Monsters vs. Aliens Has Just Enough Charm
Audiences have every right to be apprehensive every time Dreamworks or any other studio besides Pixar puts out a Computer Animated Film these days. It’s really a hit and miss proposition with the hits really not in the same league as even the least popular of the Pixar catalog. In this respect it’s a completely unfair methodology to hold any animated film up to comaparison to something in a class of a Toy Story. So it should be taken with a grain of salt when I assess Monsters vs. Aliens by saying that “it’s no Toy Story.” But it is a pretty fun ride.
The story is pretty much covered in the trailers. The Earth is being threatened by an alien invasion and the U.S. government’s reaction is to pull out a set of genetic mutant monsters that it’s kept imprisoned for the past 50 years for the safety of the public. The latest addition to the government’s monster collection is Susan, dubbed by the government as “Ginormica,” a pretty standard young woman played Reese Witherspoon who happened to grow to enormous size after a mishap with a radioactive meteor.
Susan is the emotional heart of the story as she moves through the despair of dealing with her “disability” and learns through the process of helping fight the threat that her size and strength give her a sense of empowerment.
While there’s a lot of humor in the scenarios and “pop culture” references there aren’t really many out and out belly laughs in the film, but it seems to maintain a steady dose of charm and lots of smiles and chuckles.
from Witherspoon as Susan, there is a lot of star power in the rest of the cast including House’s Hugh Laurie as Dr. Cockroach, a scientist that suffered from an experimental mishap that left him genetically merged with a Roach ala “The Fly,” Will Arnett, as a humanoid fish thingy called “The Missing Link,” and Seth Rogan who provides most of the chuckle inducing one-liners as a blue jello-like blob monster simply called Bob.
The most endearing character in the film for me is “Insectosaurus,” a gigantic mutant grub that has the cuteness of a stupid little puppy and is sort of the “pet” of the other monsters. There’s just something incredibly cute about this massive insect and it’s stone cold mindless glare that is really heartwarming in a giant bug sort of way.
Monsters vs. Aliens, while being very likeable, really doesn’t have much bite to it in the form of an emotional core. In fact’s it’s surprisingly shallow and nice for the most part. Even the humans or the “authority” figures pretty much pack no punch. When giving a character a name like General W.R. Monger (Kiefer Sutherland) you would expect that there would be some ethical or moral judgments being made, but nope, pretty much everyone’s filled with good intentions except for the evil squid-like alien. Even the President, played by Stephen Colbert, seems to be filled with good intentions even if his poor judgment has lead to putting the button that launches the United States’ nuclear arsenal right next to the button that dispenses the cappuccino in the War Room.
Since we’re in a 3-D resurgence recently there are definitely a lot of hit and miss entries in this realm. I’m going to qualify my recommendation of Monsters Vs. Aliens that if you choose to put it on your spring must-see list that you do choose the 3-D version of the film. One thing that good CG animation seems to be made for is 3-D and this film is really full of some stunning 3-D images. There just enough full out 3-D gimmicks mixed in with the rich depth to majority of the film that this does turn out to be really boosted by this format.
If you’re not expecting anything more than the most simple expansion of what you’re seeing in the trailers then you shouldn’t have a second thought on throwing down a few bucks for Monsters vs. Aliens. It’s just entertaining enough of a distraction to make it worth your while and it’s actually pretty hard not leave the theater with a guilty grin on your face.
Technorati 
Del.icio.us 
StumbleUpon 
Digg 
Facebook 
Mixx 
Reddit
Tags: Movie Reviews
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
2 Responses to “Monsters vs. Aliens Has Just Enough Charm”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
March 30th, 2009 at 7:16 am
This actually looks like one that will be decent to watch when it comes out at home. I’m just not a huge theatre guy for most things. These movies that have been coming out in 3D have they been seeing special DVD versions that include the 3D and a pair of glasses?
March 30th, 2009 at 9:11 pm
I would have to rate the 3-D in this flick as A1. Best I’ve seen in the recent 3-D resurgance by leaps and bounds.