Operación escape

We took our ten year old, and as always, enjoyed a movie made for kids with enough entertainment thrown in for adults. It appears that kids and parents go through the same things, regardless of the planet. Found myself laughing most of the way through, especially when my boyfriend leaned over and said 'you know this is a movie for kids, right?' I guess I'm a kid at heart and this movie was very enjoyable. Loved seeing who played which characters at the end. I only recognized one during the film, but was pleasantly surprised by the rest! Maybe it was the holiday, but our theater was packed, and everyone seemed to walk away having enjoyed the show.

It's no Frozen of course, but some light fun with aliens for the whole family with some awesome animation.

'ESCAPE FROM PLANET EARTH': Two and a Half Stars (Out of Five)

An animated sci-fi adventure film about a popular astronaut hero from another planet who becomes trapped on Earth and has to be rescued by his computer nerd brother. The all-star voice cast includes Brendan Fraser, Rob Corddry, Ricky Gervais, William Shatner, Jessica Alba, Sofia Vergara, Sarah Jessica Parker, Jane Lynch, Craig Robinson, George Lopez, Steve Zahn and Chris Parnell. It's directed by first time feature film director, and former storyboard artist, Carl Brunker and written by Brunker, Bob Barlen, Tony Leech and Cory Edwards. The animation is colorful and fun to look at and the cast is impressive as well but the story and scene content is pretty simplistic. I liked the monster movie sci-fi send-up though.

Scorch Supernova (Fraser) is a popular astronaut superhero, of sorts, on his home planet Baab. He's looked up to by many there but his brother, Gary (Corddry), is the brains behind their team and he always guides the dimwitted Scorch through his missions, from the BASA base where they work. Gary never gets any of the credit though and even his own son Kip (Jonathan Morgan Heit) idolizes Scorch. When their boss, Lena (Alba), orders Scorch to travel to the 'Dark Planet' (Earth), in response to an SOS there, Gary knows it's a bad idea (due to the fact that no other alien life form has ever returned from there). He advises Scorch not to go on the mission but Scorch ignores him and the two get in a huge fight when Gary quits. Scorch goes on the mission without his brother's help, for the first time, and is captured and imprisoned at Area 51. It's of course up to Gary to save him.

The animation is beautiful to look at and has a lot of character to it, unfortunately the story doesn't. It's about as simplistic and by the numbers as you can get. I like a lot of the actors in this cast (especially Corddry, Gervais and Vergara) but their talents are wasted here. Fraser is perfectly cast as the dimwitted hero, once again, but he's the only star that really adds anything special to his role (which is funny because he's arguably the least talented). Like I said the whole Area 51 monster movie send-up is fun but that's about it. It should please kids but other than some great looking animation and a decent score (including a cool song by Owl City) the film has little else to offer adults.

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I took my 9yo and 7yo to see it while a friend of mine with a 5yo did not want to expose her child to a PG movie. Honestly, Tom & Jerry, Road Runner, and Popeye cartoons are 10x more violent than this. It easily could have been G rated. The violence was very mild. The movie was pretty good with some funny parts but many references will go over most kids heads while parents will laugh (do any children under 10yo know what "Area 51" refers to??) I would recommend saving yourself money by staying away from the 3D version of this movie. The first comment from my 7yo after the movie was, "there wasn't much 3D" and she was absolutely right. There were some, but by the middle of the movie, you don't notice it. Movie has a pretty good story line. Not a great movie, but not bad either. Good movie to see on a rainy weekend or day off of school.

Along with bird flick Adventures of Zambezia, this animated alien escapade has been stuck in the large shadow cast by Dreamworks' The Croods this school holiday period. Which, frankly, is completely expected, yet also a bit of a shame. Escape never soars to great heights, in fact it's happy to just coast along in second gear for the most part, but there's a simplicity and lack of self-knowingness to it which is uncommon for family outings these days, making it somewhat refreshing. There are very few pop culture winks and nods, and even less gags for adults, with the focus predominantly on crafting a fun, and funny, film for the kiddies. The animation is noticeably cut-price, the story is unoriginal and the voice cast is a who's who of of C-grade talent - Brendan Fraser as the dimwitted hero, Rob Corrdry as his brainy brother, William Shatner as the nefarious human villain, plus Sarah Jessica Parker, Steve Zahn, Jane Lynch and Craig Robinson to boot - however the tempo is quick, the jokes are frequent and the action sequences are full of gusto; everything a little critter wants from a trip to the cinema.