BABAR VISITS ANOTHER PLANET

No doubt Babar has some old friends who happily revisit him under any circumstances, but most will be disappointed by the blobby pastel pictures and uninspired text of this latest of the popular elephant's adventures. Kidnapped via rocket by creatures who "look like elephants but yet they're not elephants," Babar, Celeste, and the children visit a floating city that hangs in the air (from large red balloons) above a soft, mucky planet. After breakfast at an automatic fountain that dispenses cakes and soft drinks they attend a flying egg festival, but leave for home when Authur's accidental puncturing of one of the balloons threatens to set off a touchy interplanetary incident. Little of Babar's old ingenuousness and few of the endearing incongruities of his condition are recaptured here; indeed, the depicted space town with its silly looking inhabitants resembles a 2nd-class Seussy Disneyland more than the jungle Celesteville we remember.