Monsters vs. Aliens

After a hesitant but overall rewarding trip to the theater, I have arrived at the conclusion that “Monsters vs. Aliens” is quite a breath of fresh air from DreamWorks’s usual drivel. After their pathetic recent attempts to make good movies, I wondered about just boycotting all of their garbage. While it has its share of flaws, this film has nevertheless made me think again. With an excellent cast of comedians, great 3D special effects, and highly entertaining modern humor, this movie really breaks through the ordinary boundaries of animated films, producing a good-quality flick for kids and adults to enjoy.

The use of famous comedians in the star roles was a great move on the filmmakers’ parts. Stephen Colbert, Seth Rogen, Paul Rudd, and other great comedians as the other assorted characters made everything almost believable and quite funny. They all performed their roles enthusiastically, and it was obvious that they enjoyed themselves and were allowed free reign in the improv department. I was also quite impressed at the actors’ easy chemistry with each other, and their abilities to seamlessly cooperate in their roles.

The comedy constantly spewed by the cast was very well integrated with dazzling special effects that did a wonderful job of distracting from some of the film’s lesser elements. It was quite obvious that the scenes were specially designed for 3D viewing, as they took quite a few liberties with throwing things into your face in an overly invasive attempt to showcase the power of 3-dimensional gimmick. While I quickly tired of the quick 3D zoom-ins that made me cringe backward in my seat, I was still able to appreciate the incredible CG effects and the quality 3D scenes that were obviously so labored on. They were, quite frankly, incredible.

Now even in all this film’s glory, it still had several weak points. One problem was with the story elements. Seeing as the entire movie exists solely to parody monster and alien genres of film, I am fairly forgiving of its problems, but still it became quite irksome when so many plot points were left unexplained and so many plot holes left wide open. Because of the story defects, the film also skips out on any character development, except with the main character, 49 ½ foot tall Ginormica. It holds itself up alright in the end, however.

Overall, “Monsters vs. Aliens” gets seven out of ten stars, for some good laughs, a great cast, and terrific special effects, but little in the way of a good story and any form of character development. I would hope for a sequel, but at the same time, I’m not sure I trust DreamWorks to make a good movie twice in a row. It is worth packing up the kids and checking out this amusing bit of eye candy.