Tag: Animated

Flow was watched early from a screener. It is being released in Seattle on December 6th, 2024.

Who doesn’t love a good animal adventure? This one is about a cat (none of these animals have an actual name in the movie, but, my own kid referred to the cat as Felix, so now you have to know that as well). This cat likes to chill by itself, and eat fish that some dogs have fished up, quite rudely. The area has no humans at all, but there is a house of a woodcarver, who really loved cats. Maybe it was this one? So there are several cat statues around, some quite large.

And…then a flood happens! A large flood, with the water keep growing, and growing, and growing.

Well, the cat doesn’t like water, and is a bad swimmer, but thankfully…a small sailboat appears nearby and saves it! And it has a Capybara in it? What the hell is a capybara doing steering a boat? Will it eat the cat? Better to be in the boat, than in the water. Soon, other animals join the boat, a whole misfit crew situation, as they try to navigate this flooded world, with food scarcity, not much land, and shiny baubles.

There is not enough pro-Capybara media out there. There is not enough anti-Capybara media out there, either. Where is all of the Capybara media??

Flow feels like a cutscene of a PlayStation 2 video game, and a short turned feature length film, all in the best ways. It is Cel-shaded, but also, something else? It reminded me about the short Paper-man, sort of. A highly stylized art style that was unique, and maybe still a little old and retro, while clearly being better than the technology 25 years ago.

What the animation did was allow the film to be looked at with curiosity and pleasure. The other aspect that should be highly touted (And again, reminiscent of an animated short), was that it had no dialogue. These weren’t talking cartoon animals, they are just regular cartoon animals, trying to live their animal lives in a world that seemingly was abandoned by humans. I love me a no dialogue film, if it works for the plot and story, which this one absolutely does. The story we can tell through their interactions. The story of what happened to the humans can only be guessed and theorized, which is itself fun. And the story of how these animals learn to co-exist and try to survive in their new environment is one worth seeing.

I think Flow is an animated film that takes risks, and in a year where there are some big budget releases that realize they can put out lesser products, and still make bags full of money, it is great when these smaller films show that the genre (animated) is one still worthy of your time.

3 out of 4.

Sirocco and the Kingdom of Winds was watched as part of the Seattle International Film Festival 2024! It had its showing on Sunday, May 12th as part of the festival, and it was the Seattle premiere of this film!

Long winded titles about wind are long winded. What is this, some modern fantasy book series?

Well, yes, in the movie it is.

You see, Juliette and Carmen are sisters, and they are at a babysitters house, and bored! Well, Juliette is bored. And their babysitter is taking a quick nap, even if it is Juliette’s birthday. Also, this person has wrote the fantasy series Sirocco and the Kingdom of Winds. Eventually, some toy creation pops out, and makes a magical portal, that of course Juliette decides to jump into, forcing her older sister to follow.

And hey look, they are now weird cat people! And they are in the world of the books. Thankfully it isn’t scary, it is cool.

Until these goblin creatures find them, capture them, and break the toy so they cannot portal home. Oh, and then they also get separated. The older sister to be married off to the head goblin’s son, and the younger kid to be a maid to a visiting singer, Selma. The good news is, Selma is awesome, and powerful, and wants to help the girls. But the real person to help with the toy is going to have to Sirocco, and he is scary and controls big giant storms.

These goblin people look like they like to party though…

I was excited to show my kids their first FRENCH cartoon, and they still did get to see it. But unfortunately, it was dubbed. Oh no! Still a French cartoon, but the people who did the English voices aren’t noted anywhere, so I couldn’t tag them.

As for the movie, it is basically a Studio Ghibli’esque film. A giant focus on the child characters, and their feelings and facial expressions. Some danger, but nothing we think will actually win over at any point. A world of whimsy and strange shapes and structures. It hits all the marks, just is less anime and more whatever this style of French is called. I think if you like Ghibli films a lot, you would love this one.

Both of my kids enjoyed it a lot, including my youngest who made it very clear that she didn’t think she would like when I showed her the trailer, but she dug it a lot.

For the adults? Well, the story is relatively basic. And it is fine. But it is not something groundbreaking in any level. A tiny, cute story, that is relatively short. A nice break from the hardcore films of death and destruction out there.

2 out of 4.

Marry Little Batman was watched early as a screener. It comes out on Prime Video on Friday, December 8th!

Batman! Nununununununununun. I did not count if I put the right amount there, nor do I care.

This Christmas Batman movie is set in a Gotham where…Batman had finished the job! Like, the crime is all gone. Woo. So Batman (Luke Wilson) has been more settled down, and has a son, Damien (Yonas Kibreab). Mother? No idea, I don’t think it is brought up. Maybe it was a mitosis thing.

Either way, Damien is super young and likes to play, but generally in a mansion only has his dad and an Alfred (James Cromwell). There are toys, gadgets, and bat caves. Oh yeah, he knows about Batman.

Anyways, long story short, around Christmas, Batman gets in a jam, appears to be missing or dead, so Damien thinks he needs to done the costume before all of these villains come out and steal Christmas, or whatever.

Also starring Brian George, Dolph Adomian, Therese McLaughlin, and David Hornsby as the Joker.

Why does Alfred look like the world’s wrinkliest long penis? From the very first frames, it became incredibly clear that this is not a movie for me.

Style wise is the first indicator. The animation style was absolutely gross in my mind. Not because of a penis joke I made above, but the style instead just felt like, I am not sure, an early 2000s Cartoon Network show? Something that is super quick and easy? I don’t think animation needs to break the bank every film with futuristic drawing technology, classic is fine, but this isn’t even something appealing to me. It feels like a television show, in the worst way, but goes on for 90 minutes.

The next glaring category was the voice acting. I am not some purist that thinks a certain voice actor is the best actor for the job and should keep doing it. Changing people up is great. (Unless it’s Mario, then they should get an impersonator). But almost no voice really hit for me. Sure, Kibreab as the kid? Fine. Wilson is a great actor, but he never felt like Batman to me this whole film. Just felt like a silly dad. The catalog of villains were all forgettable, except for Hornsby as the Joker. He had some giggles, sure, and it just still felt really off and like I was getting the most reject version of his character they could have made. Something left at the bottom of the bin and ignored.

And finally, the story. It is wild a little bit that part of this plot would have the kid thinking his dad was dead for a large part of this film. And he is hearing his voice on the bat belt. It is played for comedy, and we know that Batman isn’t, but damn, this kid, whose size makes him look like he is 5 years old or younger (look, the animation style is BAD), but it is fucked up. I never feel compelled about any part of this story. I don’t get scared, or excited, or confused. I just watch in boredom, apathy, and a bit of disdain.

I am not saying some people out there might think this is just a cute Christmas movie. The good news for you if you like it, is that it is also turning into a Prime show at some point next year which, well, explains a whole lot more in that regard.

0 out of 4.

Unicorn Boy is part of Make Believe Seattle, and it is playing on Saturday, March 25, 2023. 

As has come up in many reviews before, my high school mascot was the noble Unicorn. So, did that make me a Unicorn Boy? Am I still a Unicorn Boy now? I will say yes to both.

I was of course very happy to pursue a film with a title like that, as I need more movies that are about unicorns or at least unicorn adjacent. For some reason it is a market overly saturated in TV shows, video games, and books. But not movies. I wonder why is that. Do movie watchers not like Unicorns? I hope that isn’t a stereotype.

Stereotypes make me make these faces.

Matty’s (Matt Kiel) life is currently spiraling downward. He has friends, fineeee. But he broke up with his girlfriend. It was a little awkward the timing too. It was after she said she loved him. And he panicked shortly after, and broke up with her. Okay, sorry, it was a lot of awkward, not a little. Don’t worry, Matty realized he missed her greatly. Life wasn’t as good without her. So he could just like, call her back and apologize and they could reconnect. Surely that would work.

Well, several voice mails later, sure enough, he is not able to get ahold of her. Wild right?

Unfortunately, while in a bathroom at a coffee shop, Matty gets sort of abducted by a unicorn, and brought to a strange colorful, rainbow filled world. This unicorn, Prince Purpleton (Sarah Natochenny) also doesn’t talk much and seems to be…uhhh, broken almost. And messy. Hard to describe. But Matty is brought back to their palace, where he learns that there might be a giant Unicorn running around, threatening things. But no one believes this story but the prince. The king (Patton Oswalt) is extremely passive and the queen (Maria Bamford) is mean. What is going on, how does this effect Matty?

Well it effects him a lot, apparently. Especially when he gets revived in the bathroom, and he is taken from the Unicorn world, and he spends a majority of his time trying to get back, to help his new friends, in a world that seems to be better than his own.

Also starring Sethward, Parvesh Cheena, and Harold Perrineau.

Messy rainbows, a picture.Unicorn Boy is a lot. A lot of interesting voice work, a lot of interesting colors, and certainly a lot of interesting facial expressions. Honestly, when cartoons focus on extreme facial reactions to events, it reminds me back to Ren and Stimpy, and I never really love it. It makes me make an extreme facial reaction and I never really get over it. And I never got used to in in this film either, which leads me to looking away from the characters more than watching them, which is a strange position to be in, and might be my own personal preference.

But the best news about this movie, is that the story totally works and is worth exploring and watching. My own biases on animation aside, I think Unicorn Boy not just tells a relatively unique story, but an important story. It tackles quite a few issues. In general, grief and depression, finding yourself, dealing with different levels of abusive parents, and of course, determining that the body you are in is not the body that matches you. You know what I mean? I think you do.

And to go with the story, the voice acting itself was top notch. Our lead, Matty, is voiced by the director, writer, and main animator of the movie. Sethward is his real life friend in some comedy group, who got famous from America’s Got Talent. But we also got a few celebrities for roles, and of course, the voice of Ash Ketchum. An impressive lineup for an independent animated film.

Unicorn Boy is a movie for a lot of people, and a lot of people can probably interpret it different ways. But regardless of which way you interpret it, you should be able to recognize that it is definitely done with heart and humor in mind.

3 out of 4.

Did John Lasseter fuck around with employees and sexually harass people while working for Disney/Pixar?

Well, most assuredly yes. He even admitted to it and called them missteps. That is pretty poorly worded. What a fuck. So he got booted out of Disney/Pixar, which makes sense. But damn it, he has /talent/ so he can’t not have a job. How will he live off of his previous riches?

So Skydance Animation was made! Okay, it was made before that controversy. But they hired Lasseter to run it, because they wanted a big name I guess. And that is the intro you get to have for their first animated film, Luck! Which is premiering straight to Apple+.

Oh, but this movie has dragons. Why isn’t it on HBO?

Luck is a story about Sam (Eva Noblezada), whom you might have already guessed, is unlucky. She is clumsy, she is late, her stuff stops working, she falls, she gets pains, but damn it she is 18 now, and about to live life on her own. Her own apartment, her own basic job. Why is that? Oh yeah, because she was also in a foster home. Yep, her unluckiness meant she was also there for years and never got taken in by a “forever family”, and just had to live a sad life alone. Yep, we are going depressing with this real quick.

But leaving the home meant that that Hazel (Adelynn Spoon) is now alone. A newer foster kid in the home. Sam makes sure she should still visit so often, so she won’t be alone, and hopes she has better luck.

Sure enough, she runs into a black cat, who drops a coin (ah, must be a lucky penny), and then Sam has good luck! She blames it on the coin of course, and wants to give it to Hazel so she can be adopted (fuuuck, that’s too depressing for me). But, once again, she is unlucky and loses it after intentionally setting it down.

That is when she runs into the cat again and….well, the rest is history. You know, after she follows it to a secret Luck world where Good Luck is created and fostered, with a polar opposite Bad Luck side that brings bad luck into the world, with a smorgasbord of diverse characters.

Also starring Colin O’Donoghue, Flula Borg, Jane Fonda, Lil Rel Howery, Maurice J. Irvin, Simon Pegg (as the cat!), John Ratzenberger, and Whoopi Goldberg.

Oh shit, emotions rising. Characters are hugging!

Honestly, this movie made me cry. But it is seriously hard not to. The first ten minutes are extremely sad. I feel so bad, that the took something kind of whimsical like having good or bad luck and equating it to something so serious like having someone fucking adopt you. Normally the stakes for this type of thing are missing a shot in a big sports game, or question in a competition. But sorry, your unusual unluckiness prevented parents from wanting to have you in their life? And often not show up at all for visits? Goddamn, calm down movie people.

Honestly, writing that makes me a bit more annoyed as it all comes together.

For the film itself, it is pretty damn basic. It feels like a lot of other generic kid fantasy films. Go to a magical realm. Have a diverse cast of different characters and magical beasts to look at. Have to go from point to point to collect things, to get closer and closer to a goal. And learn a lesson, that is really obvious from us the viewer. Just a standard, unimaginative story line. Even if it is in a new world we haven’t been before, it doesn’t do anything particular shocking with that world.

Overall, Luck is really lazy. For a child, it might be nicely distracting. But its tone is off, and honestly leaving a bad taste in my mouth to cheapen foster kids and adoption into good and bad luck. Sure the film made me cry, like twice, but it did so by being very manipulative with some real tragedies that didn’t actually matter for a lot of the story.

1 out of 4.

Hey remember Sing? Yeah? But why do you remember Sing?

I remember Sing being an incredibly average film. The trailers definitely implied a lot more songs might be featured in it, but most of them were just used in a montage audition scene. It was a mediocre film mostly because it had a very basic plot, and pretty standard tropes when it came to the plots of the individual main characters. The lead character wasn’t someone I looked at and cheered for. They let the mouse, despite being a dick all film, have a happy ending without making amends, which is shocking for a kids movie. And then you know, it ended.

It definitely didn’t feel like the type of thing that would get a sequel. But with Illumination Entertainment, anything they make that can be franchised and soaked for money with a lowest common denominator of jokes, they will do it, I suppose.

So hey, let’s see what nonsensical reason they come up for a sequel for Sing 2.

That button isn’t ominous enough. Needs to do something like open a trap door, or hit a bigger gong.

What’s going on with the animals, after they put on a fun little singing show for their friends and family? Well, they are still working together to put on original shows. They made a version of Alice in Wonderland, but you know, with other pop songs being song for it. They constantly sell out their show, which is impressive in their regular sized community, but alas, they want more.

Buster Moon (Matthew McConaughey) invited a talent scout to see the performance, but she leaves halfway through because it is not right for her employer, Mr. Crystal (Bobby Cannavale). He has a big hotel and theater in a Las Vegas like city, and he needs a new stage show. The scout didn’t think their show was good enough to even bring for an audition. Rough.

But Buster convinces his crew to head to the auditions anyways. And they will lie their way to the audition, and lie their way to a show start, by making promises he can’t guarantee, about a show that isn’t written. Good times. Follow your dreams haphazardly. Promise that you will get a big star, Clay Calloway (Bono) despite him being a recluse for 15 years.

Starring the returning voices of Reese Witherspoon, Scarlett Johansson, Taron Egerton, Tori Kelly, Nick Kroll, Garth Jennings, Jennifer Saunders, and Nick Offerman. And now we get voices of new characters voiced by Adam Buxton, Eric Andre, Halsey, Letitia Wright, Pharrell Williams, Chelsea Peretti, Julia Davis, and Peter Serafinowicz.

Word a Lion eat a porcupine? Probably.

In all honesty, I went in expecting to hate Sing 2. Let’s be clear. It really doesn’t make sense to exist. The idea behind this is that now that the con-artist found some actual talent through the rubble that is his town, he wants to make them a bigger famous act, basically singing cover songs, to works as entertainers? Ehhh.

I find it hard to find the lead character charming at all. He is a guy who just constantly lies because he feels he deserves greatness? He lies about things that might not be even conceivable, like the prize money in the first film. Things worked out for him, and that is great, but ehh. Not my kind of message for kids.

A lot of the side plots are pretty trash. The plot of our Gorilla not dancing well, and needing to dance well for his scene? Whatever. It was very much not in character for the choreographer to do what he did during their final show, and that ruined that potentially cool scene for me. The Elephants plot was also extremely basic, about not knowing how to fall in love. The plot of the musical they put on was shit, because none of the planets had any actual storyline for their musical.

The heart of the film comes from the Calloway character, a famous older star, who lost his wife, and gave up his career, to live alone with his deep lion thoughts. Bringing him into their fold took them time, and his moment on the stage was a bit charged up in emotions. I did cry during it. Those bastards. And despite the terrible way for the plot to unfold, from its beginning lies, to its terrible subplots, it was a fun show they put on for the experience. It was a bad musical, but a fun show.

One final note. What is going on with the songs here? Like, as far as I can tell, all of these people are aware they are singing cover songs of someone else? There is more evidence of that given that when they sang a U2 song, they talked about it belonging to Clay, of course voiced by Bono. And in Sing, it is not like all those townsfolk just had songs they made up on the fly ready to go. So they are all covers and exist. Why the hell is everyone so bananas over people singing cover songs? Why did Ash have any level of a successful rock career just singing cover songs? This is very unrealistic. There is going to be a Sing 3 probably, because hey, money. And people like cover songs in cartoon movies. But trying to figure out why people go bananas for them in front of them is bizarre.

2 out of 4.

Welcome to Encanto, or what I also call it, the second Disney Animated film this year. Disney has been doing an every other thing in regards to their films. One a musical and one that is not. We are at the musical one which meant I went in pretty excited despite being a bit weary about the overall plot.

But…Lin-Manuel Miranda helped make the plot of the film, and the music behind it. And I can’t not get behind a project he is involved in. Hell, watching Vivo was a surprise for me because I didn’t know he was involved with that.

If you look back at my review of Raya, you would have seen that Disney has been kicking Pixar’s ass the last few years overall. And not surprisingly that was still true. Luca was okay, Encanto was amazing. Pixar can just disband now. Before we get Cars 4.

Don’t tell any kids I said there could be a Cars 4. They might start acting up. 

Years ago, Alma Madrigal (María Cecilia Botero) was on the run with her husband and three kids, with members of her community, in the Columbia mountains. They were being chased out by invaders. And in that time, she lost her husband in order for the rest of her family to be saved. She prayed and wished for help, and her magical home was born, protected in the mountains, to grow a wonderful community that looked out for each other. And her three kids were given magical powers once they hit a certain age, to help protect the community. And their kids as well.

That is, until we got to Mirabel (Stephanie Beatriz). The door didn’t work. No powers were granted. Something was wrong. But she is upbeat nonetheless. Who needs /powers/ in a family of superpowered individuals in a magical house to have a good time?

But her younger brother is now up for his. The first since she was denied. If his power doesn’t manifest, was it her fault? And if there starts to be visions of her breaking their magical house and tearing their family apart, will it be her fault? And should she just, like, leave, you know?

Also starring the voices of Jessica Darrow, Angie Cepeda, Carolina Gaitan, Diane Guerrero, Wilmer Valderrama, Rhenzy Feliz, Adassa, Ravi Cabot-Conyers, Maluma, Mauro Castillo, Alan Tudyk, the singing voice of Olga Merediz, and of course, John Leguizamo.

You see, the house is a metaphor…for family.

A lot of these recent animated Pixar/Disney movies have had a mostly predictable plot. Frozen would end with her in control of her powers. Moana would return the heart of Te Fiti. And in Luca they would be gay, do crimes. But I found myself constantly guessing at where it would go in this movie and being wrong, and I really enjoyed that. I mean, I knew it would involve the house breaking, or not. Powers being gained, or not. But the how? The why? That was exciting and unique in the movie.

I loved the music in Encanto so much, I wished I could listen to it on my way home from the theater. But alas, at that time it wasn’t available yet. I even waited to write this review until I had a chance to re-listen to the songs. So many of them feel great, with layers and multiple voices, and different harmonies. I was surprised to find that Beatriz also sang all her own parts. She was very limited in In The Heights, so I just assumed she couldn’t sing, but she did great.

Encanto is just a beautiful movie. I think it is interesting that the main character is clearly interested in embroidery, given her clothes and what’s in her drawers, but it was never actually talked about at any point in a significant way. It is just a fact about her character. I especially liked the animation when they did the Bruno, Luisa, and Isabela songs. It was just constant visual explosion on the screen, and it left me in down right awe.

I am happy that Disney made a somewhat simple and small movie about people with gifts. I am glad they didn’t go against what they were preaching the entire film like they did in so many other classic Disney tales. And I am glad that Miranda’s genius keeps growing, and I hate him, and I love him, for it.

4 out of 4.

The Mitchells vs. The Machines is one of those films that you are hopefully going to hear about from word of mouth. I know I didn’t notice it pop up on Netflix. I know if I did, I would have just ignored it most likely for a bit, and watched it by myself a week or two later. The cover for it on Netflix doesn’t look appealing to me at all. It doesn’t do the actual animation style any justice, and just looks like a cheaply made piece of crap. And let’s be honest, The Mitchells vs. The Machines is not a title that screams out “watch me.”

I don’t know the Mitchells. Why should I care about the Mitchells?

I guess every famous cartoon family has its start, and if their goal is a franchise, they can constantly have them battling other entities. I guess.

I am getting off track. I didn’t want to watch this movie. I was told I should watch this movie. I am glad I watched this movie. You should also watch this movie. And now, here is a review.

This is apparently an action film with guns, dinosaur bombs, and a dog faced pirate. 

The Mitchells are apparently going to have to save the world. And they are not a perfect warrior clan. They all have faults, barely have any cohesion, and sort of hate each other depending on the circumstances. Katie (Abbi Jacobson) feels like an outsider from her family. She has always been into films and creating her own strange movies, that her parents just don’t understand. Her dad (Danny McBride) is Mr. Nature, doesn’t do anything with tech, can fix a lot of problems, and loves to build. Her mom (Maya Rudolph) is pretty mom stereotype, caring and all of that jazz, believes in everyone. Her younger brother (Michael Rianda) is just super into dinosaurs, starring in his sister’s movies, and is afraid of being alone. Also they got a dog that is barely a dog. 

Katie got accepted into her dream school in California, for Movie makers and is exited about leaving her home and finally being with people in her life who get and understand her. The “weirdos” and such. Unfortunately, she gets into a big argument with her dad the day before they leave. And his solution? To cancel her plane ticket away from this dump, so they can road trip to College, making her miss out on orientation, but letting them bond one more time.

And unfortunately, during that time, a big robot rebellion begins! Fuuuuuuu. And purely by accident, they find themselves to be the only group of humans not captured. I guess they gotta figure out how to save our entire species. 

Also featuring the voices of Eric André, Olivia Colman, Fred Armisen, Beck Bennett, Chrissy Teigen, John Legend, Charlyne Yi, Conan O’Brien, and Blake Griffin. 

You know, I am not even sure that is a dog…

If I had done my own research I would have found out that I definitely wanted to see this movie. Besides the stacked voice cast (including McBride doing a great impression of Seth Rogen has a father role, based on my confusion on checking IMDB, I would have been able to see that the executive producers of this are Lord/Miller, and I have never not loved something they produced or helped create. 

As for the actual film? Damn, what a roller coaster. But it is a roller coaster that just keeps going in loops and is mostly full of really exciting ups. This is a bad metaphor. It has some strong messaging about reliance of technology. Pretty obvious stuff overall, but it doesn’t harp on the message and say that technology is evil. It is necessary for our hero after all to follow her dreams, and allows her to do something she wants in life, so it is awesome still. It is more the corporations who suck, and we can all agree on that.

This film was surprisingly funny. I really didn’t expect to laugh as much as I did, especially out loud. My kids could enjoy it too, for similar reasons. It had jokes for all, and some good throwback jokes to technology issues in life. It is also full of colors and perfect for the ADHD riddled world we live in, but never really annoyingly so.

I was surprised about halfway through the movie (with a plot point that felt like it would be close to the end) to find it had so much more movie left to go. But it didn’t really feel boring, if not a little too long near the end in the final scenes. A small amount of editing/cutting near the end would have been fine. But again, I still love the movie overall.

Give it a watch. I believe it went to theaters for a bit, so it should be eligible for awards next year. Raya and the Last Dragon was good, and now this. Shit, is animation back this year? Will Luca actually be good?! 

4 out of 4.

Se

When I first found out about Secret Magic Control Agency, I figured I was definitely not going to watch that movie. Its poster/images just screamed a straight to DVD, low effort, low budget, animated film. I loathe those types. They always make me so angry. They are extremely basic on story, and hide behind the fact that they are a kids film in order to say they don’t have to stand up to the quality expectations of an adult.

Fuck that noise. Kids deserve quality too. Should we only ever feed our kids hot dogs, and never let them try pork roasts, or steaks, or turkey? No. Kids can know good stuff exists too, even if it means coming to terms with the fact that a lot of basic stuff out there is, in fact, basic, and not worth their time.

So why did I watch it? Because it actually released on Netflix. A much bigger platform than expected, so I need to check it out quick to see if it is worth time before people get stuck wasting their own time potentially. Or you know. maybe it was great and I needed to spread the word.

Corgis, by definition, are low effort as well. 

In this magical kingdom based on (checks notes), ugh, fairy tales, we have kings and queens and magic users and all of that. But because of shenanigans in the past, magic is now regulated by the Secret Magic Control Agency. I guess they are like the CIA force of this world. I don’t know what they actually do most of the time (make sure people doing magic have the appropriate bureaucratic paperwork? Capture people using magic like a villain?) but right now they have a very important job. The king was kidnapped!

Led astray by some mysterious food. Oh no. So the agency is going to get one of their top up and coming agents on it. Gretel (Courtney Shaw)! Why just one person? No, the powers that be think they need to get a thief as well to join her, someone who knows how to lie (something that the agency should be able to handle given their normal job functions…?) and they specifically search out Hansel (Nicholas Corda / Alyson Leigh Rosenfeld). Yes. Siblings.

But they are grown up, one is a charlatan, the other a law enforcer. And they want them to work together to get the king back before everyone realizes he is gone. So they have to put away their differences and you know, do that.

Also featuring the voice work of Erica Schroeder, Johanna Elmina Moise, Marc Thompson, Mike Pollock, and Tyler Bunch.

Captured but unlimited dessert? There are worse places to be. 

Low. Effort. Films. That could be enough of my analysis and end, but I guess I will be specific.

This could have been a generic fantasy film about completely new entities. But they decided no, we NEED this to be Hansel and Gretel. Why? WHY? The fact that they are these characters doesn’t do really anything for this story. They make a bread crumb way back home reference. There is one line about the Grimm Brothers writing up their shenangians, but in charge of changing the details to make it sound like a story instead to…hide the truth? From who? Is this set in the past in this world? This has a lot of advanced stuff in here, and wouldn’t make sense to be set in our own world, let alone the past. That is a bad joke and they should feel bad.

The only thing they needed for the plot would be to have a brother and sister. Almost all of this is new material. Just because something is on the public domain, doesn’t mean it has to be used. No child is going to be picking movies and be iffy about this film, but see that it has H&G and go “Oh shit, hold on momma, this got my favorites in it lets get it!”. No one cares and it just makes an already lazy movie feel more lazy.

Honestly, if this was an original story that wasn’t relying on name recognition of aspects in order to tell a story, it would fall easily in the 1 out of 4 territory, because at least there was effort. But the lack of effort just pisses me off, especially when the makers would probably acknowledge that this film isn’t great themselves. They would just mark it off as a kids movie and say it works for that level, and that is unacceptable.

0 out of 4.

Here it comes! Studio Ghibli has crossed a line many animation companies have already crossed. They have made a CGI movie. Will they fully cross over and become completely CGI? They were probably the last major holdout that was doing a more traditional look for all of their animated releases.

And I already hate it. I will admit, looking at the stills/trailer for Earwig and the Witch, I didn’t have high hopes for the film. It doesn’t look  great at all. The animation levels look like a small independent company doing their first film ever, that happens to be CGI. Not a pretty successful animation company trying CGI. They have money, they can make it look better.

But alas, I have been iffy on Studio Ghibli movies lately anyways. I have been having a hard time getting into their whimsy and mystery. Maybe this one will fix it?

Spoilers: It wont. Earwig (Taylor Henderson) was left on the porch of an orphanage as a baby, from a mysterious woman. They didn’t like that her name was Earwig, and apparently from a witch, so they figured they would hide that latter fact and also call her Erica Wig.

Ten years later, she is a bit of a terror in the orphanage. She does what she wants, she whines and complains, and she knows she wont be adopted ever, so she is biding her time. That is until a scary lady, Bella Yaga (Vanessa Marshall) and a tall scary guy, The Mandrake (Richard E. Grant) waltz in and totally pick her. But why?

Well, Bella Yaga is a witch, she could sense the witchy-ness in Earwig, and she needed an extra set of hands for potion making. Earwig thinks she will learn how to do magic and will totally help out! Turns out that Bella has absolutely no intention of making it pleasant for Earwig, or teaching her magic. Just someone to gather ingredients.

Ah, this new situation sucks. Who would have known that you can just adopt a kid to get a house worker?

Also featuring the voices of Kacey Musgraves, Logan Hannan, and Dan Stevens as a cat.

“Damn, that’s a huge witch.”There are quite a few problems with Earwig and the Witch. And honestly, the CGI is probably the least of its concerns. The CGI is still not great and notably average or below average throughout the movie, but it is not the biggest cause of concern.

Band plot – Worthless. Check out this poster graphic for the film. It is the most common form of advertisement I saw. It definitely does not represent this film. There is a brief band plot, involving history, the witch, mandrake, and Earwig’s mom. And it goes absolutely no where. It certainly doesn’t end up with them all being a band together with Earwig the lead vocals. This poster makes it look like a musical or band movie or anything, and it certainly is not. It teases some of these elements, and never does anything useful with them.

Earwig – She has no growth in this film. She is put into a trial to overcome and succeeds. The problem is, she started as a do whatever she wants child, and the movie ends the same, although definitely worse. No lessons learned. It is a terrible message. When she kept repeatedly calling the cat by her old friend’s name, I assumed it was some twist about the old friend being the cat. But no, they are two different entities. She is just a shitty kid who doesn’t care about the names of who she is talking to. They made a kids movie about a shitty kid.

The ending – By far, this is likely going to be the worst ending of a movie I have seen all year. I can easily imagine this movie making my worst list, and it is far too early to know where it land. But holy shit, this ending is such a waste.

SPOILERS ON THE ENDING. SPOILERS ON THE ENDING. Okay, here it is…It just ends! After some changes with magic occur, we get some weird time jumps, and it feels like the last hour of movie should have taken like 20-30 minutes max. It feels like the movie is about to start and do the main plot. And then with the a door opening and a mom arising, the movie is like, lololol credits. It makes absolutely no sense to have an ending there. It is like we got a prologue of an eventual story, but one I will never seek out, because of being dicked around in this film.

I hope this movie continues to get blasted, because it is truly really bad. And I hope Studio Ghibli doesn’t look at this and blame it on the CGI. Because sure, it is bad, and if it helps not make more like this, then that is swell. But fix the goddamn narrative structure, because this movie is absolutely a waste of anyone’s time who decides to watch it.

0 out of 4.