Review: MINIONS

MINIONS  (ANIMATION/COMEDY)

1.5 out of 4 stars 
Directed by Kyle Balda & Pierre Coffin
Featuring the Voices of: Sandra Bullock, Jon Hamm, Pierre Coffin, Michael Keaton, Allison Janney, Steve Coogan, Jennifer Saunders, Geoffrey Rush, Steve Carrell, Katy Mixon, Michael Beattie
Rated PG for action and rude humor.
91 minutes
Verdict: A frantic and dull exercise in strictly brand-based filmmaking that will no doubt amuse small children while parents are forced to grit their teeth.
YOU MAY ENJOY MINIONS IF YOU LIKED:
DESPICABLE ME 2  (2013)
DESPICABLE ME  (2010)
PENGUINS OF MADAGASCAR  (2014)
HOME  (2015)
THE SPONGEBOB MOVIE: SPONGE OUT OF WATER  (2015)

The little, yellow, pill-shaped imps called "Minions", which became the mascots of animation studio Illumination Entertainment and their hugely successful flagship franchise of Despicable Me movies, are absurdly popular, so it was only a matter of time before they got their own solo movie.  The level of cultural saturation the Minions have reached defies reason.  Remember when people posted inane, would-be clever/insightful statements on top of a nature background to social networking sites?  The backgrounds didn't make sense then, and the Minions that now accompany these statements don't make sense now.  You can't walk into a grocery store without seeing these characters on a couple of items, at the very least.  They're on Twinkies, bananas, Swiffer mops, breakfast cereal, McDonald's Happy Meals, board games, Amazon shipping boxes, Tic Tacs, apple sauce and paper towels, and that's hardly the sum of it; this brand is a marketing juggernaut.  Unfortunately, that may be the extent of the Minions' potential, because MINIONS, the movie, is nothing more than dull centerpiece to a massive marketing machine.
With narration by Geoffrey Rush, the shoestring plot takes us back to the very origins of Minions as single-celled organisms in the primordial soup before evolving into the gibberish-speaking, goggle-wearing, yellow creatures, and all throughout the millennia, they've wanted nothing more than to find the best villain to serve, consistently with dismal results.  By 1968, the Minions have made their home in the Arctic and sunken into depression due to their lacking of a sense of purpose, but Kevin, a relatively smart Minion, decides to venture out into the world and find a villainous master for their kind, accompanied by fellow Minions Bob and Stuart.  Arriving at Villain-Con, the villains convention, the Minions land jobs as henchmen for the hottest new baddie on the scene, Scarlet Overkill (voiced by Sandra Bullock), who wants them to steal Queen Elizabeth's (voiced by Jennifer Saunders) crown for her, and when things go awry, Scarlet tries to destroy them.

The plot is extremely thin, meandering through a series of loosely connected episodes in which the comedy relies very heavily on the title characters' signature gibberish, provided by co-director Pierre Coffin and comprised of a little English, a little French, a little Spanish, a little Italian and a fair bit of nonsensical babble.  Even with a running time of only 91 minutes, there simply is not enough here to sustain a feature film.  The Minions of the Despicable Me films were more like props than characters, used as fodder for slapstick gags, and they do not evolve from that role even as they're made the central focus of the film.  I'd say it's like having the Ark of the Covenant chasing down Indiana Jones, but that actually sounds pretty cool still, and MINIONS is more of a drudge.
Despite her best efforts, Bullock's casual vocals feel wrong in this kind of Looney Toons animation where she sticks out like a sore thumb amongst all the funny voices and even her own character's exaggerated rendering.  On the other hand, as Scarlett's groovy inventor husband Herb, Jon Hamm is the highlight of the film, and mind you, the highlight is Jon Hamm's vocal performance, not Illumination Entertainment's frustratingly static character types.  Of course, the practically non-stop Minion gibberish will drive most parents mad over the course an hour-and-a-half, not to mention the days of imitation by their children.
It's a movie most younger children will enjoy, however, for its bright colors and overall silliness, but even for those who enjoyed the Despicable Me films, it's hard to see what the average discerning adult will find to appreciate beyond the entertainment value for their little ones.  The humor is too broad (lots of 1960s pop culture references like hippies, The Dating Game and Richard Nixon) and even when a premise has potential, the execution never lives up to it.  Most of the genuinely funny stuff has already appeared in the trailers, and the best joke from the trailers doesn't even appear in the finished film.  It's a dull frenzy that fails to justify itself beyond what it truly is: a brazen advertisement for an already absurdly popular brand.