Summary (from the studio): Star racecar Lightning McQueen (Owen Wilson) and the incomparable tow truck Mater (Larry the Cable Guy) take their friendship on the road from Radiator Springs to exciting new places when they head overseas to compete in the first-ever World Grand Prix to determine the world’s fastest car. But the road to the championship is filled with plenty of potholes, detours and hilarious surprises when Mater gets caught up in an intriguing adventure of his own: international espionage.

Torn between assisting Lightning McQueen in the high-profile race and towing the line in a top-secret spy mission, Mater’s action-packed journey leads him on an explosive chase through the streets of Japan and Europe, trailed by his friends and watched by the whole world. Adding to the fast-paced fun is a colorful new all-car cast that includes secret agents, menacing villains and international racing competitors.

Warning: Spoilers below!

Liked:

• As with all Pixar films, Cars 2 was a treat to look at. The brilliant colors and attention to background detail in every scene won’t go unnoticed — even if you’re not specifically looking for stuff like that.
• I usually don’t like Owen Wilson, but I think he’s a good Lightning McQueen. The movie just felt different whenever that car was front and center.
• There were some funny parts scattered throughout. This was definitely enjoyable in places.

Disliked:

• The storyline felt incredibly disjointed to me. Why would anyone think it was a good idea to introduce an espionage angle into a movie like this??? This should have been about racing, not an international spy ring!
• Mater is a good secondary character, but it doesn’t work when he becomes the focus of the film. I wish he had just remained the sidekick here.
• I didn’t really care who the spies were and didn’t fully understand what they were trying to do. Did I miss something or was the only explanation of the nefarious plan given at the very end of the film after the traitorous Sir Miles Axelrod had been unmasked? In order to become invested in the plot, shouldn’t the audience be given a better understanding of what was going on?
• This was a bit too long for a kids’ movie. My 9-year-old had trouble sitting through the whole thing (and no, he doesn’t have ADD or anything like that!).

Rating:

I’ve never watched a truly bad Pixar film, and I don’t think Cars 2 changes that. It certainly wasn’t as good as other titles in the studio’s history, but it was watchable. If the filmmakers had stuck with Lightning McQueen as the main character instead of switching to Mater, I think the story would have been much better. As it is, it’s still fairly enjoyable for adults and children alike, so I give it 3 stars out of 5.

Prior to my recent viewing of this film, I’d only seen The Wizard of Oz from beginning to end once in my life. This happened when I was a child, and though I didn’t remember too many specifics about the movie, I always thought about it as a classic along the lines of The Sound of Music: something that plays on television almost every year that can be easily enjoyed by the whole family. This time around, I decided to introduce the Wizard of Oz to my 8-year-old son just so he would have some inkling what the film was about.

As I might have expected, my son didn’t respond too well to The Wizard of Oz. In this day and age of Avatar and Transformers, Oz must seem incredibly cheesy to him. He was bored at the beginning; perked up a bit when the tornado struck; paid attention to some of the earlier scenes in Oz; and then ended up staring off into space for most of the rest of the film. I can’t say I blame him, actually. The movie didn’t hold up that well with me, either. Sure, some of the songs are good and the overall message is wonderful. But those things didn’t make it any easier to sit through the entire run time.

I know a lot of people love The Wizard of Oz, so my rating is certainly not going to be a popular one. To me the film was too dull in many places, and too overwrought in others. I give this one just 2 stars out of 5.

Plot summary (from the studio): When California girl Susan Murphy is unexpectedly clobbered by a meteor full of outer space gunk, she mysteriously grows to 49-feet-11-inches tall and is instantly labeled as a “monster” named Ginormica. The military jumps into action, and she is captured and held in a secret government compound. The world learns that the military has been quietly rounding up other monsters over the years. This ragtag group consists of the brilliant but insect-headed Dr. Cockroach, PhD; the macho half-ape, half-fish The Missing Link; the gelatinous and indestructible B.O.B.; and the 350-foot grub called Insectosaurus. Their confinement time is cut short, however, when a mysterious alien robot lands on Earth and begins storming the country.

As a last resort, under the guidance of General W.R. Monger (on a desperate order from the President), the motley crew of monsters is called into action to combat the aliens and save the world from imminent destruction.

Warning: Spoilers below!

Liked:

• I thought B.O.B. was the best character by far. The animation was fantastic, and it seemed that he was always doing something funny in the background of each scene he appeared in. Also, Seth Rogen’s voice was perfect here. Rogen just sounds like a dumb, fat blob, so it fit. (That was meant to be a compliment. Really.)
• Kiefer Sutherland’s work as the army general was pretty good, too. I was definitely entertained by his stereotypical, gung-ho, over-the-top take on a “war monger.”
• Derek Dietl was the kind of character you enjoy rooting against. His perfect hair and too-polished smile reminded me of some guy on an infomercial trying to sell the best mattresses los angeles has to offer — but I guess weatherman was a good fit as well!

Disliked:

• The story was very boring, IMO. It didn’t seem like the stakes were very high, since the villain seemed only to want whatever substance infiltrated Ginormica’s body. It’s not like he was out to destroy the Earth or anything, so it didn’t matter one way or the other if he succeeded.
• The final battle with the Monsters vs. Aliens was the most anticlimactic I’ve ever seen! The Monsters were just given their weapons, and all it took to blow up the ship was some incredibly stupid dance routine from Dr. House Cockroach.
• Susan would rather be Ginormica and hobnob with a cockroach, reptile, giant butterfly, and gelatinous blob than be a normal human? Uhhh, okay.

Rating:

I usually go a little easier when rating animated family films than when rating ordinary films, but I just can’t give Monsters vs. Aliens the benefit of the doubt. The title and concept sound exciting, but the execution is simply terrible. There’s no real action in the movie and no significant motivation driving the characters. Even my 8-year-old was bored out of his mind. I give this one 2 stars out of 5.

Plot summary (from the studio): Mr. Popper is a driven businessman who is clueless when it comes to the important things in life. Mr. Popper finally understands what he’s been missing, thanks to a new inheritance: six penguins who turn his swanky New York apartment into a snowy winter wonderland and the rest of his life upside down.

Warning: Spoilers below!

Liked:

• The kids were actually okay in this one. Usually I’m annoyed by the children in live-action family movies because they act like such spoiled brats or are just way to precocious to be believable. The kids in this one, however, pretty much acted their age and weren’t that bad.
• I enjoyed Popper’s transformation in this one. He went from wearing Italian suits and buying leather backpacks at GotBriefcases.com to a scruffy lumberjack to a normal person in the course of the film. Kids need character arcs that are easy to see and understand.
• My son liked the penguins and laughed at their antics. Fortunately, penguins aren’t available at the corner pet shop, otherwise he’d probably be begging for one nonstop! Anyway, as a parent, the most I can ask out of a family film is that my child be entertained with some harmless fun.
• I thought it was a nice touch how Pippi (Mr. Popper’s assistant) primarily used words that began with the letter “p”. That was awesome and made me smile every time!

Disliked:

• There really isn’t any point in seeing this film if you’re not watching it with youngsters. There’s very little in here that adults would enjoy on their own, so don’t even bother.
• I realize that a lot of kids wish their divorced parents would get back together, but I’d rather not see that fantasy played out in movies like this. I think it’s highly unlikely to happen in real life, and seeing it in a film might give particularly young and impressionable children some false hope. Yes, I’m nitpicking here, and many children might not even pick up on or care what happens to Mr. Popper and his ex-wife. But still…

Rating:

Overall, Mr. Popper’s Penguins is a decent enough family film that will be entertaining for most children 10 and under. Adults probably won’t enjoy it nearly as much, but it’s short enough that getting through the whole thing in one session won’t be a problem. I give the movie 3 stars out of 5.

Warning: Spoilers ahead! Unlike a lot of people, I was never particularly enthralled as a child with the book Where the Wild Things Are. I just didn’t get why it was supposed to be so good. Maybe it’s because I’m a girl or because I never acted out like Max or because I simply didn’t have that kind of imagination. Whatever the reason, the book never spoke to me. My son sort of likes it, though, so he wanted to see the film. We finally got around to renting it recently.

But you know what? This is just not the kind of story that plays well on the silver screen. The single biggest problem for me was the kid who played Max. He seemed far too old to be having such massive tantrums and doing childish things like standing on the table even after his mother told him to get down. I mean, really? He looked like he was 10. What 10-year-old acts that way? One that has anger management issues, probably — and that’s all I could think about during the whole movie. In the book, I got that Max was a boy with a very vivid imagination that he employed to help himself escape the drudgery of being grounded in his room. But in the film, I kept thinking, wow, this boy has severe problems and needs professional intervention. I have a feeling that’s not the effect the filmmaker was going for.

Nothing else really captured my attention in the film. None of the creatures was interesting to me, nor was Max’s various relationships with them when he was on the island. I was basically bored out of my mind the whole time.

As for my 8-year-old, his favorite scenes were the ones that were lifted directly from the book. In fact, he sat with the book open on his lap while watching, and pointed excitedly whenever he recognized a scene. Otherwise, he was pretty restless and bored too. It took us a few sittings to get through this one.

Overall, I thought this movie was a big waste of time and money. There was nothing at all redeeming about it, IMO. I give it 2 stars out of 5 — and that’s only because I somehow managed to watch the whole thing.

Plot summary (from the studio): From the studio that brought you “Shrek,” “Madagascar” and “Kung Fu Panda” comes “How to Train Your Dragon.” Set in the mythical world of burly Vikings and wild dragons, and based on the book by Cressida Cowell, the action comedy tells the story of Hiccup, a Viking teenager who doesn’t exactly fit in with his tribe’s longstanding tradition of heroic dragon slayers. Hiccup’s world is turned upside down when he encounters a dragon that challenges he and his fellow Vikings to see the world from an entirely different point of view.

Warning: Spoilers below!

Liked:

• Toothless was kind of cute and fun to watch. He reminded me of a Pokemon more than a dragon, though.
• I thought it was fantastic that Hiccup lost his foot in that fall. Far too often, characters emerge from heated battles completely unscathed, which of course is ridiculous. It was fitting that Hiccup lost his foot so he could match Toothless, who only had half a tail.
• The flight scenes were beautifully done. I normally don’t pay attention to such things and view those stretches in films only as filler, but I couldn’t take my eyes off all the swooping and diving here.

Disliked:

• I thought most of the voices were just completely off. America Ferrera and Jay Baruchel sounded way too old for their charactes, and Gerard Butler didn’t sound “big” enough for Stoick. I can’t stand Baruchel’s voice anyway, but it almost made me want to stop watching.
• There wasn’t much of a character arc for Hiccup (or anyone else). Hiccup was the same nice, even-keeled boy at the end of the film that he was at the beginning. Some of the other characters changed their opinions of him, but that was only after he led the defeat of the big, bad dragon. Those were sudden changes rather than arcs.
• I wasn’t really interested in anything any of the adults in the film did. Whenever Stoick was front and center with his Viking crew, I kind of tuned out.

Rating:

How to Train Your Dragon was a fun family movie that both children and adults can enjoy. I watched this with my 8-year-old son, and after a slow start, he really got into and loved the dragons and the fight/flight scenes as much as I did. I give this one 4 stars out of 5.

Plot summary (from the studio): In a happy suburban neighborhood surrounded by white picket fences and flowering rose bushes sits a black house with a dead lawn. Unbeknownst to the neighbors, hidden deep beneath this home is a vast secret hideout. Surrounded by an army of mischievous little minions, we discover Gru (Steve Carell) planning the biggest heist in the history of the world. He’s going to steal the moon (yes, the moon!) in Universal’s new 3-D CGI feature, Despicable Me.

Gru delights in all things wicked. Armed with his arsenal of shrink rays, freeze rays, and battle-ready vehicles for land and air, he vanquishes all who stand in his way. That is, until the day he encounters the immense will of three little orphan girls who look at him and see something no one else has ever seen: a potential dad.

One of the greatest super-villains has just met his greatest challenge: three little girls named Margo, Edith, and Agnes.

Warning: Spoilers below!

Liked:

• I liked the orphan/Gru storyline much more than the part about stealing the moon. I could have watched an entire film about the girls trying to win Gru over, but maybe I was just in a particularly sentimental mood when I saw this.
• I’m glad that Gru didn’t make it to the dance recital in time. That would have been way too convenient and sappy at that point in the movie. Since it was a family film, I thought he would make it, so it was nice to see the writers go a different way.
• The littlest girl with her unicorn was adorable!
• Gru reading the girls the kitten book (complete with finger puppets) was awesome.
• At first I thought the minions were weird and creepy, but I admit they grew on me after a while!

Disliked:

• I didn’t particularly care for any of the voice work in this film. I hated Steve Carell’s wannabe Russian accent, and I thought Jason Segel was completely unrecognizable as Vector. I guess some people might find merit in the fact that Segel “disguised” his voice so well, but part of the fun of seeing animated movies as an adult is picking out the voices.
• Stealing the moon was kinda ridiculous, even for a movie with freeze rays, shrink rays, and squid rays. I wasn’t into that plot line at all.
• Gru’s mother didn’t serve much of a purpose here. I wondered why the character was even needed. Just to give Julie Andrews another gig, I guess.

Rating:

I usually end up watching a lot of animated films in the summer because I need to keep my son entertained when he’s home from school. I rarely ever end up enjoying them as much as I liked Despicable Me. While it was by no means on par with Pixar classics, it still gets 4 stars out of 5.

Plot summary (with possible spoilers): Toy Story 3 opens with Sheriff Woody (voiced by Tom Hanks), Buzz Lightyear (Tim Allen), Jessie (Joan Cusack), Mr. Potato Head (Don Rickles), Mrs. Potato Head (Estelle Harris), Rex (Wallace Shawn), and Hamm (John Ratzenberger) doing what they do best: engaging in some wild imaginary play with their kid Andy (John Morris) at the helm. But alas, this is merely footage from an old home movie that Andy’s mom (Laurie Metcalf) shot when Andy was younger. In reality, these toys haven’t been played with in years. After all, Andy is now 17, and headed off to college.

And therein lies the problem for these old toys. Andy’s mom has told him to clean out his room before he leaves. He must pack the stuff he wants to bring with him, take the stuff he wants to keep up to the attic, and either donate or throw everything else away. The toys worry about what that means for them, but Woody assures everyone that they’ll be OK. Their purpose was to be there for Andy when he needed them; now they’ll more or less retire to the attic.

Andy scoops up all his toys and collects them in a trash bag — all except Woody, who will go with the college things. Andy intends to take the toys up to the attic, but he gets distracted, leaving the trash bag in the hall. Andy’s mom thinks this bag is intended for donation, so she takes it to a local daycare.

At first, the toys think they’ve stumbled onto the best-case scenario. They’ll always get played with at the daycare, and when one group of children grows up, there’s a new wave of youngsters right behind them. But it soon becomes apparent that Lotso (Ned Beatty), the teddy bear in charge of the place, is a rather evil character. This leads to a lot of sticky situations that Andy’s toys have to escape in order to get back home. With Woody’s help, they do just that.

In the end, Andy looks at his toys with fondness for all the great times they had together. He ends up taking them to a little girl named Bonnie (Emily Hahn), who will play with them properly and love them as they deserve. Andy has one final play session with his toys as he shows Bonnie what Woody and Co. can do, and then he heads off to college while his toys look forward to their new kid.

Liked:

• The theme of growing up and moving on was poignantly handled in this film. Getting rid of childhood toys is something that every teen faces at some point, and though we might not ever get as nostalgic as Andy, I think we can all relate to what he was going through.
• The film moved along at a great pace. There were no boring scenes along the way, and every kid in the theater (including mine) was riveted from beginning to end.
• This was a terrific sendoff for the franchise. I hope they end the series here, and don’t go for a fourth installment. What’s next, more angst as we watch Andy sell textbooks from his first year in college? Ha. I’m sure if they wanted to, they could do a film with Bonnie as the main kid. The ending did leave the producers with options for future films, but I hope they do the right thing.
• Toy Story 3 created genuine emotional responses in many places, including the end. Bring your tissues, because you’ll need them!

Disliked:

• Nothing, really.

Rating:

Toy Story 3 is a film that has enormous appeal to everyone, regardless of age. I saw kids, teens, and adults alike weeping (or at least sniffling) by the end, as the story touches on universal emotions. This is the best movie of 2010 so far, and is not to be missed. I give it 5 stars out of 5!

Plot summary (with possible spoilers): The lovable green ogre Shrek (voiced by Mike Myers) has settled into a not-so-exciting domestic routine with wife Fiona (Cameron Diaz) and their three young children. Shrek does the same things every single day, deals with the same problems, and puts up with the same annoyances. He doesn’t realize how much of a rut he’s in until his child’s first birthday. With everyone making demands on him and the Three Pigs ruining the birthday cake, Shrek loses his cool, lets out an ogre roar, and stomps away from the party.

Fiona comes after him, but Shrek gets even angrier when she doesn’t take his side in the whole thing. He slinks off by himself, and ends up drinking in a tavern with devilish deal-maker Rumplestiltskin (Walt Dohrn). Rumplestiltskin offers Shrek a chance to trade a day from his past for a day that will make him feel like a scary ogre again, like he did in his bachelorhood before he met Fiona, Donkey (Eddie Murphy), Puss in Boots (Antonio Banderas), and the rest of his current crew. The angry Shrek agrees, without having read the contract all the way through. As it turns out, Rumplestiltskin took away the day Shrek was born, meaning his whole life will soon disappear — and the lives of those he loves will change forever.

A frantic Shrek looks for some way out of the contract. It’s Donkey who finds the hidden exit clause: only True Love’s First Kiss can break the contract, which means Shrek has to convince Fiona (who now doesn’t know him) to fall in love with him all over again and kiss him before the day ends.

The rest of the film follows this It’s a Wonderful Life theme, as we see how Shrek’s friends’ lives would have turned out without him. This being a fairy tale, everything is righted by the end and the main characters get their “happily ever after” tag.

Liked:

• The main characters are so familiar by now that they’re enjoyable even when they aren’t doing much. Puss in Boots with his big-eyed begging face when he wants something, Donkey’s mile-a-minute commentary, etc. These things work in the film, and should have been featured more.
• It was short. I think the running time was just over 80 minutes (not including the credits), which was good considering the fact that lots of young children (including my own) were in the theater and probably wouldn’t have been able to sit through much more.

Disliked:

• This wasn’t exactly an original storyline, was it? And it wasn’t executed particularly well, either. I didn’t like the Resistance plot, and wished the writers had come up with something else for Fiona to be doing without Shrek. Fat, lazy, spoiled Puss in Boots was kinda cute, but that was the only part of the alternate universe that was interesting.
• The Rumplestiltskin character just seemed off in some way. He wasn’t as diabolical as he could have been, nor was he a clownish idiot, like some of the past villains in this series. He was in the middle, and consequently, pretty bland. Or maybe it was just the fact that he wasn’t voiced by a “known” actor that made me feel this way.

Rating:

I thought the first two installments of the Shrek franchise were very good, but it’s clear that Shrek Forever After should be the last attempt. Please let these characters fade away now. Do moviegoers really need to see Shrek and Fiona going through all the stages of parenthood and marriage? I give this film 3 stars out of 5.