Monsters University: The Tamest College Ever

Monsters University is an animated family film directed by Dan Scanlon. The plot follows Mike (Billy Crystal), and Sully (John Goodman), in their university (or college), years serving as a prequel to Monsters Inc.

This film is needless, there is no way of getting around that: it did not need to be made. However, despite this it adds a few nice character arc wrinkles to the beloved duo that are worth talking about. It shows how when Sully and Mike met they were adversarial, Sully coasted by on his father’s name and didn’t bother to try and Mike is trying very hard to be something that he is not. It is interesting to see their motivations and behaviour here and then to rewatch the first film, it gives it some new flavour.

The trademark Pixar heart is present, in a much-reduced capacity from the original film though. You do empathises with Mike as you can see how hard he wants to be a scarier despite not being scary, it is heart breaking and the big emotional moment at the end of the film when he finally gets to step over the line onto the factory floor is a cheer worthy moment and feels earned.

Overall, this film is needless there is no getting around that, but it adds to the motivations and characterization of various people from the first film adding a new context which is nice and crucially beneficial.

Pros.

The character work

The Pixar heart

Adds rewatch value to the original

Cons.

It is needless

It has pacing issues and often feels like it is filling time

Hercules: Does James Woods Age Well?

Hercules is an animated film directed by Ron Clements and John Musker. The plot is a retelling of the Greek Myth of Hercules, though it combines a lot of different stories together, so it is not beat for beat. We see a young Hercules (Tate Donovan), be ripped from his parent’s arms and raised as a mortal. After he finds out about his supernatural heritage he sets out to become the biggest hero in the world and regain his place amongst the Gods.

I remember watching this in school as a treat on the final day of term, I remember enjoying it. My how times change.

So I have a laundry list, to borrow the phrase, of problems with this film. Firstly narratively it is a mess. There is two defined acts and then a third one that just feels like a bunch of stuff cobbled together, the result of this is a film that has a sizeable amount of the bloat.

The gospel soundtrack is one of the better aspects about the film, it adds an extra element that is hard to describe and enhances it completely. However, a lot of the normal songs ,(mainly the ones sung by Hercules himself), lack any charm or catchiness, this creates a noticeable dip in the soundtrack. Furthermore, the voice actor for Hercules doesn’t give the role any passion or character, Hercules feels like the blandest most stereotypical hero, in his own film and that is the fatal flaw.

The supporting cast are also a mixed on the one hand you have James Wood and Danny DeVito, both of whom are excellent, on the other hands you have the rest who are again so bland and devoid of personality that they just fade into the background.

Overall, this film showed me that rose-tinted glasses are a real thing, it is very meh and feels both too busy and also empty at the same time, it is perplexing.

Pros.

The gospel soundtrack

Woods and DeVito

Cons.

Hercules is boring and bland

It tries to hard to cover everything

The non-gospel songs are bad

The supporting cast are a very mixed bag

2/5

Reviewed by Luke

Spies In Disguise: Slenderman’s Super Spy Cousin

Spies In Disguise is an animated family adventure film directed by Nick Bruno and Troy Quane. The plot sees super spy Lance (Will Smith), be accused of going rouge, in the process of clearing his name he is turned into a pigeon by child genius Walter (Tom Holland), and the two team up to save the world.

Before I get into this review I just want to talk about the character models. There is something seriously wrong with the proportions of these characters, to a point where Lance looks related to the Slender Man and Jack Skellington. I am of course talking about the legs of these characters; they are way too long for their bodies and other proportions it is distracting. The opening scene where we see Lance do spy stuff and beat up the Yakuza is the best example of how bad the character design looks; the legs are off.

The premise is fairly cliched and nothing you haven’t seen from a kid’s movie before, the theme is embracing your weirdness and realising that others who aren’t the same as you are okay too. I found this film to be quite enjoyable for the most part it had me laughing a few times, it hit the right emotional notes and the film knew just how to use Will Smith’s signature type of charisma. This film would be nothing without Smith.

I enjoyed the weirdness of this film and the pigeon stuff and would like to see more films embracing strange premises like this in the future.

Overall, Smith and his charisma made this film. Ben Mendelsohn is also strong as the film’s villain, who has many great moments to shine. My only complaint would be about the off-putting character design and the predicatable plot, but neither of these are deal breakers.

Pros.

Smith

Mendelsohn

All the pigeon stuff

Cons.

The legs

The predicatable plot

4/5

Reviewed by Luke

Beauty And The Beast: The Definition Of Stockholm Syndrome

Beauty and the Beast is an animated family film directed by Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise. The plot sees social outcast Belle (Paige O’ Hara), becomes the prisoner of a Prince (Robby Benson) who was turned into a beast after insulting a witch. As things appear sinister Belle realises that The Beast is not as monstrous as he first appeared, and they end up falling in love; it is a tale as old as time.

So before I get into it, I want to say yes I know the premise is troublesome, it is a textbook case of Stockholm Syndrome and the message of the film sucks hard, but hey it is a Disney animated film so what else is new.

This was not one of the Disney animated films I grew up on, I think I might have seen it once before, so when I watched it the other night it was almost like the first time and I have to say message aside it is a fairly okay family film. This is not in top tier Disney animated films at least not to me.

I thought the songs where okay, some better than other admittedly. They were catchy enough and they got in my head, but I didn’t remember them much once the film ended. I liked Belle and thought she was an interesting character it is just a shame that she is side lined once the Beast is introduced to the narrative. Her and the Beast have a form of chemistry on screen that is believable, thought I wouldn’t call it romantic.

Overall, one of the meh tier Disney animated films, maybe if I had grown up on it I would have felt differently, but as it stands it just seems quite bland with a seedy undertone the more I think about it.

Pros.

The animation is beautiful

Some of the songs are good

Cons.

Some of the songs are bad

The message and the premise are troublesome

Belle is a good character but doesn’t get to shine

2.5/5

Reviewed by Luke

Scooby Doo And The Legend Of The Vampire: Rock On

Scooby Doo And The Legend Of The Vampire is an animated family film directed by Scott Jeralds. The plot follows Scooby (Frank Welker) and the gang as they head to Australia for a music festival, once they get there they find some strange goings on resulting in them coming face to face with a local vampire called the Yowie Yahoo.

So this was another classic from my early 2000’s childhood, I decided to revisit it as the animated Scooby Doo films prove to be great comfort viewing. I have to say I enjoyed it, it held up well. Also unlike Monster of Mexico this film did not rely on cheap stereotypes for characters, and actually had some well written Australian and Aboriginal characters (for a kid’s movie at least).

Though I talk a great deal about the problems with formulas I have to say the Scooby Doo formula works well, you know what you’re going to get and there is some comfort in that. I found the villain, the Yowie Yahoo to be quite interesting and I enjoyed the throughout rock feel of the film, which I thought was boosted incredibly by the return of the Hex Girls from The Witches Ghost.

Overall a fun and entertaining Scooby Doo adventure with interesting new characters and a terrific reunion.

Pros.

An interesting monster

Not using stereotypes

The rock feel of the film

The return of the Hex Girls

Cons.

A tad predictable

4/5

Reviewed by Luke

Iron Sky, The Coming Race: Facebook News Got It Right

Iron Sky The Coming Race is a Finnish German Austrian comic science fiction action film directed by Timo Vuorensola. The plot this time around sees the surviving humans now living on the ruined Nazi moon base, however, there existence is threatened by the fact that the base is falling apart. So the daughter of James Washington (Christopher Kirby) and Renate Richter (Julia Dietze), from the first film, Obi (Lara Rossi) must lead a team to find a new element within the hollow Earth to power up a spaceship and save the last of her people.

So yeah as you can guess this film goes fully out there and has a race of lizard people being present throughout human history and saying that the Earth is hollow. I think these new twists added to the mythology of the film and helped this sequel to feel different enough to stand on its own. Furthermore, the ending twist of the Soviets having a base on Mars is inspired and hilarious; if a little predictable.

My issue with this film is that though the new characters introduced therein are good, they just aren’t as good as Washington and Klaus (Gotz Otto), from the first film. In terms of likeable lead characters this film defiantly has a void that isn’t filled by the new cast. Whatsmore by having Renate having a backseat for most of the film I feel almost cheated out of seeing her as the badass leader of the remaining humans, (this happens off-screen).

Overall, this is still good and entertaining and by embracing further wackiness it does justify its existence, but it should have been a direct follow up with a bigger focus on Renate and should have kept James around. A bit of a disappointment.

Pros.

The Red Planet twist at the end

Further embracing the weirdness

Renate’s final scene

Cons.

The new character struggle to be likeable

It just isn’t as good

3.5/5

Reviewed by Luke

Ferdinand: John Cena’s Charm Has Limits

Ferdinand is an animated family film directed by Carlos Saldanha. The plot follows a Bull called Ferdinand (John Cena), who doesn’t like to fight. In the Spanish world of bull fighting that proves to be a liability and Ferdinand soon finds himself facing up to some unpleasant truths.

So, I really enjoy Blue Sky Animation, I am a big fan, yes, I know they didn’t make this and that it was actually made by 21^st Century Fox Animation, but I saw their name attached and thought I would check it out. My takeaway? It is a very meh film, sure it is a nice turn your brain off kids movie, but if you’re looking for any substance or originality you’re looking in the wrong place.

The plot feels very been there done that. I can name a whole host of other movies that have a lead character who doesn’t like or can’t do something that his world revolves around. The unoriginality in and off itself is not the damming thing, plenty of films feel samey, my issue is that this film can’t seem to be bothered to do anything new with the premise beyond an unfamiliar location.

Overall, John Cena’s easy charm can’t be called upon to make this a good film. As far as animated films go maybe give this one a miss, you and or your kids won’t gain anything from watching it.

Pros.

I enjoyed the Spanish flair

Cons.

Boring

Seen it before

Kate McKinnon was at her most annoying

The emotion feels hollow

1/5

Reviewed by Luke

Cats: Eye Bleach

Cats is a musical drama film directed by Tom Hopper. The film is a big screen adaption of the famous theatrical musical of the same name.

So, yes I watched this to see if it was as bad as everyone said and yes, I can confirm for you all it is trash. Copies of this film should be burnt and we as a species would be better if we could erase it from our collective memory. Here’s how I got there.

Right from the off, the design and look of the Cats themselves is off putting, they’re too humanoid and also weirdly sexual. I don’t know if Furriers where the secret target demographic for this film, but it is weird, the casts are often shaking what would be their human sexual organs and yeah, its uncomfortable.

Secondly there is no real plot, from the opening moments of the film we are bombarded with songs telling us about what cats are and what their world is, but they don’t really explain anything, and you have no idea what is going on. There is also a song very early on in the film that takes place in a graveyard and I personally found something very disconcerting about this one, like it made me panicky and troubled and I can’t really tell you why.

I understand that it is a musical, but the constant songs get to be a bit much, there are other musicals that have actual lines of dialogue in-between their songs, but this is not one of those films. The acting is blatantly not there, most of the actors seem to either be there for an easy pay day or because they were forced into it (at least that is how they appear when they are on-screen as they clearly don’t want to be there).

Overall, this is as bad if not worse than you have heard.

Pros.

It is bizarre.

Cons.

The furriness of it

The design of the Cats themselves

The lack of a basic plot

The repetitive non-sensical songs

The terrible performances.

0/5

Reviewed by Luke

Rise Of The Guardians: Forgotten Dreamworks

Rise Of The Guardians is an animated film directed by Peter Ramsey. The film sees the immortal guardians of children, Santa Clause (Alec Baldwin), The Easter Bunny (Hugh Jackman), The Tooth Fairy (Isla Fisher), and Jack Frost (Chris Pine), team up to defeat the evil entity know as Pitch (Jude Law).

So for the most part this was very generic family fantasy fare, the plot went the way you would think it would with an unlikely outcast hero rising to the occasion to save his friends and the world from evil. Same old same old. In many ways I don’t need to tell you what happens in this film because without seeing it you will be able to predict it.

The characters are likeable enough and the voice actors are giving it a valiant try to inject some personality into otherwise quite vacant character husks. However, the script certainly does the film no favours and often feels like it is caught between two different ideas; mainly in regard to tone.

The one positive I will say for this film, is the animation itself is great. It is very distinct and has it owns style that separates it from the rest of the DreamWorks line-up. I especially enjoyed how they showed the nightmare powers of Pitch on-screen, I thought it was very visually interesting to look at and that it also had an impressive scale.

Overall, very standard fare, you will have seen many other animated films just like this. The cool animation and strong voice acting won’t be able to change that fact. Very much a meh.

Pros.

The voice acting

The animation style

Cons.

Incredibly predictable

The characters feel very one dimensional

The tone cannot stay consistent

2/5

Reviewed by Luke

Scooby Doo And The Monster Of Mexico: South Of The Border

Scooby Doo And The Monster Of Mexico is an animated family film directed by Scott Jeralds. The plot sees Scooby (Frank Welker), and the gang head to Mexico for Day Of The Dead, however, once they arrive things start to go awry and of course a monster rears its head.

This is classic Scooby Doo, this to me is the Scooby Doo I grew up on; showing my age a bit there. No racing, no forced needless crossover, no Simon Cowell, just good old fashion mystery solving.

I thought the monster was a touch generic, they could and should have gone into the backstory and the legend of the monster more; that would have made it standout better in the wider Scooby Doo Universe. That said I enjoyed the Mexican twist on the classic Scooby Doo formula, I thought it gave it a nice sense of place and distinct personality.

Unfortunately that Mexican twist proves to be a double-edged sword. Though it has positive aspects, it also leads to the furthering of outdated stereotypes. This could have been a lot worse, but when it occurs on screen it does stick out, giving you pause. It certainly hasn’t aged well.

Overall, this is a fun Scooby Doo adventure that shows why the classic formula is so great, however it ages poorly and could do with further development in certain areas, these issues stop it from being perfect Scooby Doo ala The Witches Ghost.

Pros.

Classic Scooby Doo

A distinct sense of personality

Fun and entertaining

Cons.

The use of Mexican stereotypes

The monster is quite bland

3.5/5

Reviewed by Luke