Flying The Nest (2019) - Movie Review

Just as spring always follows winter, of bloody course there’s always at least one bad talking animal movie out in cinemas. As much as I feel like I’m grinding this dead horse into a fine powder with how much I talk about it on here, the fact that this is what audiences have come to expect is precisely why I’m still here railing against it. I approach family films the same way I approach any other genre, with the same want for something worthwhile to write about. But alas, not only is this film beyond worthless, the best thing I can say about it is that it occasionally reminds me of animated media that isn’t as bad as this.

The first feature film by Icelandic production houses GunHil and Cyborn, the animation here is… not meant for the big screen. Aside from the annoyingly overblown character dimensions, which lean way too hard into humanising the numerous animals and bird on-screen, it has roughly the same texture quality as the average Dreamworks Netflix spin-off. That might work fine on TV, but in cinemas, it is not nearly good enough. And of course, we have that grandest of my animation pet peeves: Shitty CGI water. When the best-looking part of your production is a scene done just with shadows, it’s time to start over because you’ve already failed.

Not that worthy animation could’ve made this tolerable, though, as the story of Ploey the Plover (yes, the film points out the lack of creativity with the main character’s name, and no, it doesn’t make it any better) is aggravatingly bland. It’s basically Duck Duck Goose reduced to a single main character, only without anything remotely cool added to it. The closest we get to any kind of unique cultural identity is during the mandated musical number that shows hints of Icelandic influence in its melody. Other than that, it’s an adventure flick with the pacing and stakes of a road trip, one that seems to have specifically picked the most boring pit stops possible. Yeah, we get a few moments with a mouse colony combining into one big creature, but quite frankly, I liked it way more when the wolf pack from Storks did it.

Look, I get that these films are usually checked out as a lightweight distraction for kids; I understand that I’m not the intended audience for this. But I find it hard to believe that any child has the attention span needed to sit still through this movie, considering it can’t even get pre-pubescent pandering right on top of everything else. On the off-chance that this film is playing near you and you’re looking for something to take the younglings to, please do your kids a favour and take them to see anything else.