The Easter Bunny Is Comin' to Town (1977)

Such a frustrating disappointment

The story-telling is good with flashbacks.The film is both funny and heartbreaking. You smile in a scene and get a soulcrushing revelation in the next.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

I was a child of the 80s and grew up watching this special every single Easter. We even had a copy on a battered old VHS that my father had taped off of the television. So even if it didn't air on a network, we were still always able to see "The Easter Bunny is Comin' to Town" when Easter rolled around. It had literally been decades since I'd last seen it when I came across it on YouTube and decided to watch it for old time's sake. I vaguely remembered the plot and characters, and some bits of dialog verbatim, but I had forgotten quite a lot about this little special. I sat with my husband and hoped that I would be rediscovering a gem of my childhood that I could share with my own son in a few years. Boy was I wrong.I'm a big fan of all the classic Rankin Bass stop-motion holiday specials, but this one? In a word, terrible. Even the rose-colored glasses of my childhood nostalgia couldn't save this one. In fact, I was shocked when I came on here to see that there was not one negative review for this appalling program. I felt compelled to write my own review, because someone needs to be honest here, this program is just not good.For starters, this special is little more than "Santa Claus is Comin' to Town" with the Easter Bunny shoe-horned into Santa's role. Complete with the Fred Astaire character and the reading of children's letters with questions for the Easter Bunny during the intro. Since when do children write letters to the Easter Bunny anyway? But I'll be kind and ignore this. It even looks like they've reused the same set for Somber Town that was used in "SCICTT", so it's very difficult to ignore the similarities. As with the Christmas special, the whole point of the show is to explain why we do certain things at Easter, but the scenarios they come up with to explain why we do certain Easter traditions are ridiculously laughable.By far the worst explained Easter tradition is, "Why do we dress up on Easter?" There is a big mean bear who lives on the mountain that separates Kidville from the rest of the civilized world. Sunny the Easter Bunny decides that in order to warm the bear's icy heart, all he needs is a new suit of clothes. One minute the bear is all roaring and mean, but then once he sees his new clothes he becomes a sobbing mess and is a pushover for the rest of the film. This was the best they could come up with to explain wearing nice clothes on Easter? It makes my brain hurt.Also I understand that this is a children's program and no one is expecting writing on par with Citizen Kane, but there are plot holes in this special big enough to float the Titanic through. It really feels like the people involved in this special didn't even try.Sunny the Easter Bunny lives in a town called Kidville, where everyone is a kid, even the teachers and mayor. As the special progresses, several Easters pass, but not a single one of the children age a day. This could have easily been explained away with a quick mention of Kidville being a magical place, but not even that deus ex machina is utilized.When the villains are trying to thwart Sunny in his attempts to bring a trainload of Easter goodies into town, their "brilliant" plan is that they put butter on the train rails to make the train slip. After this plan doesn't work out, they have absolutely nothing to fall back on. Seriously? You're supposed to be these awful villains hell-bent on destroying Easter, but after your buckets of butter don't work out you just give up? Lamest villains EVER. Not to mention that all it takes for the main villain to give up her mean ways is a flower. Seriously, a flower. One minute she's banning people from having children and forcing an entire town to eat nothing but beans, but give her a nice flower and she's suddenly sweet as pie.The one nice thing I will say about this special, and the only reason I was kind enough to give it three stars, is the fact that all these years later some of the songs are still danged catchy. Also Sunny the Easter Bunny is very cute. So kudos to whoever did the song writing for this Easter special, and whichever character designer came up with Sunny, but shame on everyone else who was involved with it.Needless to say, I think instead of ever watching this special with my son, we'll just color some eggs instead.

Rankin/Bass have been responsible for some of my favourite childhood memories and I am very fond of a vast majority of their stuff now. The Easter Bunny is Coming to Town is not one of their best, but at least it is not another Cricket on the Hearth. The ending is very rushed and abrupt, maybe a longer length may have helped. But much more than makes up for that. The visuals are bright, colourful and highly accomplished, while the sweet and whimsical score and songs also appeal. The writing has many funny and heartfelt moments, and I equally loved the cute, zippily paced and well-meaning story. There are some good values and even some religious elements that don't feel out of place or heavy-handed. The characters are highly likable and engaging, and while I did miss Paul Frees the voice acting especially from Fred Astaire as the warm and loving narrator is terrific.In conclusion, well worth the look and charming. 8/10 Bethany Cox

I never got into the world's view of Easter. What I mean by world's view is, for Christmas we have Santa and the elves and such. For Easter it's the Easter bunny. Yet I never got involved in that much, that I can remember, as a kid. I'm a Christian, and of course my focus was on Christ.However, it was interesting to watch this video to not just enjoy classics, but to see what things the world does Today and the creative ways they are explained in movies like this. And one thing that shocked me but shouldn't have was the mention of religion. The chicken or the egg song was awesome when they revealed the Bible story.I must say that the majority of the movie was great, and I really enjoyed it. The only odd thing was the ending, which seemed badly rushed, for lack of better word. The mean aunt suddenly gave into Easter and next thing you knew, she was happy and then the movie ended there, with the conductor and the train. I was expecting the movie to end with the conductor seeing the Easter bunny all grown up and professional and everyone happy. Because it didn't, that confused me a little, but hey it's a classic anyway.I rate this 7/10.

some may prefer that other hop bunny, you know, the CGI one, but seriously, i like to sit down and check out the old time stop motion stuff. it's cuter, funnier and a lot trippier to try to figure out how much work went into the process.stop motion animation is basically a lost art form and very few people these days know how to animate the numerous puppets involved in the technique. with computers used in everything these days, it's become as quaint and archaic as the art of hand carved wood.Rankin/Bass were the masters of this form and still the best in my opinion. their animated TV specials are still more colorful and elaborate than more recent efforts.i'm also always impressed at how tuneful and likable the music scores always are too. i wouldn't say they are Sondheim or anything, but they are nicely done and effective.fun to see old timer Fred Astaire reprise his snow mobile mail carrier from the 'Santa Claus' special, only here he drives a bright yellow choo-choo modeled somewhat after the little engine that could story.cute as a bunny's fluffy tail and always suitable for kiddies and families. also as fun and festive as a easter egg hunt. great for baby boomers and their grand-tykes. i'd rate this ooky pooky for everyone.