 |
| Courtesy of DreamWorks |
That’s got to be what happened with The Boss Baby, further proof that DreamWorks Animation remains the Pepsi to Pixar’s Coca-Cola. Honestly, the rest of my review could be summed up in a tweet written by fantasy author Sam Sykes a couple of weeks ago:
Pixar: “What if this girl’s emotions are all different people and show how she becomes a whole person?”
DreamWorks: “What if…a baby in a suit?”
Granted, Michael McCullers (who penned the Austin Powers sequels and the underrated Baby Mama) attempts to spice up the basic story by constructing a needlessly convoluted mythology and throwing in a ticking clock finale. But the 97-minute flick (which you’ll immediately forget as soon as you hit the restroom) still boils down to “Look! The cute little baby acts like a businessman and sounds like Alec Baldwin! Isn’t that hilarious?” Nope, it’s not. Sorry if that makes me a buzzkill, but I need more.
The Boss Baby kicks off with a cute look at BabyCorp, the heavenly factory where babies are sorted into two categories: those who go to live with families on Earth, and those who are groomed for management positions. The titular character (Baldwin) falls into the latter group, so BabyCorp sends him on an important mission to infiltrate the Templeton family. You see, babies and puppies are sworn enemies, and they wage constant battle to see who will emerge victorious in the war for human affection.
Dad (Jimmy Kimmel) and Mom (Lisa Kudrow) Templeton work for Puppy Co., so if the Boss Baby can get his hands on their company’s top secret plans for a new designer pet, he can find a way to sabotage it. There’s just one hiccup in his plan. His big brother Tim (Miles Christopher Bakshi) was perfectly fine being an only child and doesn’t like this new baby coming in and stealing all his parents’ time and attention.
Once Tim realizes the Boss Baby will return to BabyCorp after he completes his mission, the two put aside sibling their rivalry to stop dastardly Puppy Co. CEO Francis Francis (Steve Buscemi). If you guessed that the brothers grow closer during the process and realize maybe they do love each other after all, congratulations.
The Boss Baby isn’t completely terrible. I laughed several times, particularly at a cute, non-blasphemous baby Jesus joke and the Glengarry Glen Ross reference that was criminally spoiled in the trailer. I also appreciated the attempt to make Tim an unreliable narrator to excuse some of the plot’s more outlandish elements.
Funny enough, that aspect of the plot briefly allows the film to escape the homogenized DreamWorks visual palate for a bit. Since grown-up Tim’s (Tobey Maguire) narration immediately explains his character’s overactive imagination, director Tom McGrath (who also helmed the three Madagascar flicks and Megamind) attempts to inject some intriguing creativity into the studio’s typical animation style.
Unfortunately, the material quickly defeats him and all the characters eventually revert to the same old glossy, smirking “DreamWorks face.” (Google it to see what I mean.) Combine that with a voice cast that might literally be phoning it in (Baldwin and Kimmel seem particularly unengaged), and this ends up feeling like a paycheck movie for everyone involved.
It’s a shame since I enjoyed Trolls, DreamWorks’ previous entry, much more than I expected to. The studio has taken a big step backward here. Here’s hoping that the upcoming Captain Underpants (which boasts a promising trailer) and How to Train Your Dragon 3 (billed as the wonderful series’ final installment) will get things back on track. At least until the inevitable The Boss Baby 2, I guess. The movie took in more than $50 million last weekend, so a sequel is inevitable.
The Boss Baby is rated PG for some mild rude humor.
Grade: C
Dad (Jimmy Kimmel) and Mom (Lisa Kudrow) Templeton work for Puppy Co., so if the Boss Baby can get his hands on their company’s top secret plans for a new designer pet, he can find a way to sabotage it. There’s just one hiccup in his plan. His big brother Tim (Miles Christopher Bakshi) was perfectly fine being an only child and doesn’t like this new baby coming in and stealing all his parents’ time and attention.
Once Tim realizes the Boss Baby will return to BabyCorp after he completes his mission, the two put aside sibling their rivalry to stop dastardly Puppy Co. CEO Francis Francis (Steve Buscemi). If you guessed that the brothers grow closer during the process and realize maybe they do love each other after all, congratulations.
The Boss Baby isn’t completely terrible. I laughed several times, particularly at a cute, non-blasphemous baby Jesus joke and the Glengarry Glen Ross reference that was criminally spoiled in the trailer. I also appreciated the attempt to make Tim an unreliable narrator to excuse some of the plot’s more outlandish elements.
Funny enough, that aspect of the plot briefly allows the film to escape the homogenized DreamWorks visual palate for a bit. Since grown-up Tim’s (Tobey Maguire) narration immediately explains his character’s overactive imagination, director Tom McGrath (who also helmed the three Madagascar flicks and Megamind) attempts to inject some intriguing creativity into the studio’s typical animation style.
Unfortunately, the material quickly defeats him and all the characters eventually revert to the same old glossy, smirking “DreamWorks face.” (Google it to see what I mean.) Combine that with a voice cast that might literally be phoning it in (Baldwin and Kimmel seem particularly unengaged), and this ends up feeling like a paycheck movie for everyone involved.
It’s a shame since I enjoyed Trolls, DreamWorks’ previous entry, much more than I expected to. The studio has taken a big step backward here. Here’s hoping that the upcoming Captain Underpants (which boasts a promising trailer) and How to Train Your Dragon 3 (billed as the wonderful series’ final installment) will get things back on track. At least until the inevitable The Boss Baby 2, I guess. The movie took in more than $50 million last weekend, so a sequel is inevitable.
The Boss Baby is rated PG for some mild rude humor.
Grade: C
Comments
Post a Comment