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★½☆☆☆
24 November 2016
A movie review of SING. |
“Wonder and magic don’t come easy,” Buster Moon (Matthew McConaughey)
2016 has been a year of mediocre mainstream animations being continuously churned out. (The independent and arthouse scenes have been the saviours.) SING is a sentimental, vacuous, glorified karaoke animated movie. Why are so-called TV talent contests being celebrated? Are they not more about fame than art? One would understand if the searches were also about song writing – see the work of John Carney (ONCE, BEGIN AGAIN, SING STREET). Like BURNT from last year, SING already feels dated.
2016 has been a year of mediocre mainstream animations being continuously churned out. (The independent and arthouse scenes have been the saviours.) SING is a sentimental, vacuous, glorified karaoke animated movie. Why are so-called TV talent contests being celebrated? Are they not more about fame than art? One would understand if the searches were also about song writing – see the work of John Carney (ONCE, BEGIN AGAIN, SING STREET). Like BURNT from last year, SING already feels dated.
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Matthew McConaughey has already helped to deliver one of the top cartoons of the year, KUBO AND THE TWO STRINGS. This pales. Scarlett Johansson also has a far more memorable vocal performance in the surprisingly ace THE JUNGLE BOOK. Talking of Disney, ZOOTROPOLIS/ZOOTOPIA is maybe now the benchmark for a thoughtfully realised animal world.
Buster Moon was wowed as a 6-year-old koala bear by opera singer Nana Noodleman (Jennifer Saunders), and began a lifetime love affair with the theatre; so much so, his working class father saved up so that his son would have his own playhouse (we don’t see this for some reason – that kind of sacrifice is not explored). As an adult, Buster now has money problems; his venue is in jeopardy after a series of flops (we don’t get to witness these, to gather whether they in the ilk of hugely ambitious artistic projects ahead of their time (e.g. HEAVEN’S GATE), or merely vanity projects, or plays of little merit).
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It is hard to be interested in Buster, because his personality is cursory. In addition, why should the audience care about this building? Little effort has gone into encouraging our investment. SING is hardly *BATTERIES NOT INCLUDED or UP.
The movie zooms around the city for us to glimpse at the upcoming secondary characters, each given a single melodramatic issue to overcome. A commonality of sadness is neglect, whether it is a son, wife or girlfriend – all three resolutions will not surprise. A high percentage of the runtime is so predictable. We will meet them all again after Buster’s scheme to save the theatre goes wrong.
The impresario decides that a singing contest will be the answer to his financial woes. His elderly, doddery secretary Miss Crawly (voiced by director Garth Jennings – what a shame this movie is not as inventive as some of his superb music videos) accidentally changes the $1000 prize money to $100k, and the city is suddenly abuzz. Rather than cancelling, Buster goes ahead. It is not clear how a one-off, single night show will raise the prize money and also put Buster into the black. Perhaps kids won’t care about the minutia, but one likes to think they will.
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The jokes are not even the saviour. The comical aspect is gratingly broad, of the face-slappingly obvious variety – oh look, a snail singing ‘Ride Like the Wind’ or Frogs belting out ‘Jump’, at the audition. Ever since Heimlich in A BUG’S LIFE, there is the so-called comedy character just because he has a German accent; see also Klaus in THE LIFE AQUATIC WITH STEVE ZISSOU or Johann in HELLBOY 2. Here, Gunter is voiced by Nick Kroll, who actually has delivered the best baddie of 2016 (so far), as the hilarious Douche in SAUSAGE PARTY (a movie that would have sat better if the humour hadn’t derived too often from being of a different nationality). SING did have a funny sequence – Buster and best bud sheep Eddie (John C. Reilly) working at a car wash as ‘Neesun Dorma’ plays – a shame the rest of the film couldn’t similarly be as inventive.
Saccharine subplots abound, for instance: After being built up the entire movie, will Meena (Tori Kelly) the shy elephant finally get her chance to shine?
If you watch one musical this year, about trying to make it in the entertainment industries, let it be LA LA LAND.
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