Tuesday, March 4, 2014

The Lego Movie (2014)

I can't say I'm surprised that Hollywood would turn toys like G.I. Joe and the Transformers into movies. With their built-in popularity and unique characters, it makes sense. But I am surprised, however, that they would use other toys from beyond the realm of action figures for movie ideas. We've had movies based on board games in the form of Clue and Battleship, direct-to-video cartoons based on Barbie dolls, and now we have a movie based on Lego bricks. A Lego theme park and dozens of Lego video games I can apparently handle, but I honestly still can't wrap my head around the fact that someone actually made a theatrically-released movie about the popular little building blocks. But The Lego Movie is very real, and was actually a big fat hit both financially and critically upon its release early last month. So being the curious moviegoer that I am, I had to check it out.

Welcome to the city of Bricksburg, where ordinary construction worker Emmet Brickowski (Chris Pratt) is beginning to realize just how lonely his life is despite being constantly bombarded with propaganda telling him that everything is awesome. His world is quickly shaken up when he encounters a woman sneaking around his construction site late one night. As he follows this mysterious lady, Emmet falls into a hole and emerges with an equally mysterious Lego brick stuck to his back. The woman, calling herself "Wyldstyle" (Elizabeth Banks), reveals that this brick is a mythical artifact known as the Piece of Resistance and realizes that Emmet is "The Special," a hero mentioned in a prophecy told to her by the blind wizard Vitruvius (Morgan Freeman).

The prophecy states that The Special will be the one to use the Piece of Resistance to defeat the tyrannical Lord Business (Will Ferrell). But as his nearly absolute lack of imagination makes itself known, it quickly becomes evident that Emmet isn't very special at all. So until he can realize his true potential, Emmet is taken across various Lego playsets by Wyldstyle, Vitruvius, and the "Master Builders" ― among them an over-excited '80s-era astronaut named Benny (Charlie Day), a unicorn/feline hybrid called Uni-Kitty (Alison Brie), and Wyldstyle's boyfriend Batman (Will Arnett) ― as they try to avoid being caught by the evil Bad Cop (Liam Neeson) and falling into Lord Business's clutches.

The concept of using Lego bricks as the basis for animation is nothing new. People have been making homemade short films with the versatile toys for decades, while Lego themselves have licensed their name to different direct-to-video cartons over the last few years. But The Lego Movie is the first to get the huge Hollywood blockbuster treatment, and it's something totally worth seeing. The Lego Movie is the total package, a wonderful combination of gorgeous animation, entertaining voice acting, and a fun, heartwarming story that gels together to make a truly great movie.

But the movie was in good hands from the start, thanks to the writer/director duo Phil Lord and Chris Miller. No strangers to animation, having worked on the short-lived MTV cartoon Clone High and, more recently, the Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs movies, Lord and Miller have crafted something that can entertain both kids and adults. As far as their direction goes, they do a fantastic job. The movie might be CG-animated, but Lord and Miller make sure it still appears as if it were assembled by hand with Lego bricks. The animation even has a certain clunky feeling to it that makes it feel all the more authentic. It's a real visual treat, full of great sight gags and little things just beneath its surface for diligent viewers to find.

Even the movie's great, immersive 3D enhance the experience, pulling the audience into the world Lord and Miller invite us into. I'm sure The Lego Movie works just as well in standard 2D, but seeing it in 3D makes for a more engaging experience. It works in the movie's favor, that's certainly for sure.

But while the animation is great, the movie was propelled even higher by Lord and Miller's fantastic screenplay. They seemingly take a cue from Wreck-It Ralph by bringing us the moral that anyone can be a hero, anyone can be special. It gets especially schmaltzy towards the end, but the story is consistently amusing and heartwarming. But more importantly, it never stops being funny. Like the sight gags, the jokes come fast and furious, coming at such a high rate of speed that the misses are quickly redeemed by another joke. There's enough going on here that the movie has something for everybody, something to make everyone laugh.

And I'd be remiss if I failed to mention the great group of voice actors assembled to lend their talents to the movie. Everyone is on their A-game, but there are some I just have to highlight. Charlie Day plays his "1980-something space guy" character with an abundance of hilarious energy, while Liam Neeson is particularly funny in a dual role as the grizzled, perpetually angry Bad Cop and his cheery alternate personality, "Good Cop." The biggest highlight is Will Arnett as Batman. The movie's version of Batman is what would happen if Christian Bale's version of the character were a cocky, condescending prick, and Arnett plays it with glee, right down to mimicking the guttural growl Bale used when playing the character. I've seen some reviews that have called Batman one of the best parts of The Lego Movie, and between Arnett's voice work and how Lord and Miller have written him, it's hard to disagree with them.

One could view The Lego Movie as being as much an advertisement for Lego bricks as The Wizard was for Nintendo games in 1989, but the big difference is that The Lego Movie is actually really good. The movie is a big "up yours" to the Transformers and G.I. Joe movies, proving that movies based on toys can be entertaining without having to sacrifice emotion or characters. We might only be a couple of months deep into 2014, but this is definitely one of the best movies of this short year thus far. So if you haven't seen it yet, do yourself a favor and do so. The Lego Movie's theme song says "everything is awesome," and when it comes to this movie, that's most certainly true.

Final Rating: ****

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