HOLLYWOOD STOCK EXCHANGE
THE ENTERTAINMENT MARKET
THE ENTERTAINMENT MARKET
Angry Birds is hands down the best video game to film adaptation *ever*... (no spoilers)
I am not kidding. I went to see it on Friday (don't judge me, if it was up to me I would have watched X-Men) but let me tell you, they nailed it.
The animation is insanely good, more than it ever had the right to be, seeing that this is based on an iPhone game.
The story is simple and it's pretty much the "story" from the games (I only ever really played the first iteration back when it came out) but they expanded it where it had to be expanded and re-worked stuff to make the rest fit. For example, the birds themselves are not exactly like the game, but you can tell the design of each one was carefully thought out and nothing looked rushed, and after seeing this, I can't picture what the birds used to look like.
And on the most part, it works as something to hang the jokes off (a lot of which land thanks to the shotgun approach) and it never really gets into Pixar territory but it deals with some bigger themes by the end of the run-time.
The voices were pitch-perfect, I think Josh Gad was the stand-out and Dinklage was great... so was Sean Penn (although I completely forgot he was cast in it before I went in).
I really can't get over the animation. The level of detail and the tiny movements of the birds was crazy good. It really makes the animation of the Minion and Despicable Me movies look even worse by comparison than they already do.
One of the downsides was that I couldn't shake this feeling that the movie was kind of like a demo-reel. They try really hard to play with all these cool different styles and riffs on movie genres and it does come off like they are trying to show off what they can do, especially when they chop and change the look of scenes really fast -- sometimes for a sight gag or joke, other times for fun -- and it kind took me out of it (but eventually I got used to it).
But kids should eat it up. It has the same feeling the games had, even that rapid-fire direction, feels like I'm switching levels in the game (or even switching from app-to-app) and you can tell it was designed for those with tiny attention spans.
Even though it sounds click-baity, it's the truest video game film I've ever watched and all filmmakers can really learn from what they did right here when it comes to video game adaptations. You can change what needs to be changed, as long as it is in service of making the film feel like it's from the same planet from the games, and above all, that it works as a movie.
Did I mention how good the animation was?
Angry Birds is hands down the best video game to film adaptation *ever*... (no spoilers) May 21, 07:01
Better than Jean Claude Van Damme's Street Fighter?! SACRILEGE!!!! {nm} May 21, 07:36
It appears that you have not seen "Super Mario Bros." Film was exquisite. And, yes, the . was in the title. {nm} May 21, 12:48
