Smurfs: The Lost Village Review
PG: Some Mild Action and Rude Humor
Sony, Columbia Pictures, Sony Pictures Animation, The Kerner Entertainment Company, Star Capital
1 Hr and 27 Minutes
Voice Cast: Demi Lovato, Rainn Wilson, Jack McBrayer, Joe Manganiello, Danny Pudi, Mandy Patinkin, Julia Roberts, Michelle Rodriguez, Ellie Kemper, Ariel Winter, Gordan Ramsay, Jake Johnson, Tituss Burgess, Gabriel Iglesias, Jeff Dunham, Meghan Trainor
REVIEW: Sony, the repulsive whores of reboots, are back at it again. Before they give us our third reincarnation of Spider-Man this July, they decide give us a fully CG Smurfs reboot nobody asked for. Yep, we're getting two Sony franchise reboots within the same year people! But who cares? It’s the Smurfs as you should’ve seen them in the first place. Besides, you can’t get worse than Raja Gosnell who, [as I said in my CHiPs review], is a poison to every film adaptation he gets his hands on. And then after sitting through this, I saw his name behind the executive producer credits so you know what that means.
A mysterious map sets Smurfette and her best friends Brainy, Clumsy and Hefty on an exciting and thrilling race through the Forbidden Forest filled with magical creatures to find a mysterious lost village before the evil wizard Gargamel does. Embarking on a roller-coaster journey full of action and danger, the Smurfs are on a course that leads to the discovery of the biggest secret in Smurf history!
THE GOOD: Well its about time a Smurfs movie was released in CG! It's as if the head of Sony Pictures Animation said “we’re Sony Pictures Animation. WE NEED TO DO MORE ANIMATION! NOT THIS LIVE ACTION/CG HYBRID SHIT! Even though it did work for Goosebumps." The best thing about Smurfs: The Lost Village is the animation. From the Smurfs to Gargamel to Azrael the cat and the forest creatures, the designs are all faithful to Peyo’s original creation. Not only does this feel faithful to the 1980s animated series, but more to its comic strips to which the Smurfs originated from. When characters get hurt, different colored stars spontaneously appear like you see in your average comic strip or TV show. The backgrounds are beautiful and detailed where for the entire 90 minutes, you feel like you're in the world of the Smurfs.
Because of the film’s CG production, the movie benefits from a frantic pace. Because of SPA's filmography of fast speed and frantic moving motion pictures like Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs and Hotel Transylvania, this rightfully has the fast speed to keep the film going. There is a lot of movement going on throughout that thoroughly works. Whenever an action sequence comes on, you are engaged because of the fast movement and the animation. The film constantly plays with the Smurfs’ small scale as everything that chases them are larger than them which makes the action sequences surprisingly epic. It relies on your average Hanna Barbara cartoon physics that truly captures the spirit of the Smurfs.
As I said, this is the Smurfs as you should've seen them in the first place: CG. No Neil Patrick Harris or Jayma Mays or any of that real world shit. This reboot is so rebooted that the entire voice cast was changed even though it doesn't really make a difference. Since her voice isn’t grating as Katy Perry’s Smurfette or every variation of Smurfette for that matter, Demi Lovato’s voice performance as Smurfette really carries this entire movie. She doesn’t have a raspy voice that I’m unable to understand for her voice is clear and shows a lot of range of emotions.
THE BAD: Before the 2011 release, The Smurfs were originally supposed to be produced and released by Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies as a fully CG film slated for a 2008 release. When Sony got the rights, they Raja Gosnell'ed the shit out of it to where it became the turd we all know and hate till this day. This film perfectly feels like the Smurfs movie that was supposed to be released in 2008.
That is the problem.
Smurfs The Lost Village is a film that feels more than 10 years way too late. This film actually would’ve fit in the 2000s decade during the time when studios [that weren’t Pixar] were trying to find their footing with balancing CG animation and story. If it barely succeeded in one or the other, critics just gave them a pat on the back and an E for effort. Shit, even Disney Animation didn't succeed with this until they released Bolt in 2008.
The movie is zany and fast, but today we apply that fast animation with both an engaging story and consistent humor. Today we have films like The LEGO Movie and Shaun the Sheep which features fast and zany animation, but a meaningful story. And then there are some movies that rely a lot on its humor and animation more than the story that also work like Despicable Me and Secret Life of Pets. There is a good amount of effort put behind this, but a lot of feels as if it was fast-tracked for release. I say this because the story feels incomplete and the humor isn't fully fleshed out. Even when they're delivered its not even that funny. In fact, it feels more mean spirited than funny since a lot of the humor comes from everyone picking on Brainy Smurf just for being a nerd.
The only thing that the Lost Village has going for it is its fast animation. Director Kelly Asbury (Shrek 2, Gnomeo & Juliet) tries his best making the film as faithful to Peyo’s original series, but his direction can’t top the blandness of the script.
It is odd because the film was written by two female screenwrtiers. One wrote episodes of The Goldbergs (Stacey Harman) and the other is currently writing the upcoming Wreck-It Ralph sequel (Pamela Ribon). The script isn’t terrible for it, fortunately, doesn't feature pop culture references or product placement but it's nothing particularly special. The film is concise with its story, but it doesn’t really have much going on. The movie is centered on a mystery that was spoiled in the trailer but yet obvious, to begin with. It's pretty much Smurfs in the Valley of Women.
The film has a strong opening where it begins like an episode of Modern Family with a mockumentary format explaining what Smurfette is. It is a clever idea that is just immediately dropped until the very end. After that, the film just turns into your typical point A to point B adventure movie. This sucks because I remember a uniquely specific Sony Pictures Animation movie that was released a decade ago which had a mockumentary format and was consistent with it. This movie was called Surf's Up and was the only SPA film to this day to be nominated for an Oscar for Best Animated Film.
The story is about Smurfette wanting to find out her individuality, but its nearly the same story we saw in the last Smurfs movie. Though nobody likes the live action Smurfs films, that doesn’t mean you have to retread the story about individuality. Female individuality is a message that is powerful for girls especially in a time like today. The issue with this is that they have absolutely no idea how to deliver that message at all. It is nearly nothing as effective as the many entries released by Disney in the past year which is saying a lot since writer Pamela Ribon was one of the writers on Moana which is a perfect Disney film that was effective with its feminist individuality message that managed to have an engaging story. They don’t do much with the female Smurf group except show how much it cost to hire Julia Roberts, Ellie Kemper, and Michelle Rodriguez and say HEY WE GOT FEMALE SMURFS SO WE CAN PULL IN THE FEMALE DEMOGRAPHIC TO WATCH THIS MOVIE! I can see your corporate marketing game Sony you can't fool me!
I can’t believe I’m saying this but at least with the first live action Smurfs film, there was a sense of urgency with the Smurfs getting home before Gargamel found them. There’s no real sense of urgency here because Gargamel is nothing but a joke. As much as I’m okay with the new voice cast, a Hank Azaria Gargamel was constantly missed. Hank Azaria was the show stealer for the movies due to his voice and his character. This Gargamel is a man-child at best who really doesn’t know what he’s doing. He’s not menacing or a huge threat which results to him being bland as an antagonist. Hank Azaria was menacing enough to be that sense of urgency those films needed. Rainn Wilson is a great voice actor, but his pitch as Gargamel feels half-assed as if he just got out of bed to do this. I remember Wilson being the antagonist in Dreamworks’ Monsters Vs. Aliens where his voice perfectly balanced the humor with that character. He had a pitch that was menacing and intimidating. He wasn’t a character that was to be taken seriously but he was a formidable foe to the monsters so I’m just baffled of how little effort Wilson puts into this. It’s just Rainn Wilson’s regular voice as Gargamel and it sucks.
Besides the generic story, the film has plenty of cringe-worthy moments. For every Smurfs film, I was happy there was no inclusion of a certain song ever being played UNTIL NOW! It was inevitable for this song. They play the Eiffel 65 hit Blue (Da Ba Dee) during a montage where Smurfette assimilates with her Smurf sisters and it does not fit the montage at all. The film plays unnecessary music for no reason throughout. I did groan but I honestly wasn’t going to mind it as long as the film didn’t end with a big dancing sequence.
OKAY, I’M DONE! I’M TIRED OF ANIMATED MOVIES THAT CONCLUDES WITH DANCING. DANCING IS NOT THE ONLY WAY TO CONCLUDE YOUR MOVIE. ONLY SHREK AND THE DESPICABLE ME MOVIES EARN THE RIGHT TO DANCE AT THE END OF THEIR MOVIES! FROM NOW ON, IF YOUR ANIMATED MOVIE ENDS WITH A DANCING SEQUENCE
YOU
ARE
LOSING
A
STAR
AUTOMATICALLY
AARDMAN, DREAMWORKS, PIXAR, I DON’T FUCKING CARE WHO YOU ARE! You bust a move before your credits, you lose a star. For a moment I preferred the Smurfs rapping midway through the 2011 movie opposed to a fucking dance party to end this movie.
LAST STATEMENT: Generic, thematically outdated, and stale, Smurfs: The Lost Village is proof that no matter how pretty something looks it's never good to revive the dead horse you’ve already beaten into the ground.
Rating: 2/5 | 45%
Super Scene: Gargamel breaks the fourth wall during the credits.
