How entertaining? ★★☆☆☆
Thought provoking? ★☆☆☆☆ 15 May 2013
This article is a review of EPIC.
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“What's going on, baby girl?” Mub
“Talking snails!” Mary Katherine
“Actually, I'm a slug. No shell over here, baby,” Mub
In the slew of sequels (a third SHREK, second CARS, fourth ICE AGE, third MADAGASCAR), an original animated feature should be welcomed with open arms. When WALL.E supposedly cost $180 million, I guess cartoons are just as risky as their live action blockbuster counterparts. And unfortunately, lately, they feel as staid and lacklustre as too many; see BRAVE and RISE OF THE GUARDIANS for instance. The smaller animations are the ones delivering – PIRATES! – FRANKENWEENIE – PARANORMAN.
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Chris Wedge returns to the director’s chair eight years after the disappointing ROBOTS. He was also the helmer who gave us the initial and most satisfying ICE AGE. Hopes were middling then. And like the recent CROODS, EPIC appears to be influenced by AVATAR, interested in showing us a fantastical world, peopled by colourful creatures. Here, they are talking insects in a forest, getting around on birds and bats. There is a battle going on, between those trying to protect the environment, the miniature Leafmen, headed by Ronin (Colin Farrell) and their queen (Beyoncé), and those wanting to destroy the wilderness through a rotting power, led by Mandrake (Christoph Waltz). It’s not clear why Mandrake wants to do this. Won’t this eventually destroy his food source?
Meanwhile in the human world, Mary Katherine (Amanda Seyfried), MK as she likes to be called, has just moved from the city to the country to live with her estranged eccentric scientist father, after the passing of her mother. There is no real emotion to this reunion, no comforting of his bereaved daughter; he just bumbles around in unfunny slapstick shtick. And is representative of the lazy characterisation and poorly conceived mythologizing.
Eventually MK gets magically scaled-down and gets sucked into the war. There are shades of ALICE IN WONDERLAND and HONEY, I SHRUNK THE KIDS. And that typifies proceedings; there are the niggling echoes of other films throughout, even down to a PHANTOM MENACE-style race introducing potential boyf material, Nod (voiced by the for once not stilted Josh Hutcherson).
Once Leafman sized, MK just takes everything in her stride. You would as a kid be loving this, but she’s a teenager, and there’d be a million questions to ask of its inhabitants. She just rolls with it. The action is all zooming back and forth across the woodland on a quest that must be completed by the end of the day, involving a mega powerful flower pod. (I hear you dear reader, my thoughts exactly.) There are skirmishes in a minor key, which are mildly diverting, but will enthral young children I’m sure. For the rest, you know you’re in trouble when a key mechanic of the narrative is an animated iPod Touch.
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