Rio (2011)
Directed by Carlos Saldanha
Captured by smugglers when he was just a hatchling, a macaw named Blu never learned to fly and lives a happily domesticated life in Minnesota with his human friend, Linda. Blu is thought to be the last of his kind, but when word comes that Jewel, a lone female, lives in Rio de Janeiro, Blu and Linda go to meet her. Animal smugglers kidnap Blu and Jewel, but the pair soon escape and begin a perilous adventure back to freedom -- and Linda.
3 connections found
View:
3 films that influenced Rio
What critics say influenced Rio
Clement sounds like Jeremy Irons, which is appropriate since Nigel is an anthropomorphic villain on par with Irons' Scar from The Lion King.
Not all of the 14 songs are as successful in capturing the spirit of the moment, and one song seems derivative of a big production number we heard in "The Lion King."
Rio's opening, an apparent homage to the beginning of The Lion King , does little beyond providing evidence that old-fashioned, 2-D hand-drawn animation can at times provide a more complete, compelling experience than new-fangled, 3-D computer-generated animation.
The grey, droopy-eyed cockatoo – who looks like Sidney Greenstreet and sounds like Scar from The Lion King – is in cahoots with exotic pet poachers and helps them take Blu, Jewel and the other birds to a poacher’s hut, before they’ll be shipped abroad.
This is a lightweight family cartoon, not City of God or something.
Clearly, Blue Sky Studios (the team behind the “Ice Age” movies) were merely looking for as colorful a setting as possible but anyone who knows the real-life story of Brazil (or has seen “City of God”) may think that this was an unusual subject matter.
It's not exactly "City of God," but there's at least some acknowledgment that life's not all about samba and sunbathing in Rio.
So Blu and his human, Linda, do like Fred and Ginger and fly down to Rio, Rio by the sea-o, where they run afoul of some "City of God"-inspired thieves and their murderous cockatoo henchman ( Jemaine Clement ) and spend most of the picture searching for each other.
City of God in a kids’ movie?
Brazil, of course, has a strong movie past with City Of God among the many stories to have used the country as a backdrop.
And the use of 3-D, which so often feels so needless and like such an afterthought, is surprisingly effective in the hands of Saldanha (director or co-director of the “Ice Age” movies) and his team.
But Carlos Saldanha, who has directed or co-directed most of Blue Sky’s productions (including the Ice Age films and Robots), is a native Brazilian, born and raised in Rio de Janeiro — and that’s why Rio is something special.
Director Carlos Saldanha ("Ice Age" trilogy, "Robots"), himself a native of Rio, creates an enchanting backdrop for the birds' rollicking story.
As with Ice Age: The Meltdown—which also leaned heavily on a last-of-their-species-so-they-better-fuck plotline—Rio keeps the sex talk PG-rated, but it was still odd to see it as a kiddie-film storyline once, let alone twice.
The buzz: Ads for “Rio” promote it as coming from the makers of “Ice Age,” as if that’s a good thing.
Rio is the latest 3D animation from Carlos Saldanha, director of the Ice Age series.