Chris Renaud
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Toy Story (1995)
Directed by John Lasseter
influenced Despicable Me (2010), The Lorax (2012)
Characters
The gorgeous and glorious new film of this fable from Universal’s “Despicable Me” team turns a somewhat gloomy, cautionary tale into a 3D musical, with catchy tunes and gags borrowed from every film from “Toy Story” and “The Truman Show” to “Babe.”
More annoying, Despicable Me borrows left and right from other, better animated/kids films, lifting ideas from The Grinch, Meet the Robinsons, The Incredibles, A Series of Unfortunate Events and Toy Story (the minions are nothing more than a carbon copy of the alien squeeze toys in that film).
Resembling the underground factory in Metropolis, it's manned by yellow, phallic, sometimes monocular humanoids not unlike the one-eyed blue B.O.B. in Monsters vs. Aliens, or the three-eyed Pizza Planet aliens from the Toy Story movies.
In truth, it’s not the best title from a marketing perspective, since it doesn’t tell you anything about the movie, certainly not in comparison to, say, “Toy Story,” “The Princess and the Frog” or “Finding Nemo.”
Small, yellow, capsule-shaped and coverall wearing, these minions scurry about doing all manner of work for Gru, whom they adore the same way the aliens in the "Toy Story" trilogy worship the all-powerful Claw.
The Bad Guys (2022)
Directed by Pierre Perifel
influenced by Despicable Me (2010), The Secret Life of Pets (2016)
Themes Plot
The Bad Guys shared a theme with films like Wreck-It Ralph , Megamind , Despicable Me , and most importantly Zootopia .
With its emphasis on gadget-enhanced heists, and ability to work them into the story even in the service of virtue rather than vice, The Bad Guys recalls the villain battles of Despicable Me .
We’ve seen it in Megamind (2010) and to a much larger degree, Despicable Me (2010).
"The Bad Guys" certainly qualifies as a richer experience than the animated sequels to "Despicable Me" and "The Addams Family," but lags behind all Pixar productions.
Think Despicable Me , Sing , or the most recent animated Grinch cartoon from Illumination as key aspects.
It goes to some creative and funny places, featuring some fine voice talent, but the animation is nothing special, and way too much of it feels like rehashed parts of other animated films, most notably Monsters Inc., Zootopia, and the Despicable Me series.
The Incredibles (2004)
Directed by Brad Bird
influenced Despicable Me (2010), The Lorax (2012)
Characters Visuals Plot Themes
While the O’Hare character is somewhat reminiscent of Edna Mode in Pixar’s The Incredibles, Thneedville’s visual and thematic cues are similarly evocative of the twin worlds of WALL-E.
The boy has a name now, Ted, and he's voiced by Zac Efron; he journeys out to the wasteland home of the Once-Ler (Ed Helms), trying to impress a girl, Audrey (Taylor Swift), who wants to see a real-live tree - for Ted and Audrey and everyone else lives in the walled city of Thneedville, where everything is artificial, including the air, sold by the cunning entrepreneur Aloysius O'Hare (Rob Riggle), who looks like The Incredibles 's Edna Mode on drag king night.
He looks less like a Dr. Seuss character than Edna Mode from "The Incredibles."
More annoying, Despicable Me borrows left and right from other, better animated/kids films, lifting ideas from The Grinch, Meet the Robinsons, The Incredibles, A Series of Unfortunate Events and Toy Story (the minions are nothing more than a carbon copy of the alien squeeze toys in that film).
The world of Despicable Me is reminiscent of The Incredibles, where superheroes and supervillains participate in everyday life, raising their kids and keeping up their suburban homes just like ordinary mortals.
Despicable Me is already instantly inviting comparisons with Brad Bird's The Incredibles and has a chance to ingeniously invert loyalties over to the bad guy's point of view and purpose.
Mission: Impossible (1996)
Directed by Brian De Palma
influenced The Lorax (2012), Despicable Me (2010)
Music
Not only are these people unpleasant for the most part, but the new aspects of the story are forced, frenetic and so far from the gentle but pointed original that the film's musical riff from the "Mission: Impossible" theme does not sound out of place.
The movie, which also benefits from the straightforward agenda of the villainous air salesman Mr. O’Hare (Rob Riggle), would be even cleaner without some of its comedic lunges—like Ted’s mom (Jenny Slate) dancing to a tree’s disco ball or a group of fish singing the “Mission: Impossible” theme song.
There are a few pleasures to be had here, beginning with those charming fish (their rendition of the "Mission Impossible" theme is a highlight).
The fish who inhabit the forrest can’t just walk around on their fins; they have to do a Mission: Impossible spoof as well.
When the Lorax and some animals sneak into the Once-ler's house late at night, we hear the "Mission: Impossible" music.
Some very amusing original set pieces — like an expedition to a department store by a trio of minions and a giddy amusement-park outing for Gru and the girls — fit well next to swift spoofs of Mission: Impossible and The Godfather.
The gorgeous and glorious new film of this fable from Universal’s “Despicable Me” team turns a somewhat gloomy, cautionary tale into a 3D musical, with catchy tunes and gags borrowed from every film from “Toy Story” and “The Truman Show” to “Babe.”
Thneedville is a futuristic metropolis not unlike the sheltered environment of “The Truman Show.”
Thneedville feels like an animated version of the world inhabited by Jim Carrey in The Truman Show.
This latest effort from Illumination Entertainment falls in line with its “Despicable Me” and “The Secret Life of Pets” franchises.
Sing is, of course, the big family-friendly holiday movie for this Christmas, hoping to capitalize on audience goodwill built up from the Despicable Me franchise and The Secret Life of Pets.
The producers of the animated family flick "Sing" really, really want you to know it was made by Illumination Entertainment, the same surging animation outfit behind the "Despicable Me" movies.
If it weren’t for the four little Minions who flex their pipes at the opening of “Sing,” you wouldn’t necessarily know that the massively entertaining jukebox musical that follows hails from the same studio that brought you “Despicable Me” and “The Secret Life of Pets.”
Finding Nemo (2003)
Directed by Andrew Stanton
influenced The Secret Life of Pets 2 (2019)
Themes Characters
Even though it poaches some themes and narrative structure from yet another Pixar classic (“Finding Nemo”), at least this time around the filmmakers demonstrate an essential understanding of the deeper elements that make that film work.
As in Toy Story 2 , this twist is quickly untwisted; Max becomes a surrogate parent to the tyke, mimicking the pivot from fear to protectiveness from Monsters, Inc. and the nervous-dad tics of Finding Nemo .
I checked because I thought the author of the screenplay might have been Dory, the forgetful fish from Finding Nemo.
Max’s over-parenting plight is reflective of storylines in Finding Nemo and Inside Out, and his connection with Rooster calls to mind the down-home connection between Lightning McQueen and Doc Hudson in Cars.
There are the requisite film homages and references (“The Fugitive” an obvious go to, “Some Like It Hot” less so) to keep the adults happy, and the parkour-performing wiener dog is just pure fun.
“I’m a cat,” she replies acidly — to which Pops offers the wonderful final line from Some Like It Hot .
"Nobody's perfect," he shrugs, stealing a line from Some Like It Hot.
All that we see of Santa's North Pole home is a big cottage on a mountain and a scene or two in the elves' toy shop (speaking of the elves, they come off as unfunny rip-offs of the yellow minions from 2010's " Despicable Me ," whether that's the case or not).
The film relies far more on the mere fact of "Santa Claus with swords" or "Easter Bunny with boomerangs and a bad attitude" than it does in giving anybody a distinctive, meaningful personality, and the whole film ends up feeling like a gimmick; a handsome, complex gimmick, but still just one more in the line of DreamWorks's impersonal pop culture melanges, thankfully deprived of any obnoxious jokey references outside of the lazy theft of the minions from Despicable Me .
His shop is manned by Yeti (who look a heck of a lot like Chewbacca) and Elves (who resemble the Minions from “Despicable Me” in almost every way).
Then there are Santa's elves, who provide the kind of silly comic relief that the minions of Despicable Me provided.
Even the deeply adorable stuff — like Baby Tooth, a tiny helper fairy, and Santa’s elves, who are more like an army of rambunctious kittens crossed with Despicable Me’s Minions — cut as often as they cute.
Elves consisting of conical red hats with eyes peering out and skinny legs protruding beneath are this movie's "Despicable Me" minions, lots of little funny, somewhat inept guys that make cute little squeaky noises.
The animation is gorgeous to the eye, while the vocal work is excellent, with Hart probably having the most fun as the diminutive but militant, chatterbox rabbit (who, if the species matched, would be some distant but angrier relative to Eddie Murphy's Donkey from the "Shrek" movies).
Kevin Hart voices the precious-but-vicious little furball — another choice casting that’s solid, but not as unexpected as, say, Antonio Banderas playing Puss in Boots in the “Shrek” movies.
As expected, there are a few gags littered around for grown-ups, notably an overt nod to The Godfather 's 'horse's head in a bed' scene and referencing the Bank of Evil - which finances nefarious supervillain deeds - as "formerly Lehman Brothers".
Some very amusing original set pieces — like an expedition to a department store by a trio of minions and a giddy amusement-park outing for Gru and the girls — fit well next to swift spoofs of Mission: Impossible and The Godfather.
To regain his standing, Gru plots to steal the moon—assuming the Bank of Evil will finance him (shades of Victor Spinetti in Help! (1965), who is “out to rule the world, if he can get a government grant”).
The singing and dancing reminded me of “Jesus Christ Superstar” more than anything else.
Despicable Me may not match the stratospherically high standards set by Up and WALL-E but that hardly matters when it’s this much fun.
These human elements are significantly stronger than the inevitable climactic feud between Gru and Vector, full of flying and sky-set action that is reminiscent of?and done better in?2009's " Up " and 2010's " How to Train Your Dragon ."
By traipsing over into Up's territory where a surly man with a plan is forced into bonding with children, the shoes become even bigger to fill.
It would help if nobody saw The Incredibles, Up and Toy Story.
Borrowing liberally, plot wise, from “Up,” “Monsters, Inc.” and other Pixar animations, “Despicable Me” is a delightful, funny little movie that had me laughing frequently and loudly.
The Grinch (2018)
Directed by Yarrow Cheney
influenced by The Lorax (2012), Despicable Me (2010), Despicable Me 2 (2013), The Secret Life of Pets (2016)
Characters
The Lorax featured a soft, cuddly Danny DeVito-voiced version of the title character.
From the studio that produced the Despicable Me movies and 2012’s terrible The Lorax , The Grinch is the second film the highly profitable family animation studio has made based on Dr. Seuss’s adored text, and it’s the second time the story of the holiday-hating green grouch comes to the silver screen after 2000’s How the Grinch Stole Christmas .
It follows two prior Seuss-based animated films: 2008’s Horton Hears A Who and 2012’s The Lorax.
Marking the third Seuss adaptation by Chris Meledandri’s Illumination Entertainment after 2008’s Horton Hears a Who! and 2012’s The Lorax , the Universal release should generate plenty of family-friendly, pre-holiday cheer when it opens this weekend.
Like the 2012 adaptation of Seuss’ The Lorax, this iteration of The Grinch comes to us via Illumination Entertainment, those purveyors of the insufferable yellow creatures known as Minions.
Co-directed by Yarrow Cheney and Scott Mosier, this is the second Illumination filming of a Seuss tale after The Lorax , and it probably won’t be the last either given that Seuss died in 1991 and his surviving family have been making big money licensing his books for films and lucrative merchandise ever since.
In many ways, “Despicable Me 2” plays a lot like an “Ice Age” or “Madagascar” sequel.
They're funny, in a Madagascar penguins or Pizza Planet little green men sort of way, one-joke bit players whose appeal was underestimated before and overestimated now, former scene swipers presently having scenes and ad campaigns handed to them.
Like the penguins of Madagascar, the Minions are destined for their own film, as an end-credits audition sequence indicates.
Dreamworks’ Madagascar and Shrek series may be creatively exhausted, but Universal proves with Despicable Me 2 that Pixar’s animators aren’t the only ones capable of top-quality sequels.
Especially smart on Coffin and Renaud’s part is the extra screen time given to the Minions, who have taken over the penguins of Madagascar and Scrat from Ice Age as the best side characters in animated film today.
Because there is no reasonable motivation for Ted’s actions in leaving the Terry Gilliam’s Brazil-esque “sanctuary” of Thneedville on his quest to find a real-live-tree for Audrey -- unless you sincerely believe that teenaged boys are nothing but perpetual erections -- The Lorax must bend over backwards, in whatever ridiculous ways it deems necessary, in order to hold itself together.
Ted, inspired by Audrey's dreams for a better, realer place to live, the Once-ler's grim downfall of "Citizen Kane" proportions, and the Lorax's messages of empowerment and respect, hopes to change all that's gone wrong in Thneedville.
When James Stewart offers to lasso the moon for Donna Reed in Frank Capra’s classic It’s a Wonderful Life, it’s purely a romantic gesture.
Soul feels like the first Pixar film where no one cared if the youngest could keep pace with the ideas as long as they ooh and aah at the Seussian sketch of its spiritual settings and cackle at the slapstick of a second act that, quite honestly, feels a small step above The Secret Life of Pets .