The Ant Bully

I really don't get the negative reviews for this movie. I'm in my forties, so is my husband. Our children are three and eleven. We all loved this movie. I'll buy the DVD.

I liked this movie as well as A Bug's Life, if not better. Why? The message that it's okay to be yourself and that you don't have to simply accept bullying is delivered in a more laid-back way. A Bug's Life and Toy Story, by comparison, are frenetic.

The actors voices and characterization are terrific. All in all, I think the visuals at the end of the film - sort of a funky, hieroglyphic narrative - help to sum up this film's appeal or lack of appeal, depending on the nature of the viewer. If you genuinely prefer faster-paced, more "in-your-face" type of movies (and I realize that most American film viewers do these days), then you will have to acclimate a little to this film. But not much. It's plenty busy.

What it also is, however, is charming. Toy Story was charming. So was the first Shrek, in its own quirky, slightly perverse way. The Ant Bully, in my family's opinion (and we go to a lot of movies), was just what we needed for a Friday night of family entertainment. We had some really good laughs, enjoyed being together, and left feeling upbeat. The audience seemed to enjoy this movie very much. There was a lot of laughter and many people stayed to watch the colorful visuals at the end.

If you don't like this movie, then perhaps you need to learn to kick back and relax a little more often. We found it to be well worth viewing and it will certainly receive a lot of travel time viewing in our car once it's released on DVD. I saw that Tom Hanks was an Executive Producer. Thanks, Tom.

"Ant Bully" was an OK movie about a boy named Lucas (vocied by Zach Tyler Eisen) who was shrunk to ant size. He was shrunken by a wizard ant named Zoc (Nicolas Cage) as a punishment for Lucas harming the ant colony. The Queen (Meryl Streep) then instructed her colony to train Lucas to become an ant like themselves which was a better solution than eating him.

This movie simply whelmed me (to use a term I heard from a YouTube comedy skit.) I wasn't overwhelmed, nor was I underwhelmed. The animation quality was fair-to-middling as was the plot. "Avatar" would go on to have a similar theme (converting a person into one of them) and I didn't like that movie at all. "Ant Bully" has similar components as other more successful movies, but the different elements didn't come together in that harmonious way that gives you a spectacular movie.

'Ant Bully' is another cute animated film with ants. Many might compare it to Dreamworks's 'Antz' and if I'm told to pick one, then 'Ant Bully' is the better one. Of course the story isn't anything new per se but it moves at a steady pace and the characters are very likable. Besides, there's no harm in enjoying some laugh-out-loud moments. For me it was a good 90 minutes spent laughing as I was watching it with my mom and little sister (who enjoyed it too). Voice talents include names like Nicolas Cage, Lily Tomlin, Julia Roberts, Meryl Streep, Paul Giamatti and many more. All of them do fairly well, though Cage appears to sound a little theatrical urban. The animation is brilliant. I especially like how the aunt 'colonization' was created with vibrant colours and attention to detail. Watch out for some cute shorts of the ants. All in all, this is a cute film to enjoy with the family.

I will say I enjoyed The Ant Bully on the whole. Of course the concept has been done to death, and the story is predictable at times. The script on the whole is nice, maybe not as smart or as sassy as Antz and Bug's Life and certainly not as humorous. But this is an example of an animated film that looks very handsome with detailed backgrounds, vibrant colouring and convincing enough character movements. The soundtrack is absolutely lovely. I always look out for this element in every film I review, and I was most impressed with the soundtrack overall. The voice acting is another saving grace, Julia Roberts, Nicolas Cage and Paul Giamatti among others do a stellar job voicing engaging enough characters. The Ant Bully also has a great moral about bullying, a topic I feel most strongly about. Sometimes there is a danger of moralising in films being too preachy, but the writers somehow managed to avoid that, and that was most commendable. All in all, this is a above decent animated film, that never tries to be the best movie ever made. It tries to do something original about a over familiar concept, and while not entirely successful, it is a jolly good attempt. Remember you could have been watching Doogal. 8/10 Bethany Cox

I love CG and am not tired of it yet. To me, the medium of the story is not as important as the quality of the plot, and in The Ant Bully, the story was just too overdone to be satisfying. The graphics and sounds were nice, and it's a shame they were not paired with a more unique storyline.

Pros: The voices were expressive, and there's a different take on ants in this movie than in the previous ones. These follow the laws of nature in some respects but don't in others, so their world may not be as familiar or believable to viewers as those in A Bug's Life or Antz might have been. The CG is great, with nice details where they're needed, and there are different species of wildlife involved. Now if they could just move on to a new subject. No one's done a big CG movie about cockroaches yet...

Cons: The message of the movie is pushed a bit too hard. In many ways, it's exactly the same message as the one in the previous two ant movies. Ant Bully might be pretty interesting for anyone who hasn't already seen A Bug's Life and Antz, but you'll probably still yawn a little and say the magician ant's catch-phrase along with him when it's repeated for the third time.