"The Boss Baby: Family Business" is a somewhat painless albeit forgettable sequel to an already average kids film

“The Boss Baby: Family Business” Film Review

37/100 “sour”

By Quinn Marcus

I remember watching The Boss Baby in theaters back in 2017, and thinking to myself ‘this is going to be the worst piece of garbage I’ve ever witnessed.’ Surprisingly, the film wasn’t all too bad, sure, it was surface level (at best) compared to far superior animated films, but I actually found some enjoyment in what I was watching. The animation and voice work was fine, plenty of the jokes landed, and it passed the time, it was just a…decent winces kids film, god that was hard to say. Anyway, they did it guys, Tom McGrath made a second one, and I saw it today, on the couch, because I have nothing else to do in life…god, what am I doing with my time? Let’s get right into it, The Boss Baby: Family Business is objectively the greatest film ever made, it’s what The Godfather Part 2 was to part 1. Humanity will never again come this close to perfect, unequivocal art. I found myself invested, deeply analyzing, and contemplating the film’s profound themes of corporate greed, the hardships of parenthood, and the familial bonds and unrealistic expectations of siblings. That was the most difficult sentence I’ve ever had to write in my life, thankfully, it’s far, and I mean FAR from the truth.

The Boss Baby: Family Business tells the story of the same two brothers, Tim, and the Boss Baby who have both grown up, and have pushed the past behind them. Tim has a family, and the Boss Baby is a successful businessman, anyway, you know the drill, they’re called on another adventure involving babies who are in a crisis, and they get mad at each other occasionally, and there are some doo-doo jokes, that’s about it.

Tom McGrath isn’t what I’d call a bad animated director, sure, he’s no Miyazaki or Pete Docter, but it’s not like he directed The Emoji Movie, he’s made some decent kids films, most notably the Madagascar trilogy, and the very good Megamind. Yes, he also helmed the first Boss Baby film, which wasn’t bad either, unfortunately, this may be his worst. I can’t stress enough how absolutely annoying, half-assed, and stupid this movie was. Its plot is basically the same as the first, our two main characters are literally turned back into the ages that they were in the previous film, just to have the same comedic effect. The only real difference is that babies hate parents now instead of puppies, oh no! Alec Baldwin once again returns, voicing what used to be a pretty hilarious character who has since been reduced to a meaningless 3D creation that, when I think about it, doesn’t have much effect on the plot.

I don’t know what happened during this film, it’s weirdly confusing. Like, if you were to ask me to summarize the story of this film, I wouldn’t be able to form a proper sentence, it’s such a mess, whereas the first film was pure mindless, simplistic fun. It’s also one of the rare animated films where I felt as if the animation quality has downgraded from its predecessor, it didn’t look nearly as creative or colorful as the first. There’s a sequence in this film where two main character’s sing a Cat Stevens song (geez, what is this movie), and they dance on singing musical notes or something, and I couldn’t help but be stylistically reminded of those 2D, crap, 10-minute kids music videos on YouTube, that’s what we’re dealing with, people! For children, I guess its animation will be serviceable, there are a few fun action scenes here and there, and I didn’t find myself cringing all too much, but with some of the gorgeous animation I’ve seen in my life, this is certainly at the bottom of the barrel.

James Marsden seemingly took Tobey Maguire’s place to play the older version of Timothy, and he’s okay, the film does have some entertainment value when it came to his character’s situation of having an older voice in a child’s body, and Alec Baldwin’s decent, the voice work isn’t terrible. The first third of the film was interesting, and for a second there, I was like, damn, they may be going for some substance here, but the moment the new baby begins to talk, I was exhausted. The first film’s ending actually had stuff for children to take away from, and it was emotionally quite fulfilling, but this one seemed like it was meant for children to laugh at potty humor, and have a pointless, inane time, which is exactly what I feared it to be. Don’t get me wrong, my expectations were like the lowest of the low for this film, and perhaps some kids will like it, and parents will have 100mins to take a nap, but that’s not my kind of animated film, I’m sorry. Ah, yes, Jeff Goldblum’s also in this film, for…money reasons probably, and his role is abominably written as well. In term’s of what this film had to say, and what its message was, it’s pretty standard stuff that’ll likely be understood by kids, but it’s nothing we haven’t seen before, and I highly doubt kids will be affected by it in any way, shape, or form. In the end, The Boss Baby: Family Business was an absolutely unnecessary sequel that turned out to be a lazily written, sort of amusing diversion strictly for kids that can barely justify its own existence.

"Luca" is a disappointingly average new addition to Pixar's esteemed filmography

“Luca” Film Review

57/100 “sour”

By Quinn Marcus

Pixar may be one of the most universally loved animated studios on the planet, consistently opening our eyes to new, wonderful worlds for our imagination to grasp, and successfully upping the standard for every other kid’s film out there. Sure, they’ve had a few hiccups (The Good Dinosaur, Cars 2, etc.) but I haven’t disliked a new Pixar film in years, Luca may have changed that. Now, I didn’t necessarily hate this film, but from what I’ve come to expect with each upcoming Pixar film, it definitely doesn’t rank amongst the greats. To put it simply, if you walk into this film anticipating Pixar’s next masterpiece, you’ll hate it a whole lot more than I did. My dad loves to use the word “cute” to describe many of the films I’ve shown him, so, as you can probably imagine, hearing that word pisses me off, but I have absolutely zero hesitation applying that word to this simple, very average animated flick.

Luca tells the story of a young boy/sea monster named Luca in a coming-of-age adventure in which Luca and his best friend Alberto decide to leave the safety of their home in the ocean to accomplish their dream of owning a Vespa and traveling the world. That’s literally what the entire plot revolves around, a frickin’ Vespa, give me a break.

Alright, time to get down to business (no, not in the Mulan way), in order to grade Luca properly, we must first discuss what makes the majority of Pixar’s films so great, why are they acclaimed as much as they are? Well, for starters, the animation always seems to improve with every film they release. Toy Story 4 marked a massive step forward for the studio’s already praised animated team, and you could confuse Soul for the real world if the character’s heads weren’t shaped like pieces of fruit. Luca doesn’t have the best animation of the bunch, but I am happy to say that once again, the animated team outdid themselves, the water, characters, buildings, everything was gorgeous. There were quite a few very impressive shots, and even my parents, who barely enjoyed the movie, couldn’t help but commemorate how beautiful it looked.

The second most important thing is the classic emotional gut-punch we get from Pixar’s films. Up is a fantastic example, featuring one of the most heart-wrenching openings in movie history, and proving that you can set the tone for a film with one of the opening scenes, rather than the ending. Luca lacks the emotional connection I have with most of Pixar’s films, several of which made me cry, we don’t get to know much about any of our main characters, their development is the equivalent to a piece of cardboard. There are rare moments when the film finally begins to settle down to talk about who our characters are, which may be one of the film's weakest aspects. Hell, even Onward made me more emotional than this, probably because the story’s a little more complex than a blank sheet of paper.

This brings me to the third most important part of a Pixar film, its expertly crafted world. Both Incredibles movies, Brave, and several other Pixar films all have excellently built, fantastical stories that are creative, and hold intriguing characters. Luca also lacks this to a certain extent, and even left open multiple plot holes that are easily identifiable, and annoyed me quite a bit. For example, it’s never explained why the sea monsters turn into humans when they go on land, Disney’s The Little Mermaid did this flawlessly, and I don’t consider that to be a perfect film. I won’t get into more to avoid spoilers, but even my little siblings were able to point out several questionable aspects of the film’s plot. Usually, if a Pixar film isn’t a full-on drama, with little bits of comedy interwoven here and there, it’s a hilarious film.

Luca actually has a lot of quality laughs, the first half of the film is hysterical, and surprisingly very entertaining. Unfortunately, the rest of the film is actually pretty boring and has one of the stupidest pieces of conflict out of all of Pixar’s films. The villain is horribly generic, and can easily be made fun of, I’ve seen characters like this a million times before, it was clear that the writers were playing it safe on that end. I will say, as one more positive, that the voice work, as always, was terrific, Jacob Tremblay and Jack Dylan Grazer were funny and had solid chemistry, but were nothing too remarkable. If I were to compare Luca to one of Pixar’s films, I’d say something like Monsters University is a fairly good match. Both are enjoyable, if not very smart, each has dazzling animation in an otherwise less-than-complex storyline. In the end, I can see why a lot of kids would end up at the very least, having fun with this film, but I can spot a special animated feature when I see one, and Luca isn’t one of those.

The Mitchells Vs. The Machines is a visually stunning, hilarious, and often impressive animated film for the entire family to enjoy

“The Mitchells Vs. The Machines” Film Review

74/100 “sweet/sour”

By Quinn Marcus

That “loaf of bread” joke may just go down as the most iconic piece of dialogue in animated history, it got me every time. The Mitchells Vs. The Machines comes to us from directors Michael Rianda, and Jeff Rowe, both of which are relatively new filmmakers who haven’t done much in the past. It tells the story of, you guessed it, the Mitchell family, a dysfunctional, device-addicted band of misfits who may just be humanity’s last hope after an army of robots goes rogue during a ceremony at a tech company known as Pal Labs, and attempts to capture every human under the rule of a phone. Before Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, Sony Animation wasn’t all too…well, impressive. Sure, they’d produced a few average animated flicks such as The Pirates, Surf’s Up, and the dreaded Smurfs movies, but hadn’t given me a reason to love their developing studio yet. However, in 2018, I got just that, and in 2021, have they repeated the high bar they set for themselves with a multiverse of Spidermen and women? Yes!..and no.

You see, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse set a new precedent for animated films from all studios, it was truly…revolutionary. From its state-of-the-art animation to a superb voice cast, the world of animation just got a whole lot more interesting. With the announcement of their latest animated project (originally titled Connected), of course, I got excited, the same fantastic team of animators for Into the Spider-Verse coming back for a futuristic, family road-trip commentary on devices, what more could humanity need? Did The Mitchells Vs. The Machines live up to the hype? Well, it’s complicated. Now, before you automatically assume I hated the film, I’m just going to get it out of the way and tell you that I simply…enjoyed it. No, it’s not another Spider-Verse, and it’s certainly not the most intelligent animated film, but it’s a ton of hysterical, ambitious fun.

Let’s start with the things I absolutely loved. First off, the animation is absolutely gorgeous, Sony has once again hit it out of the ballpark with a sleek, entertaining, and very inventive animated style that I’m sure will please children and adults of all ages. If you’ve seen Spider-Verse, the animation in this (although not as amazing) will blow your mind almost as much. The first half of the movie I’d go as far as to call “great,” it was so emotionally engaging, and I immediately fell in love with each of these characters, not only that, but it was legitimately funny, I haven’t laughed this much during an animated film in a while, and that part of the film shocked me. In fact, I’d say 90% of the jokes landed, there was rarely a moment of unintentionally awkward dialogue, most of it really worked for me. The voice cast features the talents of Danni McBride (The Disaster Artist), Maya Rudolph (Bridesmaids), and even Olivia Colman (The Favorite) Now, if you have no idea who I’m talking about, I’m just gonna say that this is what I’d call a pretty stacked cast, every single performance was perfect, I have no faults whatsoever with the voice work.

Okay, now that we’ve finished praising the film’s undeniable qualities, what are some things that I didn’t like? The message was…serviceable at best, if you wanna compare the message in this to something like a Pixar movie, or even Into the Spider-Verse, it’s not a competition. Sure, it has some decent things to say about the seduction of the technological world, and how it’s affecting us today, but unless you’re like seven years old, the message won’t feel all too surprising. The second half of the film got pretty generic for me in terms of plot, the characters were all still entertaining, and as I mentioned before, the jokes were terrific, but there wasn’t much substance left. I felt as if the writers had resorted to the big, bombastic battle trope, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing, I just didn’t care enough anymore to stay invested.

Everything went out in this huge explosion, to the point of feeling like an illogical cartoon that got too crazy for me to keep up with. Luckily, all is saved with emotionally stimulating moments when the film takes a second to pause, and while sort of out of place, helped me comprehend what was happening. Overall, while at times the film’s plot can be a tad similar to things we’ve seen before (robots taking over the world again because they’ve been given cue dramatic music “NEW ORDERS”), it’s too much of a family-friendly blast to criticize much further than that. I can call out certain parts of the film as much as I want, but I can’t deny how heartwarming, exhilarating, and occasionally genius The Mitchells Vs. The Machines really is.

Raya and the Last Dragon: The Most Typical of Animated Films

Raya and the last dragon film review

60/100 “sweet/sour”

By: Keaton Marcus

Why couldn’t you just stick with Soul, Disney? Did you really have to give us another, far inferior animated movie to watch for 30 dollars on your service? Couldn’t it at least have been free? Why is it that the weaker movies you guys have released this year cost the most? There are so many questions to ask when discussing Raya and the Last Dragon, an adorable if painfully mediocre kids flick with all of the regular hallmarks present. Mystical lands, wondrous creatures, a strong, resourceful female lead, and some half-assed, filler emotional moments in place of what could have been more. The more I ponder the film the less I appreciate it, despite a whole lot of things it does right. It’s a mixed bag, truly, and it’ll definitely do the trick with the kiddies, but anyone older should likely steer clear unless watching for a family movie night. Honestly, the movie is acceptable for what it’s aspiring to be, a run-of-the-mill, surface-level animated film with hit-or-miss jokes, but looking at it from a perspective of disappointment, it really is a let-down.

Long ago, in the fantasy world of Kumandra, humans and dragons lived together in harmony. However, when sinister monsters known as the Druun threatened the land, the dragons sacrificed themselves to save humanity. Now, 500 years later, those same monsters have returned, and it's up to a lone warrior to track down the last dragon and stop the Druun for good.

Obviously director Carlos Lopez Estrada plopped in a nice, cute message of unification between nations to remind kids that sharing is caring. What would it be without that little heartwearming theme that never attempted to be deeper, to reach the heights of Pixar’s films. Not to say that it failed at it either, because it certainly didn’t. There aren’t exactly moments of excellence in this film, but there are really good ones. Unfortunately, they take place at the typical, happy conclusion that lies in practically every animated movie these days. Critics, of course, are hyping this film up to be another masterpiece, but why? Because of its colorful aesthetic (we’ve seen better in a lot of Disney animation additions), or how it aligns with the politics of this year? I really can’t put my finger on it, much less have a surefire answer as to the reason so many people think this is a fantastic movie. The visual style is pretty at times, but at others it feels rather cartoonish and artificial, more like a DreamWorks project. The fight scenes are generally exciting and the action overall isn’t boring in any variation of the word, but a lot of it sadly is. This felt like a chore to get through a lot of the time, and as I mentioned, the frail attempts at humor didn’t exactly help the pacing’s cause. It’s just the same interaction with different characters over and over again until I simply tuned out near the end of the second act. It was one of the only times where I was legitimately dulled by a kids film.

I realize that I’ve been literally trashing a rather decent film from the beginning of this review, so let’s try to keep things positive from now on. Kelly Marie Tran kills it once again as she did with Rose in Star Wars: The Last Jedi. Her exuberant, plucky and strong energy brings such life into the lead role of Raya. It’s never dull or boring to watch her kick ass on-screen, and I’m so disappointed that her performance was surrounded by an otherwise simple, generic film. In fact, the entire voice cast was extremely impressive. Awkwafina’s screen presence is always a joy to witness, and although her character was the stereotypical magical beast with little to no development, her effort at least paid off in multiple situations. I already briefly explained my opinion on the visuals, but admitedly, they were more or less a spectacle in a few fleeting moments. They obviously weren’t poor quality or anything the rest of the time, I was simply a little confused by how middling they seemed. Otherwise, although the pacing issues are there, I did have a lot of fun in the battles, and some of the jokes were actually really good. Some landed, some didn’t. I could also see that my little siblings were enjoying everything on-screen, so I have to give the film credit for keeping children entertained, which is likely the most basic purpose of this genre. It could have been worse, it could have been better. But overall, I’m sort of disappointed by how thematically light and boring it was after witnessing an experience like Inside Out, Coco, or Soul…All masterpieces of the genre.

$TREAM IT

"Raya and the Last Dragon" is a gorgeously animated if formulaic return to the Disney animated train

“Raya and the Last Dragon” Film Review

70/100 “sweet/sour”

By Quinn Marcus

Raya and the Last Dragon comes to us from the director of Big Hero 6, one of my personal favorite Disney animated features, and tells the story of a young girl named Raya, who after 500 years of division, is tasked to mend the world so everyone can live in peace once again, but in order to do that, she must find the last dragon. The first trailer for this film didn’t look all too promising, it looked like a bunch of generic side-quests thrown together to satisfy children. However, I am very pleased to say that Raya and the Last Dragon surpassed my expectations, if not by a lot. This is by no means Disney’s best animated-adventure, certainly not as good as Moana or Big Hero 6, but I found myself impressed with the final result.

Firstly, the animation was absolutely spectacular, the fight scenes are where the film truly thrives, and luckily there are quite a few of them. From an exhilarating sword-fight in a golden temple to fending off demons of the dark, Raya and the Last Dragon’s action sequences did not disappoint. But it’s not just the fights that look great, every frame was immaculately rendered, this is easily one of Disney’s best-looking films. Every strand of hair, weapon, landscape, each plant looked perfect. The work that was put into such detail obviously paid off because it looked pretty damn good. The voice-work features the talent of Kelly Marie Tran (Star Wars: The Last Jedi), and Awkwafina (The Farewell). Everyone was great, I couldn’t point out a single weak link amongst the cast. Thanks to this wonderful ensemble, my care for the otherwise not-so-special characters grew immensely. Seriously, without the cast, I couldn’t care less about the characters, there’s a princess who needs to do a thing, but to do that thing, she needs to collect some stuff, make friends, and learn a couple of valuable lessons along the way.

That my friends is where the film unfortunately falters: the script. I am so sick of Disney’s signature formula, not because it isn’t entertaining, but because at some point these films begin to blur together. It’s the same thing each time with a few new colorful character additions just waiting to be sold online. Now, what was done with Big Hero 6 was something special, I hadn’t seen anything like it in the Disney canon, but besides the fact that Raya and the Last Dragon doesn’t have a musical number (although the soundtrack was terrific), it didn’t feel all too different. A world in peril, a warrior-princess with an adorable animal sidekick on a mission to fix it…hmm, where have I seen that before?

Regardless of the script’s obvious issues, I actually had a blast watching this film, it’s highly entertaining, most of the comedy works, and it’s all uplifted by the electrifying musical score done by James Newton Howard. Everything moves really quickly, but thankfully, it’s easy to catch up to…with the help of several annoying exposition dumps of course. This movie was clogged with exposition, nearly every line is an explanation of how things are in this divided world. While it’s certainly interesting, it’s a pretty lazy go-to option for a writer to make, and usually, we give Disney a pass, but it’s too noticeable in this film not to be pointed out. The story has some compelling themes about trust and unity, but it sadly isn’t all too subtle. However, the last 25 minutes blew me away, it was emotionally fulfilling, action-packed, and well-executed. Unlike Disney’s recent efforts, the finale felt grounded, despite purple demons turning people to stone. Disney has a way of giving us breathtaking conclusions, and Raya and the Last Dragon is no exception.

The final verdict is…Raya and the Last Dragon overcomes an overdose of Disney’s predictable signature formula with an action-packed, meticulously animated adventure that will leave adults and children feeling uplifted and (mostly) satisfied…$TREAM IT!

(2021)

Genre: Fantasy/Action/Adventure

(PG)