Maya Rudolph

There's no reason why this animated comedy adventure needed to be this pointless. Solidly entertaining movies have been made using far less as source material (see The Lego Movie). But while there are some hilarious verbal and visual gags peppered throughout this movie, it all hinges on a script that's painfully obvious and animation that simply isn't inventive enough to hold the attention without a decent story and stronger characters.

It's set in Textopolis, an app inside the smartphone of the teen Alex (Jake T. Austin). The central character is Gene (T.J. Miller), who has far too many expressions for a meh emoji. His parents (Jennifer Coolidge and Steven Wright) worry that he has some sort of defect. Threatened by the cruel senior emoji Smiler (Maya Rudolph), Gene and his pal Hi-5 (James Cordon) sneak out of the app in search of the hacker Jailbreak (Anna Faris), who can help reprogramme him if they can make it to the cloud. But Smiler sends a team of killer bots in hot pursuit.

Yes, the plot is cursory at best, and essentially exists only so the film can namecheck carefully placed apps in a series of sponsored, rather pointless extended set pieces. This leaves the movie feeling like a low-rent variation on Wreck-It Ralph, although only a few of these sequences have any visual interest. The Candy Crush world is at least a colourful alternative to the dull digital look of most of most of the movie. And the lack of imagination shows in the depiction of music streaming as a stream and a firewall as a wall of fire. There's also a strange rush to violence in almost every sequence, as the bots continually try to delete our heroes.

Continue reading: The Emoji Movie Review

There's nothing particularly memorable about this frantic animated romp, which adapts the iconic phone-app game into a movie using a rather corny plot. But the film is so random that it can't help but get the audience laughing. Youngsters will be delighted by the brightly coloured wackiness, while adults will chuckle at the steady stream of grown-up visual and verbal gags, many of which are frankly surprising to find in a children's movie.

It's set on the isolated Bird Island, where the residents have never learned how to fly and believe they are the only life in the sea. In their tight-knit community, Red (voiced by Jason Sudeikis) is an outcast because of his too-independent thinking. He's ordered to take anger management classes with groovy guru Matilda (Maya Rudolph), where his fellow students are the hyperactive Chuck (Josh Gad), the hulking Terence (Sean Penn) and the explosive Bomb (Danny McBride). Then a pig named Leonard (Bill Hader) arrives on the island, introducing new technology like sling shots and trampolines and planning a big party. But of course he has a much more nefarious intention that only Red can see. In need of help, Red takes Chuck and Bomb in search of the mythical Mighty Eagle (Peter Dinklage), the only bird on the island who can fly.

There's a slightly nagging sense that Donald Trump wrote this script (it's about a guy who's ignored as he obnoxiously shouts about the dangers of letting strangers into the community, then is proved right). But the film is so utterly ridiculous that it's impossible to take this rather dodgy theme seriously. What's even more odd is how much of the humour is aimed at grown-ups, including innuendo, puns, gross-out gags and unexpected violence, most of which will go over young viewers' heads. But it's so unfocussed that the only response is to laugh in disbelief that someone thought a joke so near-the-knuckle was appropriate for a kids' movie.

Continue reading: The Angry Birds Movie Review

Fans of bright, flashy things will love this colourful, kinetic animated adventure, although anyone seeking originality or involving characters should probably look elsewhere. This is the first Disney animation based on a Marvel comic book, although they have essentially only retained the title and a vague semi-Asian setting. The result is a film that feels like something you've already seen before, with the usual Disney plot formula, characters and action beats, plus lots of sentimentality. At least it's witty and fast-paced enough to keep us entertained.

The futuristic setting is San Fransokyo, a slightly more Japanese version of San Francisco in which 15-year-old computer-geek orphan Hiro (voiced by Ryan Potter) lives with his Aunt Cass (Maya Rudolph). Both are shaken when Hiro's brother Tadashi dies in an explosion Hiro thinks he might have caused. Then he meets Tadashi's health-care robot invention Baymax (Scott Adsit), a cuddly inflatable creature who just wants to take care of Hiro. He goes along with Hiro's plan to turn him into a fighting machine that helps find the masked man who stole Hiro's microbot invention and actually caused the explosion. Baymax also helps Hiro assemble the Big Hero 6 team, adding Tadashi's nerd-inventor pals: goofy Fred (T.J. Miller), rebellious Go Go (Jamie Chung), nice-guy Wasabi (Damon Wayans Jr.) and girly Honey Lemon (Genesis Rodriguez). Together they set out to stop the villain before he enacts his nefarious plan.

All of this is animated with bright colours and a snappy sense of the technology. There are several exhilarating set-pieces along the way as the young heroes work out their special powers by inventing all sorts of gadgets. But nothing about the script meaningfully deepens these characters. Each person on-screen is essentially one personality trait, while potentially colourful side roles (including Aunt Cass) are left badly undefined. What holds the interest is the superb interaction between Hiro and Baymax, mainly because of the obvious affection between them. And also because Baymax has all of the film's funniest lines.

Continue reading: Big Hero 6 Review