So I'm pretty jealous of Christopher Miller and Phil Lord, guys. These two young-ish dudes managed to leapfrog from "Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs", which, meh, to 21 Jump Street and its sequel, which are some of the more enjoyable comedies of the last few years. Next they get tabbed to write and direct "The LEGO Movie" with a star studded cast, which is basically the nerdy childhood dream of an embarrassingly large portion of the male population aged 20-35. As a disclaimer for purposes of this review, my brother and I spent inordinate amounts of time playing with/building LEGOs as youths, so that sentimental afterglow is absolutely going to shine through in this review. So if you don't like LEGOs (first, what are you, an asshole?), this review probably isn't for you. Also, I wandered into the LEGO store while walking around a mall the other day (my phone was being repaired, I haven't willingly stepped into a mall for non-Apple repair-related purposes since at least 2008) and let me say that if I was a child today all I would do is want Legos. Star Wars? Lord of the Rings? Marvel superheroes? Ridiculous. I know that Lego started producing licensing sets after losing a lawsuit against Megablocks in an effort to differentiate themselves and justify their higher pricing, but still. Awesome. All we had were cops, space ships, pirates, knights/robin hood and generic "town" sets in my day, kids. Count your Han Solo blessings.
So I went through a long phase in my life where I didn't watch animated movies, guys. I'd written them off as kiddie schlock (and most of them are!) but Wall-E is the one flick that brought me out of my prematurely curmudgeonly ways. Since that time, I've gained a begrudging respect for the occasional animated flick, even if it is a complicated calculus at making something smart and complicated enough for adults while still pleasing to the simple minds of mewling babes.
Enter: The LEGO Movie. Here we're introduced to everyman Emmet, (voiced by the rising king of everything, Chris Pratt) who's blissfully content in his dull, lonely existence filled with corporate speak and conformity until he finds himself dragged via a case of mistaken identity into an epic struggle for the survival of his world.
The Good: This is a smart flick. It's funny, clever, incorporates the fact that nearly the entire thing takes place in a LEGO world brilliantly in spots, and is one of the very few movies I've ever seen that managed to clearly be geared towards kids yet still be funny for my cranky, cynical, postmodern quasi-hipster tastes. The star-studded cast (Pratt, Morgan Freeman, Elizabeth Banks, Alison Brie, Nick Offerman, Charlie Day, Will Arnett, Will Ferrell and Liam Neeson among others) is clearly having a blast, and Arnett as Batman steals every scene. The fact that Fox News and other conservative media outlets were slamming a movie that is, for all intents and purposes, a commercial for a massive toy multinational for being "anti business" speaks to how the flick rises above what could have easily been nothing but an advertisement for LEGO products to be a sweet, fun, surprisingly smart time at the movies. The computer animation really makes the LEGO environments shine, and the differing worlds that make up the universe all feel distinctive and look great.
The Bad: There isn't much here. This flick is one of the best-reviewed and most beloved of the last year, and there's a reason for that. If anything, the movie is TOO referential and TOO clever for its own good, but it's a PG rated cartoon for kids... I'm not sure I'm prepared to slam it for making audiences laugh.
All in all, the LEGO Movie is a really fun time. It's hilarious in spots, surprisingly touching in others, and ultimately thoughtful and much more than the sum of its parts. I'm a childless 30 year old dude and I loved it, guys.
8/10.
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