“Migration,” a new animated film from Illumination Studios, starring the voices of Elizabeth Banks, Awkwafina and Kumail Nanjiani, and now playing in theatres, is a story about broadening horizons, set against the wild blue yonder.
The story focusses on the Mallards, a family of ducks who lead a quiet, happy life on New England’s bucolic Moosehead Pond. Mack (Kumail Nanjiani) is the protective father who keeps his kids, son Dax (Caspar Jennings) and daughter Gwen (Tresi Gazal), in line by telling them terrible stories of the perils of predators in the world outside their watery home.
When another flock uses the pond as a pit stop in their migration south, it sparks the imaginations of Dax, Gwen and mother Pam (Elizabeth Banks). Mack is not as inspired. He says he’ll only leave the pond if he can find a safer place for his family to live, but the rest of the family wonder what exciting things happening beyond their little corner of the world.
“I don’t want to miss out on life because you’re afraid to leave this pond,” Pam says, scolding Mack.
Mom and the kids are keen to hit the sky, see the world, and migrate to tropical Jamaica for the winter. Mack is reluctant, but is convinced to take flight with Pam, the kids and his curmudgeonly Uncle Dan (Danny DeVito) in tow.
“There’s a whole world we’ve been missing out on,” Pam says. “Things we didn’t even know existed.”
At a stop in New York City they liberate homesick Jamaican parrot Delroy (Keegan-Michael Key) from his prison inside a Manhattan restaurant, run by a Chef (Jason Marin) who specializes in Duck a l’orange.
“What’s Duck a l’orange?” asks Gwen.
“It’s you,” says Chump (Awkwafina), the hardnosed leader of an NYC gang of pigeons, “with l’orange on top.”
As they to stay off the Chef’s menu, the Mallard’s migration morphs from vacation, to journey of discovery as they are exposed to the great big world.
“We’re going to finish this crazy, wonderful adventure,” says Mack.
“Migration” is a fun, but slight, movie for the whole family with good messages about personal growth and overcoming fears. The lessons are simple, presented in a likable, fast-paced fashion, that don’t try too hard to moralize or teach. It’s a lighthearted adventure with none of the darkness implied by the presence of co-writer Mike White of “White Lotus” fame.
From the mild horror of an encounter with an elderly heron (Carol Kane) who may, or may not, have a taste for mallard chicks to the chaotic landing in NYC, the epitome of all of Mack’s fears, each of the big set pieces offer up a new high-flying adventure. It’s episodic, which offers up the chance for the Mallards to interact with new characters at every stop, providing variation in the story, and new opportunities in each chapter for situational humour.
“Migration” doesn’t have the same anarchic brashness as Illumination’s “Despicable Me” films. If you’re hungry for more Minions madness, be sure to arrive on time to see “Mooned,” a stand-alone short from the Minion Universe that opens the show. It rounds out “Migration’s” brief run time (under an hour-and-a-half) and contains a healthy dose of Minion magic.
Slight, but funny and fast-paced, “Migration” is an enjoyable, escapist movie with lively voice work—kids will love baby duck Gwen—and an adventurous spirit.
By the mid-1990s Beanie Babies, the heart-tagged, soft plush toys with names like Princess Bear and Bubbles the Fish, were not only collected for the fun of it, but also as a financial investment. The world’s first Internet sensation, the rarest of the $5 stuffies could fetch upwards of $500,000 in the collector’s market.
Before the Beanie consumer craze bubble burst, a lot of people got rich, including creator H. Ty Warner, the subject of “The Beanie Bubble,” a new true crime movie starring Zach Galifianakis and Elizabeth Banks, now on Apple TV+ and in select theatres across Canada.
Loosely based on real events and adapted from Zac Bissonnette’s book “The Great Beanie Baby Bubble,” the film zips back-and-forth between the 1980s and 1990s to tell the story of the three unsung heroes largely responsible for the success of the Beanie Babies.
The story of greed, betrayal and power begins with Warner (Galifianakis), a college dropout looking for the next big thing. He found it with the Beanies, plush toys with cute names, under-stuffed for maximum “pose-ability.” “Genius,” he says with more than a hint of self-congratulation ion his voice, “is 1% inspiration and 99% presentation.”
The cute toys are not, however, an immediate hit. Enter the real focus of the story, executive Robbie (Banks), Ty’s love interest Sheila (“Succession” star Sarah Snook) and innovative tech genius Maya (Geraldine Viswanathan). Here the film splinters, telling the tale of how these three women in three timelines, helped fuel the thermonuclear success of the Beanie Babies.
In each case Warner lured these talented women into his orbit, only to deny them the profits and power their work generated. “Ty will tell you he did it all,” Robbie says. “Which is as crazy as believing stuffed animals are gold.”
Structurally, this breezy look at the inequity women sometimes experience as part of the American Dream, is occasionally confusing as the broken timeline jumps from decade-to-decade, seemingly randomly. But the intercutting between storylines does effectively emphasize Warner’s ongoing abuse, and paints a vivid portrait of how his narcissism shaped not only his life and career, but the lives and careers of those around him.
Galifianakis steps away from his trademarked broad, awkward comedy to play Warner with a certain amount of pathos. That innate sadness, usually masked by a loud bravado, brings some humanity to the character, and prevents him from feeling like an un-filmed subplot from “Horrible Bosses.”
He is the catalyst for the action, but the real story here is one of resilience. The three female characters are discriminated against and struggle for credit and recognition, but each draw on a deep well of determination to create the lives they want. It’s a success story, but not just of the Beanie Babies. The real success here are Robbie, Sheila and Maya who discover their agency.
“The Beanie Bubble” isn’t a business story. The phenomenal success of the stuffed animals is the engine that keeps the story moving forward, but this is really a character-driven tale about people who find a way to balance the inequity in their lives.
My review of “Cocaine Bear” is quoted in this article from Screen Rant.
“Before buying a ticket to “Cocaine Bear” ask yourself this question: Am I likely to enjoy a movie called “Cocaine Bear”? I can tell you authoritatively that it is the best stoned bear movie of the year. Admittedly, it is a small field, but if that turns your crank, by all means check it out…” Read the whole thing HERE!
“Cocaine Bear,” a grisly new hybrid of “Scarface” and “Yogi Bear” starring Keri Russell, O’Shea Jackson Jr. and Ray Liotta in his last filmed performance, and now playing in theatres, delivers on the promise of its premise. Like “Snakes on a Plane,” another movie whose entire plot was contained in the title, “Cocaine Bear” lives up to its name. There’s a bear and he is tweaked on the devil dust, but is that enough to get people in theatres, or will audiences just say no?
The movie plays fast-and-loose with the true 1985 story of a 79-kilogram American black bear who, while wandering the Georgia wilderness, stumbled across and ate a discarded duffle bag of cocaine. Later nicknamed Pablo Escobear, in real life the poor unfortunate beast overdosed immediately and spent its afterlife stuffed and on display at a local mall.
Director Elizabeth Banks uses the real-life set up as a kick off for her story. In her retelling, drug smuggler Andrew C. Thornton II (Matthew Rhys), in a bid to avoid police, dumps 40 kilos of cocaine in the forests of Georgia. When the bear finds it and ingests it, instead of keeling over he becomes a character out of a Bret Easton Ellis novel, setting off on a bloody, coke fueled rampage through the forest in search of more drugs.
Along the way the Cocaine Bear (one character actually calls him that) gets her paws on a variety of folks, including a concerned mom (Keri Russell), a mob boss (Ray Liotta) and his henchmen (Alden Ehrenreich and Jackson Jr.) and a park ranger (Margo Martindale).
Before buying a ticket to “Cocaine Bear” ask yourself this question: Am I likely to enjoy a movie called “Cocaine Bear”? I can tell you authoritatively that it is the best stoned bear movie of the year. Admittedly, it is a small field, but if that turns your crank, by all means check it out.
If you need convincing, then “Cocaine Bear” may not be for you. On the fence? Read on.
The one-joke premise aside, the movie is a throwback to the slasher films of the 1980s. The gruesome stuff is outlandish, bloody and the kind of thing that you know you shouldn’t be laughing at, but here you are, laughing out loud at the misfortune of others.
Unfortunately, although there is a good vibe between Ehrenreich and Jackson Jr, most other characterization is kept to a bare minimum—many of the characters are essentially sentient slabs of bear food—and the dialogue isn’t nearly as camp or funny as it should be. It feels choppy—there is a good pun to be made here about chopping up lines of cocaine, but I’m too lazy to make it—and the gaps between the action sequences stretch on a bit too long.
However, “Cocaine Bear” has quite a few solid laughs. That makes up for the lack of satire or deeper meaning. This isn’t about anything other than truth in advertising. It’s about a bear and a bunch of cocaine and is only about 90 minutes long. If that appeals, make like the bear and snort it up.
My desire to see 2014’s “The Lego Movie” was on par with my wish to step on a Lego brick in my bare feet. How could a movie starring plastic, singing mini figs possibly appeal to anyone who graduated Saturday morning cartoons decades ago? But I’m a professional so I put my bias of toy story movies aside and went to the screening.
Later, as I left the theatre humming “Everything is Awesome” I was own over. Directors and co-writers Phil Lord and Christopher Miller had pulled off something great, they made a movie with wide appeal using the Legos as a muse to do what the bricks have always done, light imaginations on fire.
Question is, five years later will everything be awesome in the sequel “The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part”?
The last movie ended with the revelation that the movie’s Lego Land frenetic action had actually taken place in 8-year-old Finn’s (Jadon Sand) imagination. The new one focuses on Finn’s sister Bianca (“The Florida Project’s” Brooklyn Prince) disrupting her brother’s carefully built world of fancy with her Duplo-Block creations.
In the make-believe world Duplo aliens, led by shape-shifting villain Queen Watevra Wa-Nabi (Tiffany Haddish) declare war on Bricksburg. Fast-forward five years. Optimistic construction worker Emmet (Chris Pratt) and Master Builder Lucy’s (Elizabeth Banks) home is now a smoking ruin called Apocalypseburg where if you show any weakness you will be destroyed. Dave is now called Chainsaw Dave and Sewer Babies live under the streets.
When Lucy, Batman (Will Arnett), Unikitty (Alison Brie), Benny (Charlie Day) and MetalBeard (Nick Offerman) are kidnapped and transported to the Systar System by General Mayhem (Stephanie Beatriz) Emmet and intergalactic archaeologist / Snake Plissken look-a-like Rex Dangervest (Pratt again) set off to rescue them. “Don’t worry Lucy,” says Emmett, “everything will still be awesome.”
“The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part” is a pure pop art blast as though designed by kids. A mix of non-sequiturs, silly jokes, attention deficit editing, CPDs (Convenient Plot Devices) and music it zips along but isn’t as awesome as the original. The first film was a powerhouse of imagination and adventure. “The Second Part” has its moments—like the “Catchy Song” sequence—but feels like a dim bulb that doesn’t burn as brightly as it once did.
Like the first film the mayhem of Lego Land is tempered with real life lessons. In this case it takes an existential turn in the last third, expanding the mini fig story to shine a light on the fraught relationship between Finn and Bianca and their struggle to find a way to play together. When they learn to be kind and tolerant of one another their lives improve, as do those of their plastic figures.
“The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part’s” convoluted third reel paints the screen with too much frenetic CGI action but maintains the lesson of the first film, that NOT putting away childish things, like Lego blocks, is the key to making everything awesome, no matter what age. That the message doesn’t feel like a commercial for the brightly coloured blocks is a pleasant plus even if the movie feels like diminished returns.
Make no mistake, “The Happytime Murders” is not a Muppet movie. Sure, the puppets look like they just wandered in from “Sesame Street,” but the latest Melissa McCarthy film takes place a few blocks away in a much worse part of town.
Set in a Los Angeles where humans and puppets co-exist—imagine “Who Framed Roger Rabbit’s” Toontown with hand puppets—“The Happytime Murders” is an R-rated comedy that sees the felt cast members of ’80s children’s TV show “The Happytime Gang” systematically murdered by a mysterious killer.
Next on the hit list is Jenny (Elizabeth Banks), a burlesque dancer who was the “The Happytime Gang’s” sole human cast member. She’s also the ex-girlfriend of Phil Philips (Bill Barretta), the first puppet to join the LAPD. After a scandal pushed him off the force he became a private investigator but when his older brother and “The Happytime Gang” actor, Larry (Victor Yerrid), is offed, and with Jenny in danger, he teams up with his former partner Detective Connie Edwards (Melissa McCarthy) to find the puppet serial killer. “If it gets crazy,” he says, “I’m going to get crazy.”
Repeat after me, “The Happytime Murders” is not a movie for kids. With the first F- bomb less than thirty seconds in, the tone is set early. By the time we get to the puppet porn shoot and McCarthy snorting ecstasy with down-on their-luck puppets it’s abundantly clear this isn’t your father’s Muppet movie. Trouble is, I’m not sure who it is for. The idea of a raunchy puppet flick isn’t new, “Meet the Feebles,” “Team America” and others have put the ‘R’ in marionette with great success but they did it with wit as well as in-your-face vulgarity. In “The Happytime Murders,” easily the least funny comedy to hit screens this year, the laugh lines mostly get laughs because we’re not used to seeing puppets in… er… ahhh… compromising positions. Watching McCarthy and Maya Rudolph, who plays Phil’s love struck secretary Bubbles, flounder in a sea of felt and unfunny “gags,” is almost as sad as seeing the vaunted Henson name in the opening credits.
You know when someone constantly swears just for the sake of swearing? That’s shock value. “The Happytime Murders” is all shock, very little value.
What do Point Break, Independence Day and Beauty and the Beast have in common? All are movies released in the 1990s and all have been remade, re-imagined or rebooted in recent years.
Brand happy Hollywood is in overdrive repurposing Saturday morning superhero cartoons, big screen hits and other touchstones of 90s pop culture and audiences have mostly lapped up the nostalgia from the Clinton years. Independence Day: Resurgence and Point Break tanked but Beauty and the Beast, to use a 90s term, was all that and a bag of chips box office wise.
Soon we’ll see a live action Lion King, a new Jumanji and even more Bad Boys. This weekend it’s morphin time once again as the Power Rangers are resurrected for the big screen.
Featuring familiar characters but an all new cast, Power Rangers sees the helmeted heroes rescue the world from a powerful witch, an army of stone golems called Putties and Goldar, a giant golden monster born on Titan, one of Saturn’s moons.
It’s a blast from the past designed to draw in new fans while appealing to grown ups who came of age in the 1990s but is it possible to feel nostalgia for four actors in plastic helmets?
The dictionary tells us nostalgia is “a sentimental longing or wistful affection for the past, typically for a period or place with happy personal associations.”
Science tells us more.
As a recent study showed when we get bad news or are feeling down nostalgic, misty memories of a simpler time almost automatically kick in. Call it protection. Call it wistfulness. Call it whatever you like; Hollywood calls it money and exploits it ruthlessly because movies are a natural nostalgic go to. It’s their very essence, that dreamlike quality that takes root in our subconscious, swirling around our brains to create happy memories. They are the stuff from which dreams are woven and the feelings associated with them can give us comfort when the going gets rough.
We now live in unsettled times so perhaps the neo Power Rangers will bring back recollections of carefree Saturday mornings spent watching the TV show. Or mom and dad buying candy at a Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: The Movie matinee in 1995. Or a long ago Halloween costume inspired by Amy Jo Johnson (the popular Pink Ranger) but at the rate Hollywood is recycling ideas we’ll soon run out of things to get nostalgic about. Can you be nostalgic for nostalgia? We’ll find out in the years to come when another generation gets sentimental about the remake of the reboot of Power Rangers.
As I see it nostalgia is bad for the movies. It encourages lazy re-treads and reimaginings, not innovation and originality. If we demand new films to make memories with, to fall in love with, then Hollywood’s raiding of pop culture brands must stop. Romanian-American poet and novelist Andrei Codrescu says that in the grand collage that is art the “past and future are equally usable.” I’m just wishing Hollywood would look to the future more often.
To a degree all art is a combination of everything that came before, but interesting, original films like Moonlight, Manchester by the Sea and Get Out give me hope that some filmmakers have their eyes facing forward and aren’t simply wallowing in nostalgia.
What do you expect from a movie called “Power Rangers”? Multi-coloured, helmeted heroes, that’s what. Instead we’re treated to an hour-and-a-half of troubled teens before it finally becomes morphin time.
The new brood of Power Rangers are the most diverse group yet. After meeting at a Saturday afternoon detention filled with “Misfits, weirdos and criminals”—sort of like “The Breakfast Club” for aspiring superheroes—former football star Jason (Dacre Montgomery), Kimberly (Naomi Scott), Billy (RJ Cyler), Zack (Ludi Lin) and Trini (Becky G.)—are turned into mystical earth-saving warriors after discovering ancient glowing coins at a mining site.
Trained by wise cracking robot Alpha 5 (Bill Hader) and ancient great big head Zordon (Bryan Cranston), the Rangers learn to battle armies of stone golems called Putties and perform some tricky martial arts, but will they be able to come together as a group and learn the most important Power Ranger trick, the mighty morph from teens to besuited heroes? If not the five Morph-a-teers and the world will fall prey to 65-million-year-old former Green Ranger Rita Repulsa (Elizabeth Banks) and her giant golden monster sidekick’s plan to spread fear and destruction.
There will be a certain portion of the audience made misty by mentions of the Zeo Crystal, Goldar and Megazord but those not so inclined may find the origin story rough going. “Go Go Away Power Rangers!” From an alien life form called Rita to the “milking” of a bull (don’t ask) “Power Rangers” is a strange mix of grounded character work with out and out bonkers story elements. Banks has fun chewing the scenery as Repulsa but the movie never fully embraces its cheeseball roots, so we’re left with a movie that is simultaneously sincere and silly.
When the main cast aren’t training in Zordon’s underground lair they have regular teen problems. In fact “Power Rangers” may be the first superhero movie to feature LGBTQ and autistic heroes. That’s good stuff but good intentions don’t make for good movies.
Painful dialogue—“The door is open,” says Billy. “That’s because it’s open, Billy,” replies Jason.—and a habit of repeating everything just to make sure we get it—i.e.: We see Kimberly cut her hair before a disembodied voice says, “Kimberly did you cut your hair?”—makes this a bit of a slog.
Add to that Krispy Kreme product placement that’s more annoying than the sugar rush that follows chowing down four Glazed Kreme Filled donuts at lunch and an orgy of cut rate special effects and you’re left with a movie that will leave you pining for the relative pleasures of the original 90s television show.
It takes an hour-and-a-half to get to the Power Rangers’ signature look, the red, pink, blue, yellow and black costumes and get to the good stuff—fights with people in rubber suits. The final thirty minutes delivers most of what you expect from “Power Rangers.” It’s a few minutes of good, retro fun that should provide an adrenalin blast of nostalgia but doesn’t make up for the ninety minutes of drudgery that preceded it.
“Pitch Perfect 2” is perfect for two groups, Anna Kendrick fans and people who have already worn out their “Glee” DVDs and need another fix of footstompin’ vocal pop songs. The follow-up to the popular 2012 film is sillier than the original but should keep toes tapping and audience’s laughing.
The acapella bellas of the first movie begin the story as the reigning national champions of unaccompanied singing. They are, as an acapella commentator (John Michael Higgins) says, “An inspiration to girls all over the country too ugly to be cheerleaders.” Their career takes a nosedive as they perform at the Kennedy Centre in celebration of President Obama’s birthday. In an extreme wardrobe malfunction the Australian member, Fat Amy (Rebel Wilson), gives POTUS “a gift from down under” when she accidentally goes commando on stage.
Barred from competing in national singing contests and events—“Whose going to sing at the Puppy Bowl?” they wonder—the group, led by Beca (Kendrick), decide to go international for their final performance before graduation. Signing up for the world championships in Copenhagen they understand they are taking several risks. First, “No American team has ever won because they hate us,” they’re told, “The whole world hates us.” Secondly, they’re up against some stiff competition in the form of the German Das Sound Machine, a Teutonic terror of choir singers who vow to destroy the Bardem Belles.
“Pitch Perfect 2” is about underdogs, female bonding, coming of age and overcoming fear.
What am I saying? It’s actually only about as deep as a lunch tray, with only the barest of story to hold the characters together. The stars (Ester Dean, Shelley Regner, Kelley Jakle, Brittany Snow, Alexis Knapp, Hana Mae Lee, Chrissie Fit and Hailee Steinfeld) sing, dance, do slapstick and tell mildly raunchy jokes. It’s a summer movie that is relatively unconcerned with coherency and more concerned with spending time with likeable actors as they warble their way through the script.
Director Elizabeth Banks (yes, that Elizabeth Banks, who also appears as a sarcastic acapella podcaster) keeps “Pitch Perfect 2” nimble on it’s feet, adding laughs with funny cameos from Snoop Dogg and Keegan-Michael Key and keeping the pace in two-four time. Picking on the movie’s odd construction—the villains, Das Sound Machine, disappear for half-an-hour and a subplot involving a Beca’s career choice is wrapped up a bit too quickly—seems harsh when the film has this much of a feel good vibe.
