Director: Rob Letterman and Conrad VernonStarring: Reese Witherspoon, Seth Rogan, Hugh Laurie, Will Arnett, Rainn Wilson
Other Actors of Note: Paul Rudd, Amy Poehler, Ed Helms, Stephen Colbert, Keifer Sutherland, Jeffrey Tambor, Renee Zellweger
Plot: When a meteorite from outer space hits a young California girl named Susan Murphy and turns her into a giant monster, she is taken to a secret government compound where she meets a ragtag group of monsters also rounded up over the years. 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! Taken from www.imdb.com.
About a year ago the folks at Dreamworks sat around their boardroom and said. "You know, I know we're just the poor man's Disney and God knows Pixar is going to wail on our balls with a meat tenderizer when it comes to 3D animated movies anyway, but you know, maybe we could suck a little less than we do."
Of course, they went and made "Madagascar 2: Escape 2 Africa" anyway, but that's not the point. SOMEBODY listened and they made a plan to make good animated movies, strangely enough this plan involved Jack Black and fat jokes but no-less "Kung Fu Panda" was a huge success and a beautiful movie in style, animation, and story.
Well meanwhile in Dreamworks' department of non-shitty moviemaking they were cooking up another little project that did for classic 50s b-science fiction/horror films what "Kung Fu Panda" did for Kung Fu movies. This movie was dubbed "Monsters vs Aliens" and just like "Kung Fu Panda" on paper it sounded ATROCIOUS. Then the teaser poster was released and it looked HORRIBLE. Then I saw a trailer and was taken aback by how good it looked. The rest was history.
Basically the story goes like this. A meteorite falls to Earth on top of a woman named Susan on her wedding day. Rather than turning into human pudding as most people would do if they were hit by a metoerite, Susan instead grows fifty feet tall, inexplicably gets white hair, and becomes super strong.
Immediatly after the wedding is ruined and her d-bag fiance runs screaming like the little bitch he is, she's taken to a secret government installation and meets Dr. Cockroach, BOB, The Missing Link, and Insectasaurus (more on them later.) It turns out that since the 50s, General W.R. Monger (see what they did there) has been keeping monsters locked up in a secret underground facility to keep them out of the public eye.
Well as fate would have it, the meteorite that turned Susan into Ginormica happened to have been made of some infinitely strong space matter that is wanted by an alien that's half Kang and Kodos and half Invader Zim called Gallaxhar.
Gallaxhar sends a gigantic robot probe to Earth to retrieve the meteorite's energy. Anyway, as robots do, the robot begins tearing shit up so the Gen. Monger decides to sick his monster team against the robot to stop it.
So Reese Witherspoon is the "star" of this movie for all intents and purposes. This is very much Susan's story and most of the plot is focused around her. You see, Susan's weatherman fiance Derek (played by the occasionally funny Paul Rudd) is a selfish prick who derails their honeymoon in Paris so he can go to a job interview in Fresno. Susan really has no self-identity and sense of accomplishment but it's through becoming Ginormica that she realizes how self-reliant she can truly become. Of course in children's movie style she loses the ability that makes her special and then manages to pull a win out of her ass anyway. It may be a rerun of the message we saw in "Kung Fu Panda" but it's still very well done.
As with the Furious Five in "Kung Fu Panda" the other monsters are underutilized but still given a bigger role than their kung fu counterparts. They are composed of Dr. Cockroach M.D. who is based on "The Fly" (not the David Croenenberg one) to the point that he even physically resembles Vincent Price, B.O.B who is a mash-up between "Attack of the Killer Tomatoes" and "The Blob" (there's even a gag that parodies the shot of the blob pouring out of the movie theater doors), The Missing Link (though missing link between what and what I have no idea) who is a mixture of "The Thing From Another World" and "The Creature From the Black Lagoon", and Insectasaurus who is "Mothra" (if you're wondering why it looks like a hamster I can honestly say I have no fucking clue.)
Hugh Laurie is quite well placed as Dr. Cockroach. He embraces the mad scientist clich'e beautifully as he's alays seen creating bizarre divices out of whatever junk he finds lying around. At one point you see him building a bomb out of legos and asks Susan if she has any plutonium. He also does the obligatory mad scientist laugh which serves as a gag at several points throughout the film.
Will Arnett plays the Missing Link, an amusingl vain creature who clearly thinks rather highly of his abilities. The Link appears to be close friends with Insectasaurus though no real reason is ever given for this, it's just shown that the two have a bond of some sort.
Seth Rogen steals just about every scene he's in as BOB, an indestructible blob creatue that has no brain. He's easily distracted, forgetful, and tends to mistake himself with other characters. There's an ongoing joke where BOB thinks he is Susan and is constantly talking about getting back with Derek. He's given some of the better gags and lines throughout.
Kiefer Sutherland and Stephen Colbert are horrible, terrible, and nothing short of painful in this movie. Their jokes are bland, tired, and beyond lame even for a children's movie. There is one gag with Stephen Colbert but unless you've just watched "Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind" yesterday then you won't get it and will just be confused and think it's the stupidest thing you've ever seen. Even if you have it's still rather hard to catch.
Rainn Wilson is similarly bland but at this point we're used to him stinking up ever non-Dwight Shroot role he plays. He's tolerable and not bad, he just doesn't bring anything special to the table.
This movie makes sure to bring in plenty of gags from other movies. Aside from the origins of the monsters there's a gag the president does where he plays the five communication tones from "Close Encounters of the 3rd Kind" and then breaks out into the "Beverly Hills Cop" theme song. Even the somewhat cheesy order Gallaxhar gives to "Destroy All Monsters!" which will only be funny to dorks like me still works. Even the Dreamworks logo is done in scratched looking black and white and shows the boy on the logo getting abducted by a UFO.
Visually the animation is on-par with the average Pixar films. Unfortunately the story hasn't quite caught up. While they go a route Pixar has yet to explore by having a female protagonist, the other characters are rather weak by comparison.
BOB, The Missing Link, and Dr. Cockroach are vastly underutilized and often feel like bit parts moreso than main characters as they have to step aside to make room for Susan's story. Insectasaurus in-particular just doesn't get enough screen time which is a shame as he's the most entertaining one that's not BOB.
I'm hoping that in the inevitable sequel we'll get a chance to flesh the rest of the characters out a bit more and maybe drop a good deal of the more cheap humor. Though the Dr. Strangelove-esque war room sequences at least amused me enough to not hate the president and general characters entirely.
I was also kind of annoyed by the lack of the Versus aspect of the film. The kung fu scenes in the previous film showed that epic and well choreographed fight scenes can be utilized for animated children's films. The moment when the alien robot is trouncing the monsters and suddenly Insectasaurus shows up had me all itching and ready for some hardcore Kaiju action but it never happened. Even the fight scene between the monsters and all of the many Gallaxhar clones feels somewhat underwhelming.
Ultimately the film is a highly enjoyable experiene but falls just short of the mark that "Kung Fu Panda" set before it. It's well-done but it still feels like the script was a draft or two away from being perfect.
Dreamworks still has a long way to go before they'll be at Pixar levels, or even meet the level they set for themselves with their last great film. But don't let that negate from the fact that "Monsters vs. Aliens" is a fun, entertaining, and well-written film that will be enjoed by children and adults alike.
I give "Monsters vs. Aliens" a near-perfect 4 out of 5.
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