THE LEGO MOVIE (ANIMATED/FAMILY-COMEDY)4 out of 4 stars
Directed by Phil Lord & Chris Miller
Featuring the Voices of: Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks, Will Arnett, Will Ferrell, Morgan Freeman, Charlie Day, Alison Brie, Nick Offerman, Channing Tatum, Jonah Hill, Cobie Smulders
Rated PG for mild action and rude humor.
Verdict: A little bit of what you'd expect, but everything you'd never expect, THE LEGO MOVIE is a rich, hilarious and absolutely brilliant family film built onto a terrible idea, and I wholeheartedly recommend it.
YOU MAY ENJOY THE LEGO MOVIE IF YOU LIKED:
CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS (2009)
THE SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS MOVIE (2004)
WRECK-IT RALPH (2012)
THE MUPPETS (2011)
MEGAMIND (2010)
A film based on "Lego Construction Toys" is a downright terrible idea. Honestly, it's one of the worst ideas that anyone ever brought to cinematic fruition. And it is so good I can barely stand it.
Nobody would expect a major Hollywood studio to put out a film like it. It breaks the rules every which way, always does the unexpected and pretends to be dumb fun while slyly being the smartest film in the room. It is, in a word: subversive.
The story takes place in "the Lego Universe", where Emmet (voiced by Chris Pratt from NBC's Parks and Recreation), a perfectly generic Lego mini-figure who lives out his perfectly ordinary life in a Lego city where he works as a construction worker. He never questions the rules, gleefully following "the instructions", happily conforming to the standard. His favorite song is the city's #1 hit song, "Everything is Awesome", his favorite television show is the #1 hit television show, "Where Are My Pants" and his favorite restaurant is "any chain restaurant". When he accidentally discovers the legendary "Piece of Resistance", he suddenly finds himself swept up into a part of his world he never knew existed, THE MATRIX-style. It turns out that his world is all controlled in the tight grip of President Business (voiced by Will Ferrell), the ruler of the Lego Universe who operates a business front that creates all the "music, TV shows, surveillance systems, history books and voting machines, in addition to all dairy products and coffee," all while secretly operating as his true identity, "Lord Business", a cruel tyrant who carries out his devious plans through his literally two-faced henchman, Good Cop/Bad Cop (both identities voiced by Liam Neeson) and robot drones called "Micro-Managers". When Good Cop/Bad Cop tries to have Emmet melted down, he's rescued by Wyldstyle (voiced by Elizabeth Banks), a live-wire freedom-fighter who leads him to Vitruvius (voiced by Morgan Freeman), a blind wizard who believes Emmet is the "Special", the greatest of the Master Builders, and the one who can save the Lego Universe.
Directed by Phil Lord and Chris Miller, the directors behind CLOUDY WITH A CHANCE OF MEATBALLS and 22 JUMP STREET, has an eye-popping visual style in which every detail is made of Lego, from the Warner Brothers opening logo to the scenery, even the explosions, of which there are plenty, which are made up of glowing, hot-colored sprays of the littlest Lego studs. It's also packed with a twisted, grown-up sense of humor and a childlike wit, skewering the mainstream blockbuster trends and all notions of what by all rights should be little more than a 90-minute toy commercial. The themes are deeply layered in manner rare for a family-aimed film, and it wears its ambitions on its sleeve, toying with ideas of philosophy, theology and even some political commentary, occasionally carrying through on such ideas to extremes you wouldn't have thought possible. It's hard to believe that a movie like this made it through the mainstream studio pipeline, because it flies in the face of nearly everything that that system seems to hold holy, and yet, it assuredly provides more than sufficient entertainment for both young and old.
I can't imagine how they'll ever make a sequel to this movie, despite Warner Brothers having already announced its intentions for one, because THE LEGO MOVIE is so smartly constructed outside of all expectations, it simply doesn't allow for any obvious additions. In any case, its unlikely that it will be surpassed by a follow-up. I realize that it's obviously much too early in the running to even suggest it, by I will anyway; we may already have one of the best movies of 2014 right here in THE LEGO MOVIE. And I hardly ever played with Legos growing up.
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