Napoleon (1995)

Muffin, or "Napoleon" as he prefers to call himself, is the titular main protagonist of the 1995 Australian animal film Napoleon. He is a young and adventurous Golden Retriever puppy from Sydney who accidentally ends up in Australian nature, where he try to become a wild dog to feel brave and fearless, but this turns out to be harder than he thought.
He was voiced by Jamie Croft in his first vocal role. In the American dub, he was voiced by Adam Wylie.
==Personality==
Napoleon is like many young protagonists, imaginative, reckless, stubborn, turbulent and very thoughtless, always rushing towards obvious danger just to satisfy his need for adventure and freedom. He is also quite heady, not listening to the many warnings of wild animals he comes across and also has no common sense as he chooses to always advance towards the dangerous instead of returning home.
Fascinated by wild life, Napoleon spends his time taking himself for a tough conqueror seeking adventure. His dream is to be a wild dog to really feel free and without borders, at least until he sees how things really are in nature.
He was initially aquaphobic but was then forced to overcome his fear of water to save one of his new friends.
After realizing that wild life was really hard and that Mother Dingo convinced him that he already had everything he needed in his heart, Napoleon wanted only one thing more than anything, returned home and be reunited with his mother.
==History==
Napoleon first appears in the garden of his owners, imagining that he is in the wild. When children invited for a birthday party play and burst balloons, Napoleon approaches out of curiosity and ends up on an inflated turtle in the pool which he does not like because he hates water. Once the children are gone, Napoleon comes out of the pool and approaches in a basket hanging on balloons and finds it fun to enter and play. His mother orders him to get out but too heady as he is, he does not listen and the basket is detached from the tree and Napoleon finds himself in the air, under the worried looks of his mother. He climbs quickly so high that he can no longer jump but begins to find the danger situation rather cool and begins to sing "How High I'll Fly".
After spending some time flying next to Sydney's buildings, the basket goes back down to a station but is suddenly pushed by a train which was on its way. The train then pushes Napoleon for several kilometers before stopping at the exit of a tunnel near the edge where the basket unhooks from the train and resumes its path. Napoleon then finds himself above the ocean where he crosses a very talkative galah named Birdo who ends up bursting the balloons one by one to bring the puppy back to the ground.
After a disastrous landing but without too much damage on him, Napoleon realizes that he is in nature and realizes that he can now live a life without rules, to hunt, play and sleep only when he wants to. He suddenly hears a barking from a wild dog and goes up the ravine to find him. He meets Birdo again who is trying to get his attention but he does not listen to him because he wants to join the wild beasts but the parrot reminds him that he is only a house pet and that he will not survive a night in the wild, to which the puppy replies that Birdo is just trying to scare him before leaving in search of the wild dogs.
At nightfall, Napoleon wanders through the jungle and meets an old mopoke who tells him to go home but as with Birdo, he does not listen to him and then continues to advance. After accidentally ruining a spider web, Napoleon approaches a tree from where he smells of food coming from inside. As he begins to eat, he hears a sinister voice coming from the surroundings and suddenly a black cat appears and mews hostilely at him because she believes he is a mouse and wants to kill him. Frightened by the feline, Napoleon tries to flee but he realizes that his red ribbon is hung on a branch, preventing his escape. 
He still managed to get rid of his ribbon and fled into the tall grass, but the Cat quickly flushed him out and wedged him at the end of a dead trunk above a pool of mud. The feline is dangerously close to the puppy, which tries to reason with her, but the Cat tells him to shut up and begins to attack before the mopoke arrives and pushes her into the pool. Napoleon believing that he no longer fears anything, still ignores the wise advice of the mopoke to go home and sinks into vegetating, but without knowing that the Cat quickly turned up and that she plans to take revenge.
The next day, waking up after having thought he heard his mother, Napoleon meets parrots who repeat everything he says, annoyed. He then crosses a stream despite his aversion to water and meets another parrot who tells him the good direction for finding the wild dogs before he backtracks to teach the parrots a lesson saying "I'm a stupid bird" so that they insult themselves. 
Walking for a while, he meets a somewhat antisocial koala, then falls again on Birdo, with whom he tries to play, but that does not amuse the galah who tells him to come back, only so that Napoleon asks him to teach him how to live in nature, which makes Birdo skeptical because he does not understand why until Napoleon reveals to him that at home everyone calls him Muffin, a name he hates. A crowd of animals who have heard everything begins to sing "Muffin You Better Go Home" to make him understand that he has no chance here. Annoyed, Napoleon climbs on a floating trunk in the river which ends up drifting away. Birdo finds him and tells him that he can swim despite the young dog being afraid of the water, but ended up tempting the devil. Birdo reluctantly agrees to become his nature teacher to help him become a wild dog.
Close to a warren, Birdo asks Napoleon to catch rabbits as a first lesson, but he fails and ends up eating moss. A little further, the bird teaches the puppy how to differentiate enemies for the second lesson, unfortunately Napoleon only crosses animals who have been victims of the Cat and who have thus developed a fear of house pets. Birdo then takes Napoleon to the snowy parts so that he develops an understanding of the changing climate, but the puppy sniffs something approaching which turns out to be a herd of horses running over them. Napoleon manages to hide in a hole and blames Birdo for having nearly killed him before leaving alone by declaring that the fourth lesson is to follow his instinct and never trust Birdo.
He enters a sugarcane field and crosses a snake which tries to intimidate him, but the calls of Birdo allow him to flee. Unfortunately the sugarcane is soon burnt by humans, forcing him to run for his life. Out of danger, he and Birdo reconcile, but are soon attacked by the Cat. Birdo leads Napoleon into safety and finds his fellows until the Cat sneaks behind them and would have them without the puppy warning them. Exasperated, the Cat promises Napoleon that she will give him a slow death before leaving. The two friends cross a road and Napoleon again hears the barking of the wild dogs, but Birdo tells him to forget them and go home, but Napoleon answers that he has gone too far to abandon his mission and that he wants more than anything to know what how it feels to be a wild dog. At nightfall, the two sing together but decide to say goodbye to each other.
Now alone, Napoleon follows his path and crosses a grumpy echidna who searches for water. Being also thirsty he helps him to dig and find the water. Later, Napoleon sits under a tree to protect himself from the heat before meeting a Perentie lizard who loves the rustles of other animals. He realizes that it was the lizard that had been barking from the start, which made him so angry that he left. Realizing his mistake, Napoleon laments being an idiot, begins to think that the wild dogs do not exist, that all that Birdo had said was true and that he does not even deserve to be called Napoleon. The clouds turn gray announcing the rain and warned by a rodent who is afraid of the rain, Napoleon finds a cave for the past time.
While exploring the cave, Napoleon meets two dingo puppies named Sid and Nancy, who consider him an intruder and order him to leave their caverns. Seeing that Napoleon is not leaving, Nancy approaches him while falling in descent and threatening to tear him apart. Napoleon approaches Nancy and tries to explain that he does not want to harm anyone and even tries to play with them when he hears that their mother is not there. Suddenly, a flood of water caused by the pouring rain floods the cave and hits Napoleon and Nancy. Napoleon manages to climb back up, but Nancy is swept away by the water. Once again forced to face his fear, the puppy jumps into the water and joins Nancy, a refugee on a rock but surrounded by water. Nancy climbs on his back and the two succeed not without difficulty in regaining the edge. Mother Dingo returns to the cave after the rain stops and Napoleon realizes that she and the puppies are real wild dogs just before passing out from exhaustion.
Napoleon begins to regain consciousness just when Nancy licks his muzzle to thank him for having saved her. Mother Dingo in turn expresses her gratitude and asks how she can thank him, which the puppy asks to stay with them and be a wild dog. Sid and Nancy agree and beg their mother to say yes, which she accepts. Delighted, Napoleon snuggles up to Mother Dingo. A little while later, Napoleon looks with amusement at Sid and Nancy playing at being him, much to the pleasure of Mother Dingo. After a few days, Mother Dingo invites Napoleon to come for a walk with her.
During their walk, Mother Dingo asks Napoleon why he left his house, so that the puppy answers that he wanted to live the adventure without rules, but Mother Dingo then asks him if he had that and Napoleon answers that he found that full of rules. Mother Dingo asks more questions about what Napoleon wanted others to do for Napoleon to respond with what he was initially looking for, only to slowly realize that he found nothing of what he wanted. 
In the end, Mother Dingo asked him why he wanted to come here and Napoleon replied that he wanted to become a wild dog to be really brave and fearless, only for Mother Dingo to explain to him that he already had these two things by managing to come here and saving SId and Nancy, meaning to her that in the puppy's heart, he was already a wild dog. Napoleon finally realizes it and comes to understand that all he wants most now is to go home and be reunited with his mother. Happy to hear him say that, Mother Dingo tells him that she has a friend who could help him get home.
Transported by a kangaroo, Napoleon arrives at the beach where he had started his adventure and finds the basket with which he had traveled. Inside he finds Conan, a penguin looking for adventure. Seeing how great he was like him, Napoleon shared his own experience of adventure with Conan. In the evening, the Cat finds her trace once more but this time, Napoleon succeeds in bringing her to the top of the cliff and pushes the ignoble black cat in the water. The next day, Napoleon is reunited with Birdo who is delighted that the puppy has finally chosen to return home. On the back of a turtle, Napoleon says goodbye to Birdo, calling him the best bird in the world as he walks away from the beach.
Finally back in town, Napoleon arrives at his house, then calls his mother who is more than happy to see her son and the two dogs kissing with joy and love.
==Quotes==
==Gallery==
Napoleon Lamentation.jpg|"I'm just a Muffin after all."
Napoleon Meeting.jpg|Napoleon meets Sid and Nancy in the cave.
Napoleon Watch Out.jpg|"Listen. Listen, I won't hurt you. You're lost puppies."
NapoleonPup1.jpg|Napoleon saves Nancy.
Napoleon Help Nancy.jpg|"Your front legs are for pulling. Your back legs are for pushing."
Napoleon Sid Nancy.jpg|Napoleon with Sid and Nancy when their mother returns.
Napoleon Tired.jpg|Napoleon finally sees a real wild dog before collapsing from exhaustion.
NapoleonPup2.jpg|Nancy licks Napoleon's muzzle before he wakes up.
NapoleonPup3.jpg|Napoleon: How long was I out?Nancy: A whole night. I never got to thank you for saved me.
NapoleonPup4.jpg|Napoleon and Mother Dingo watches Sid and Nancy play.
Napoleon Sleep.jpg|Mother Dingo tells Napoleon to wake up.
Napoleon Walk.jpg|Napoleon walking with Mother Dingo, taking stock of his journey.
NapoleonPup5.jpg|Helped by Mother Dingo's maternal wisdom, Napoleon realizes where his true place is.
NapoleonPup6.jpg|After a long and dangerous adventure, Napoleon is reunited with his mother.
==Trivia==
*Napoleon is a Golden Retriever, just like Shadow from Homeward Bound and its sequel Lost in San Francisco. In fact, Napoleon is one of the very first Golden Retrievers to have his own movie.
*The fact that he does not like water is quite ironic because dogs are known to be excellent swimmers.
*After Napoleon saved Sid and Nancy, the two puppies developed a deep admiration for him to the point of playing to be Napoleon.
Category:Male
Category:Kids
Category:Animals
Category:Movie Heroes
Category:Jerks
Category:Arrogant
Category:Mischievous
Category:Rescuers
Category:Successful
Category:Archenemy
Category:Thrill-Seekers
Category:Titular
Category:Adventurers
Category:Protectors of Innocence
Category:Chaotic Good
Category:Wayward Heroes
Category:Optimists
Category:Provokers
Category:Sympathetic
Category:Fighters
Category:Anthropomorphic
Category:Live Action Heroes