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The Incredibles Movie Review: By Adam Mast, ZBoneMan.com
The Incredibles makes it six in a row for those masters
over at Pixar. This is a wonderfully glorious adventure
that benefits from the outstanding visual splendor that
we’ve come to expect from a Pixar film. It’s also
smartly written, offering up a wide range of gags and storyline
elements that will appeal to nearly every demographic in
the audience including the almighty movie geek.
The
Incredibles is a super hero movie of sorts and introduces
us to Mr. Incredible, a mighty crime fighter who always
works alone. When a crime bust goes slightly awry, our fearless
hero (as well as a handful of others in the business) is
forced to hang-up his super suit after a victim - who sustains
minor injuries - decides to sue for damages. Thus, Bob Parr
(Mr. Incredible’s alter ego) is forced into early retirement,
but thankfully he has the love of his life to grow old with.
As the years pass by, however, Bob continues to get itchy
for the old days and secretly sneaks out with his buddy
Lucius Best (aka Frozone) to foil crimes. Ultimately, he’s
called back into duty by an anonymous source and agrees
to spring back into action. However he does opt to keep
the mission a secret from his wife Helen (who also happened
to be a super hero back in the day - Elastigirl) and their
three children, who may or may not possess powers of their
own.
What
I really enjoyed about The Incredibles was it’s ability
to be both a send up and a homage to super-hero tales at
the same time. It’s playful with it’s winks to
the likes of Superman, Fantastic Four, and X-Men etc., but
it also offers up plenty of furious action and characters
worth caring about.
The
Incredibles is also wickedly funny - poking fun at a mid-life
crisis and it’s an enormously entertaining view at
super-hero suburban life. The Incredibles also comes with
a diabolically hilarious villain in the form of Syndrome
(voiced by the gifted Jason Lee). One of the best running
jokes in the movie is simply the origin of this character.
How he comes to be is sort of a sly jab at fan boys everywhere,
but again, it’s all presented in a playful manner.
Finally, this movie manages to display the importance of
family without beating us over the head with it. In this
respect, The Incredibles reminded me of Robert Rodriguez’s
creative Spy Kids films.
What’s
more, Pixar reaches new heights in the quality of computer
generated animation, delivering a tale that revolves around
human characters. Since the release of Toy Story, we’ve
seen toys, bugs, monsters, and fish come to awe-inspiring
life, but this is Pixar’s first feature length tale
to really put humans at the forefront, and they’ve
done so in impressive fashion.
Once
again, the vocal talent that’s been rounded up to bring
these characters to life is picture perfect. Craig T. Nelson
has the voice of a super-hero and his droll delivery is
right on the money. Samuel L. Jackson does his best Samuel
L. Jackson impersonation as Frozone, and listening to him
utter the line; "Where’s my Super Hero suit woman?"
is an absolute hoot - even if it is a tad obvious. Holly
Hunter offers up the strongest vocal performance. Her comic
timing made me forget I was watching a cartoon.
The
Incredibles was directed by the amazing Brad Bird, who did
plenty of work on The Simpsons before delivering the terrific
Iron Giant. With this creative fantasy tale, he once again
proves that animation is not a genre - it’s a medium.
And he’s found an innovative way to say thank you to
all the characters who have inspired him through the years
(i.e. James Bond, Indiana Jones). But mostly, I admire that
this guy never dumbs down the proceedings. Sure, The Incredibles
is funny and adventurous, but it’s intelligent in ways
that many other animated features aren’t (the recent
Shark Tale, is the perfect example).
If I
have any gripe with this picture at all, it’s the length.
I did find it a tad long (although it should be noted that
it is preceded by a terrific Pixar short called Boundin’),
and towards the end, my little ones did get a little antsy,
but a big bucket of popcorn took care of that. Where do
I rank The Incredibles among Pixar’s other releases.
Well, personally, I didn’t find it as funny as the
Toy Story pictures or as moving as Finding Nemo, but it’s
still a stunning achievement and for my money, it was more
entertaining than A Bug’s Life and Monster’s Inc.
It’s always tough to find the perfect family film,
and this is definitely one of them.
SPECIAL
SIDE NOTE!
Yes,
I did see the Episode III trailer, and yes, it is pretty
darned exciting, even if nearly half of it consisted of
footage from the other films. Still, the minute the Lucasfilm
logo appeared, the packed theater went absolutely nuts.
I was surprised that they actually showed the Darth Vader
suit in the trailer. I figured that would have been one
of the big money shots that Lucas would want to withhold.
There are also some great shots of Yoda prepping for battle
and a brief, but kick-ass glimpse of Anakin and Obi -Wan
fighting atop what looked to be an active volcano with lava
flowing in the background. For whatever reason, there are
several theaters nationwide that didn’t get the trailer.
Don’t worry. On Monday Nov. 7th you’ll be able
to check it out on line. And in fact, I understand there
are plenty of sites that already have it for viewing. Check
it out in the theater if you have the opportunity though.
It’s much cooler.
Grade: B+
Adam Mast, ZBoneMan.com
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