My Movie Review: Despicable Me

My Movie Review: Despicable Me

2.5/5

Opening Statement: Gru is the classic, animated villan who specializes in stealing very important things. Gru is no longer the biggest villan in town once a enemy villan steals the Pyramid. Now Gru must use 3 orphan girls to help him steal back a freeze ray he stole, and use it to perform the biggest heist in history, stealing the moon. Along the way he discovers that there are more important things in life.

What's Good: Despicable Me brings a lot to the table, especially the resurrection of slapstick, cartoon violence. Which I loved. The first half of this film felt a lot like a Looney Toon cartoon. The 2nd half loses that touch but sets aside for the morality lesson, which is very heartfelt and moving, but I am not entirely convinced. With so many great animated films out these days, Despicable Me does stand its own ground pretty well, much better than most animated films. Much funnier than Shrek: Forever After.

What's Bad: Unfortunately I had a piece of cake, but I wanted the whole thing with this one. This could've been a grand resurrection of that slapstick violent cartoon we've been waiting for, but it wasn't. Despicable Me has an identity crisis, it's really nice that there is a positive, heartfelt message at the end, but that is suspected in animated films these days. I didn't want Despicable to be spontaneous or pure formula. I wanted it to come to its own and attach me to these characters, I wanted to actually care by the more dramatic ending, I was way too unattached, the film relied to much on formula and its 3d trickery. It is disposable at best.

Consensus: Despicable Me can be funny and heartfelt at times, but it feels to artificial and expects too much out of its audience to find its way to its emotion. Compared to some animated films out there, this one is pretty good. But lately this one is no comparison to Toy Story 3 or How to Train Your Dragon.