MOT

Oscar Moutz is a lucky soul! This notorious and clever villain has just escaped and evades the police by running off to prehistoric times with the aid of a time door carelessly left open by Mot. This mafioso finds the paleolithic age absolutely great and immediately installs himself as the king of "Halted History". Naturally, by forbidding any progress he can be quite sure that none is going to invent school, the law court or the police. While Oscar is thrilled, Leo is horrified by his stone-age family. A helping hand from Mot is called for in order to capture the bandit and get Leo's universe back to normal.

Leo's parents have just returned from Egypt, bringing back serious sunburns and an authentic sarcophagus of a cat, which the ever deft Mot manages to crush immediately. Cutting short Leo's rage, the monster swiftly sets off for ancient Egypt, the only place where one can find an identical cat sarcophagus, ferocious guards, mourners wailing like Tyroleans, a psychopathic High Priest and a neurasthenic Pharaoh. The difficulty here is not so much finding the way through the labyrinthine corridors of the pyramid, but rather trying to raise a laugh from the Ruler of Egypt, whose life is nothing but a vale of tedium.

December 31st: party time! And Leo's parents are throwing a costume party. Finger food, music, dancing and fun, is more than one needs to attract Mot. Turning up unexpectedly, the monster mingles with the guests who consider his costume to be a great success. One small problem: Mot can't hold his champagne! One tiny sip is enough to send the monster into a strange torpor punctuated by violent hiccups which transport the house through the centuries. New guests gush from every epoch: an enterprising Bedouin, a stunned medieval samurai, an annoyed gorilla, etc. The only one not enjoying himself is Leo who is preoccupied with trying to avoid disaster and awaken Mot.

Colonel N's day of glory! This eccentric officer has manages to kidnap Mot! The monster's powers will allow him to realize his dream: to travel back in time in search of the most ferocious warriors. In the military laboratory, a platoon of soldiers is at the ready and the experiment can begin. Destination: Mongolia, 1230. Their mission: bring back the Huns, the most merciless barbarians of all time. Unfortunately for Colonel N, his squad returns with one very small Hun as all the rest had left to invade Europe. For Leo, the hardest part is not saving Mot and the tiny barbarian but rather, convincing his parents that the tiny Hun is his Bulgarian pen-pal ....

It really is more fun playing bows and arrows in the Middle Ages than doing maths, isn't it? Glued to his desk by some tricky geometry homework, Leo is trapped for the afternoon. Not to worry, Mot always has a solution. All he has to do is transport his friend to tomorrow so that he can collect the answers and bring them back to today in order to complete his work. The result: homework completed in five minutes and the afternoon free. Simple, isn't it? All this type of voyage calls for, is a little bit of accuracy - a subject Mot neglected to revise. Left reluctantly pacing the corridors of time, Leo wanders between his childhood and the centuries while Mot guzzles anti-freeze.

It's show-time for Leo! This evening in the school play he is to play the role of the wizard. For the time being, he is in his room rehearsing and it isn't going too well. Luckily Mot brings him back a role-model: a real wizard! Ralph Machinello! The best of the Middle Ages, or so they say ... With all the good will in the world, Ralph drones a series on incantations with unexpected and disastrous consequences. A booming Swiss cuckoo bursts forth from the neighbor's throat, Aunt Zelda becomes a horrifying virago, Mot is Leo, Leo is Mot, and Ralph is a bat who must be caught if ever one is to undo this surfeit of spells.

Feverish, Leo's father is suffering from a major attack of flu. He tosses in his bed beneath the myopic gaze of Dr. Meurz who requests some ice for the poor man's fevered brow. Mot, with much good will and clad in a nurse's uniform leaves immediately for the North Pole. Upon arrival the Tellurian is frozen by a violent blizzard and so neglects to close the time doors. Ice floes and penguins spill into the house. The myopic doctor frantically auscultates a sea-lion. A Russian submarine moves about in the bedroom. Battling alone against this torrent of catastrophes, can Leo save his father from the jaws of a polar bear and defrost Mot whose head occupies the vegetable crisper in the family fridge?

Under the glare of the spotlights, Diane, fifth chorus girl in a toothpaste commercial, assisted by Leo the devoted trainee, begins her career as a star. On the set are Tarzan and Jane, the heroes of the commercial who are praising the merits of fresh breath. Ready to win his first Oscar, Mot bursts into the studio armed with his acting talent and a five ton elephant ridden by two Englishmen who are keen on using exploding bullets on safari. Total destruction of the sets and also the career of Diane, whom Leo will have a hard time winning back. Especially as the scene is broadcast live ...

A woman preaching dietetics - a dinner rich in fiber and low on animal proteins - is enough to make Leo's father, just gone to bed after a low-fat meal, dream of giant hams spotting a landscape of pizzas the size of lakes. This is where Leo and Mot come in. The duo have to deal with a father who dreams that he is Rambo, machine-gunning anything that moves with lengthy bursts of olives. Escaping Dad's rather macho dream, Mot and Leo go from dream to dream, passing through the neighbor's secret world to Zelda's dreamy trance, from romantic violins to the fury of a disco with a floor of undulating waves ...

Mot has made an amazing discovery: a Roman gladiator who is Leo's exact double! The monster takes Leo to see for himself. Arriving in the middle of the Coliseum, Leo is completely floored: there is his double being chased by a raging bear. The adolescent is horrified and the monster is categorical: there can be no question of saving the twin. If one plays around with the past, one alters the present and then anything can happen. While his parents and the television speak Latin, Leo is stuck in Rome as a very mediocre gladiator and his double undergoes a stormy session of psychoanalysis in the twentieth century.

Arthur Squale, a mercenary hunter with an exceptional sense of smell, is hired to find Max, a superb parrot who has escaped from the zoo. Guided by his nostrils, Squale arrives at Leo's where Max has taken up residence. Sticking out of a wardrobe is Mot who, having been imprisoned by a Hindu trap, asks Leo for emergency aid. Leo grimaces at the idea of missing a basketball match on TV. Max is occupied with the telephone, and places order after order, attracting delivery men, mafiosi and bunnies to the house, where Squale haunts the tiniest recesses, gun in hand, ready to anesthetize Mot. The olfactory hunter is in seventh heaven - it is not every day that one stumbles upon an unknown species and spends the afternoon having doors smashed into one's face.

If you want to forget a frustrating love affair, there is nothing like a good session of snow surfing in the Himalayas. So, Mot and Leo are surfing on the Tibetan slopes when they run into a Yeti. Propelled into a time fault by the collision, Leo, Mot and the Yeti pop out of the neighbor's fridge. Mot and Leo both agree that the Yeti must return to its native Tibet. The route is simple: first stop, the Tyrol, then a stop-over at a Savoy cable-way and a lay-over at the municipal ice-rink where Diane is hoping to win the figure skating competition. The Yeti, a dark horse and amazing dancer, dumbfounds the jury by his skillfully tango on ice.

The golden city really does exist! Félipe Cortez, conquistador, and Ramon, his henchmen found it! Leaving their century and entering ours via Leo's wardrobe, Félipe and Ramon have hit the jackpot on "Win Your Weight in Gold", the game show for cultured viewers. Taken in by Leo's parents, who mistake them for Mexican tourists without passports, our two lost souls are going to be with the family for quite some time. The father is furious as every morning Cortez steals his bathrobe and Ramon tries to break down the door to Leo's wardrobe.