Migration (2023) - Movie Review

While Illumination managed to pull themselves out of their recent funk with the success of The Super Mario Bros. Movie, I was still a bit sceptical about whether that would be a fluke or not. It’s highly unlikely that the studio would be able to keep bringing back the geniuses behind Teen Titans Go! To The Movies for every release going forward, and given their previous track record of trying to relive past glories, there’s just something about how generic this film comes across on first glance that had me worried. Well, that and being written by Mike White, whose last animated venture was with the generation-defining disaster of The Emoji Movie. However, not only does this manage to keep up with that Mario-mentum (oh shush, I liked that one), but it taps back into what I originally started liking about Illumination Studios specifically.

Minions: The Rise Of Gru (2022) - Movie Review

Illumination might be in trouble. While they’ve certainly found their lane with a mixture of old-school animated slapstick and embracing the popularity of villains, their most recent features have been the epitome of diminishing returns. Their take on The Grinch was okay, but not exactly going to replace Jim Carrey anytime soon, the Secret Life Of Pets sequel was closer to a pilot for a TV show than its own film, and Sing 2 showed a noticeable drop from the rousing effect of the original. At this point, it’s easy to argue that the studio should stick with their prime cash cow (the Minions), since their ability to deliver with other franchises isn’t working out… but as their latest has shown, even that is in question.

Sing 2 (2021) - Movie Review

Well, this year’s been turning out pretty well for movie musicals, and the few talking animal movies I’ve seen this year have been consistently good… sure, let’s take a look at this feature. Although I’m not entirely sure if I need to, since this film’s marketing/trailer might be one of the worst cases of “they put all the best bits in the trailer, didn’t they?” I’ve seen in quite a while. Yes, let’s take the big emotional finale of our nearly-two-hour film, and make it the first thing most audiences will even gander at leading up to its official release; why even release it in the first place if you’re going to pull something like that?

The Secret Life Of Pets 2 (2019) - Movie Review

There’s a certain thought pattern among critical circles that children’s films basically exist to promote everything except themselves. From tie-in merchandise to video games to character-specific spin-offs to TV shows, once a studio knows that a given property has got the attention of kids, they will milk it for all it’s worth. Illumination Entertainment is no stranger to this, if the still-prevalent Minions are any indication, but their latest feature feels like a plain-faced attempt at that kind of franchise enhancement. The way they go about this, though, leaves a bit to be desired.

Comparing any modern animated film to the DisneyToon sequel factory would usually serve as one of the gravest insults possible, but here, it’s kind of unavoidable. The plot in this under-90-minute flick feels similar to Atlantis: Milo’s Return, as if three smaller pilot episodes for a series were stitched together to make a singular feature. The plots in this instance involve Max and Duke getting into trouble on a farm, Gidget encountering the apartment of a crazy cat lady, and ‘Captain’ Snowball saving an animal from a travelling Russian circus.

The acting overall is fine, with Max this time around being voiced by Patton Oswalt because having an admitted sex offender voicing something that children cuddle up with would’ve sent off all kinds of red flags, but it’s nothing all that noteworthy. Same for the animation, which pretty much abandons the first film’s Merrie Melodies style for something a bit more standard. I got more than a few Nut Job flashbacks while watching it, although this is definitely less annoying to sit through. Even with the presence of Kevin 'Why is he still here?' Hart.

It taps into familiar territory from the first film as far as humour, sticking to the animal psychology behind how house pets behave. However, that part ends up diminished in comparison to the frequent attempts at kid crazy antics. I’d be disappointed by this if the attempts at crazy didn’t pan out more times than not. Kung-fu bunny rabbits, knife-throwing monkeys, a train chase sequence, not to mention the basic weirdness of a tiger running around New York with all these house pets.

There’s some mild lip service to using the animals as proxies for parents (something that gets spelled right the hell out at one point, so deducted points on that one), but ultimately, this is just another pleasant but harmless and inoffensive distraction. While the first film managed to skate by on those grounds, if this series is going to be a recurring thing, they’ll need to come up with something more for the next go-around. Or, more preferably, they could just bite the bullet and make this into a TV show; I can guarantee that the people who still watch cute animal videos on YouTube will be into it. Hell, judging by the end credits, the filmmakers themselves seem all too aware of that.

The Grinch (2018) - Movie Review

 

While their version of The Lorax may strongly argue against this, if any animation studio was to bring another iteration of The Grinch to cinemas, Illumination are the guys to do it. Between their cartoon revivalism and their love for animated slapstick and their championing of villains that audiences love to hate, they have the aesthetic foundation to at least give this a shred of hope. I mean, the last time we got a Grinch movie, audiences landed on either the "this is awful" or "this is lame but fun" sides of the debate. Thankfully, this film is off to a good start because, whatever it has going for it, it doesn’t need to be defended as strongly.

Despicable Me 3 (2017) - Movie Review

I think I owe Illumination Entertainment something of an apology. For the longest time, I always judged them mainly off of their take on Dr Seuss’ The Lorax, which still stands as one of the single worst films I’ve ever sat through in so many ways. However, that is honestly an outlier of their work: The rest of their films, in one way or another, have tapped into a sense of nostalgia for the olden days of animation and translated it quite remarkably for today’s audiences. Whether it’s the 2-D throwback of The Secret Life Of Pets to the tribute to all things musical with Sing, Illumination has secured its place in the industry as the most retro-minded studio working right now.

 

And the crown jewel of their work to date, the series that put them on the map, is Despicable Me. Or, more specifically, the Minions that have now taken a life of their own and, whenever a new film featuring them comes out, you will doubtless see them everywhere. So, in light of the studio’s pedigree and my admitted sensitivity to overblown marketing, how does this latest instalment turn out?

Sing (2016) - Movie Review

Ever since the concept of a musical has been in the minds of man, the meta-musical has never been too far behind. Now, in a way, it is perfectly logical: When people spend as long as they do belting out musical numbers on stage, it can start to bleed out into their regular life; as such, putting two and two together just makes sense. Hell, some of the most acclaimed musicals of all time have been meta-musicals like Singin’ In The Rain and Fame. However, as is the case with the lesser forms of metafiction, it can occasionally come across like a deadline-nudging assignment where, when out of feasible ideas, they just work within the barest confines of the narrative to deliver the music. Since we’re dealing with modern-day cinematic sensibilities, and a general inconsistency when it comes to movie musicals, this could honestly go either way. Well, time to see what else Illumination Entertainment has in store for us this year.

The Secret Life Of Pets (2016) - Movie Review