newspaper office and printing press to prevent them from printing the truth, which they had just discovered. A great chase scene takes place throughout both the mouse and the human newspaper offices. Reed reveals that he was in love with Nellie all along, much to Tanya's intense dismay. When all the cats seem to be under control, the "dog council" appears just as they're regaining consciousness and chase them all away, taking Madame Mousey with them. The last scene takes place at the beach, where the audience is told that the "dog council" had chosen for the French poodle (who was the mastermind behind the night monster all along) a punishment worse than prison: returning her to her owner. Mrs. Mousekewitz, Fievel's mother, surmises saying that now that the mystery has been cleared up, Fievel may finally go to sleep, only to turn around and find him already asleep on the beach towel. There Was Going to be a An american tail 5 But it was Cancelled

Animation style

In comparison with the two theatrical features in the American Tail series, both direct-to-video releases falter in animation quality, as typical for direct-to-video cartoons. On top of that, Fievel's fur color was desaturated even though the rest of the Mousekewitz family have kept their original fur color.

Characters

• Fievel Mousekewitz (voiced by Thomas Dekker): Fievel is the main character of the film. He constantly has nightmares of the night monster trying to get him.

• Tanya Mousekewitz (voiced by Lacey Chabert): Fievel's sister.

• Mama & Papa Mousekewitz (voiced by Jane Singer and Nehemiah Persoff): Fievel's parents.

• Yasha Mousekewitz (not voiced): Fievel's baby sister.

• Tiger (voiced by Dom DeLuise): The only cat friend of the Jewish-Russian mouse family.

• Tony Toponi (voiced by Pat Musick): Fievel's best friend.

Other Voices:

• Susan Boyd-Nellie Brie, a fictionalized mouse version of Nellie Bly. She is a famous reporter in the Daily Nibbler.

• Robert Hays-Reed Dailey The head chief of the Daily Nibbler.

• Candi Milo-Madame Mousey, the meanest, witchiest miniature French poodle- The main antagonist of the film.

• John Mariano-Twitch, leader of the Outlaw Cats / Madame Mousey's manservant) The second antagonist of the film.

• John Garry- Lone Woof

Yohn's voicework

• This is the only American Tail movie not to feature Erica Yohn as the voice of Mama Mousekewitz.

Soundtrack

"Get the Facts" Performed by Susan Boyd and Thomas Dekker

"Creature de la Nuit" Performed by Candi Milo

"Who Will" Performed by Susan Boyd, Thomas Dekker, Pat Musick and Dom DeLuise

External links

• An American Tail: The Mystery of the Night Monster at the Internet Movie Database