40 Fun Facts About FernGully: the Last Rainforest

Which comedian made his animated film debut as the voice of the bat Batty Koda in FernGully?

Robin Williams had the bat written specially for him and recorded about fourteen hours of improvised lines for the part.

Which 2009 sci-fi blockbuster did some reviewers accuse of borrowing plot elements from FernGully?

Avatar drew the charge from some reviewers, while others called FernGully just one of many films that James Cameron's hit resembles.

Batty Koda's voice actor refused Disney's demand to quit FernGully after agreeing to which other animated film?

Aladdin and its Genie came later in 1992, but the actor had already promised to play Batty and would not withdraw when Disney pushed him.

The fairy rainforest of FernGully lies near Mount Warning in which country?

Australia is the setting, and Mount Warning is a real peak in New South Wales, the remnant of an ancient shield volcano.

What does Crysta carry when she lets Hexxus swallow her during the final battle of FernGully?

A seed sprouts inside Hexxus, and the fairies' magic grows it into a tree that holds him fast at the edge of the forest.

Which star of The Rocky Horror Picture Show voices Hexxus, the villain of FernGully?

Tim Curry also sings the villain's showpiece, Toxic Love, and later voiced Nigel Thornberry in The Wild Thornberrys.

What does Crysta accidentally do to the logger Zak while saving him from a falling tree in FernGully?

She shrinks him to her size by mistake and cannot undo the spell, so the pair set off together to ask the fairies' leader for help.

What had humans done to the bat Batty Koda before Crysta meets him in FernGully?

They experimented on him, leaving an electrical device stuck in his head and the manic, scrambled personality behind the film's comedy.

Which British singer, later The Lion King's songwriter, co-wrote and performed Some Other World for FernGully?

Elton John wrote the song with Bruce Roberts, two years before his songs for Disney's The Lion King reached cinemas.

Which comedy duo reunited after six years apart to voice brothers Stump and Root in FernGully?

Cheech & Chong recorded their lines in two or three hours; Cheech Marin said it felt like old times before they had a pizza and left.

What sets Hexxus free from his long imprisonment near the start of FernGully?

His tree is cut down and fed through a mobile sawmill by Tony and Ralph, the two supervisors Zak works under.

How does the fairy leader Magi Lune help her tribe on the night before Hexxus reaches FernGully?

She sacrifices herself to pass her powers to the other fairies, and they later use that magic to trap Hexxus inside a new tree.

Hexxus spends years sealed inside which kind of tree before the loggers arrive in FernGully?

A boab is a baobab species with a swollen, bottle-shaped trunk, a fitting prison for the spirit Magi Lune locked away.

Which hungry reptile tries to eat Zak before Crysta comes to his rescue in FernGully?

A goanna is a monitor lizard of the genus Varanus, and the film's one gets a whole song about its dinner plans.

What does Hexxus consume to regain his powers after escaping in FernGully?

The machine's pollution feeds him until Zak reaches the cab and shuts the engine down, starving Hexxus of the emissions he draws on.

At the start of FernGully, what do the fairies believe has happened to the human race?

They became extinct, the fairies assume, after Hexxus drove humans away long ago, which is why Crysta is so curious when Zak appears.

What is Crysta's relationship to Magi Lune, leader of the fairies, at the start of FernGully?

Her apprentice Crysta is still learning her magic, and by the end of the film she succeeds Magi Lune as head of the fairy clan.

Which actress, a lead in the 1990 teen drama Pump Up the Volume, voices the fairy Crysta in FernGully?

Samantha Mathis went on to play Princess Daisy in the 1993 Super Mario Bros. film, a year after voicing Crysta.

Which star of the high-school satire Heathers voices the fairy Pips in FernGully?

Christian Slater kept up a long voice career after Pips, including a character who shares his surname in the animated series Archer.

FernGully producer Peter Faiman had earlier directed which 1986 blockbuster comedy starring Paul Hogan?

Crocodile Dundee came after years in television, where Faiman had directed and produced The Paul Hogan Show.

Which raspy-voiced Wild Thing hitmaker voices the predator that sings about eating Zak in FernGully?

Tone Loc brought the gravelly voice of Wild Thing and Funky Cold Medina to the role and performs the character's song himself.

Which actress, Sarah Palmer in Twin Peaks, voices the fairy leader Magi Lune in FernGully?

Grace Zabriskie played Sarah Palmer again in the film Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, released the same year as her turn as Magi Lune.

Which animator, Oscar-nominated for the short film Technological Threat, directed FernGully: The Last Rainforest?

Bill Kroyer and Susan Kroyer founded Kroyer Films in 1986 to combine computer animation with hand-drawn work, the mix FernGully is built on.

Before FernGully, its director was a main animator of the computer-generated sequences in which film?

Tron convinced him to stay with computer animation rather than return to traditional drawing, and he later worked at Digital Productions.

Which major Hollywood studio distributed FernGully to cinemas and released it on VHS four months later?

20th Century Fox handled the release, and one of the film's marketers said a Walt Disney presents banner alone would have at least doubled its takings.

Which composer of the Back to the Future scores also wrote the orchestral score for FernGully?

Alan Silvestri also co-wrote the ballad A Dream Worth Keeping for the film, two years before he scored Forrest Gump.

How did FernGully's director respond to the hours of improvised lines recorded for Batty Koda?

He tripled the bat's screen time, expanding a part that had first been conceived as an eight-minute role.

FernGully's voice cast agreed with the film's environmental message and accepted what kind of pay?

Scale wages were all the famous voices took, and most of the film's $24 million budget went on the animation and the soundtrack.

Where was FernGully given a special screening on Earth Day, twelve days after it opened in cinemas?

The UN General Assembly watched it on April 22, 1992, a fitting stage for a film whose producer called it openly environmental.

Where did FernGully's producers set up their studio after, by their account, Disney twice outbid them for rented space?

A former brewery in the San Fernando Valley became the studio, and the producer says Disney then tried to buy that building too.

Which FernGully element was made with computer animation because drawing it by hand would take far longer?

Flocks of birds were among some 40,000 computer-generated frames, which the director said halved the production time.

How was FernGully 2: The Magical Rescue, made without the original voice cast, released in 1998?

Direct to video was the plan, and the release slipped from 1997 to March 1998 to dodge the crowded Christmas VHS market.

In FernGully 2: The Magical Rescue, who captures three baby animals and takes them to town?

Poachers and their dogs seize the babies, and a failed first rescue starts a fire that destroys a large part of the forest.

Which 2013 animated film from Blue Sky Studios was said to have a plot similar to FernGully's?

Epic drew the comparison in reviews even though it was loosely based on the children's tale The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs.

What kind of computer game did Capstone Software release in 1992 as a FernGully tie-in?

A coloring book in software form, sold as The FernGully Computerized Coloring Book, came from Capstone Software and IntraCorp.

Which English musician, known for the hit She Blinded Me with Science, wrote Hexxus's song Toxic Love for FernGully?

Thomas Dolby wrote three of the soundtrack's songs, among them Life Is a Magic Thing, sung by Johnny Clegg.

Batty Koda's solo song on the FernGully soundtrack is performed in which musical style?

Rap is in the title, Batty Rap, and the track of under three minutes is performed by the character's own voice actor.

Which children's singer, famous for Baby Beluga, wrote and performed Raining Like Magic for FernGully?

Raffi wrote Baby Beluga in 1979 after meeting a beluga whale named Kavna at the Vancouver Aquarium.

Which Scottish singer of the Bond theme For Your Eyes Only performed A Dream Worth Keeping for FernGully?

Sheena Easton appears on screen singing in the opening credits of For Your Eyes Only, a Bond theme that earned an Academy Award nomination.

Pixar hired FernGully art director Ralph Eggleston in 1992 during the development of which film?

Toy Story won him an Annie Award for its art direction, and he later directed an Oscar-winning Pixar short of his own.