TMNT: les tortues ninja

Greetings again from the darkness. Reinventing a once popular franchise is always a bit of a gamble since the built-in audience will be very critical to changes and building a new audience can be extremely difficult. The secret usually lies in the ability to recapture the good parts from the original and add modern touches in order to attract new viewers.

Director Kevin Munroe delivers some witty one-liners and a couple of nice fight scenes all wrapped up in a terrific new animation style that lends itself very well to the dark side of sewers and big cities. Additionally, some complicated interaction between Leonardo and Rafael add a dimension not normally seen with the Turtles. All the necessary elements are there: the fight scenes (in keeping with the PG rating) are action packed, but with very little real violence; the bad guys are bent on world domination, even though the familiar Shredder is gone; the Turtle brothers struggle at times, but of course come together as a team when necessary; and the funny one-liners will make all ages giggle.

The downsides are the opening stage-setting scene, which will be a bit boring and hard to follow for the youngsters and the lack of any type of catchy music for the characters. Michaelangelo remains the fun-loving one, but he and Donnatello are pretty minor characters, and a big complaint is the lack of edge to Casey Jones. Instead of a hockey mask, he should probably dress as the Sta-Puff Marshmallow Man. Still, none of that takes away from a fun film with a beautiful look.

Voice acting is pretty well done by the likes of Chris Evans, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Patrick Stewart, Mako, Kevin Smith and Ziyi Zhang. So take the kids and if you were once a Turtle fan, you should treat yourself to the fine new version. Cowabunga!!

TMNT does its job: CGIs are done very nicely, the visual overhaul of the Turtles' design comes near the original comic-look and for a kiddie flick (let's face it TMNTs target audience is well below 14) it is a shade darker, cooler and grown-up than any of the other animation films hitting the Box Office right now.

I was not sure what to expect after some of the reviews I read before seeing TMNT, but have to admit I was pleasantly surprised. Snappy one-liners and some tongue-in-cheek comments younger viewers will not get did really make this a great CGI-movie. Especially the hyper-kinetic camera work and the rather unusual scene setups were really intriguing.

Don't listen to the "It's-not-like-the-comics"-Fanboys and dive into the turtle world, you won't regret it.

Saw the preview of TMNT on the weekend and I have to say that the comments from ChimpCadet are spot on.

I am one of the older generation of TMNT fans and I can happily say that I greatly enjoyed watching this film. Also the row of children sitting behind me did not make one noise from the start of the film to the end. Which I think is a good sign to universal appeal of this film.

The plot ticks along at a good pace, some of the action sequence are outstanding in terms of action, animation and detail (as stated by ChimpCadet the fight in the rain is a highlight of this film).

On the whole a great film that does well to start the franchise and spawn a sequel or two.

You've probably been hearing comments of how stunning the animation was. And every last one of those comments are right. It is obvious how much care and attention was put into the look of this film. Everything from the New York City environment to the Turtles themselves looked absolutely fantastic.

The story was sort of a mixed bag. I liked the struggle between the Turtles and how Leonardo is trying his hardest to get the team back together with Raphael trying to pull away. Everything else, however, could've been a little better. There doesn't really seem to be any level of suspense here, save for a fight between two main characters (which looks phenomenal, I might add). I also would've liked to have seen a bit more screen time for Donatello, who always seems to be pushed to the side. And there were some jokes here and there that might make you cringe, most of them involving Michelangelo. But this is still an enjoyable flick for everyone to watch, even if you're not a Turtle fan. It's worth seeing for the animation alone.

Just saw this tonight at an advance screening. Have to say it didn't really leave me disappointed, but it's certainly not harking back to the hyper violent original graphic novels that some might have hoped. It's more of a continuation of the original couple of films, so more action than violence.

The story is a bit silly, but befitting of an animated piece. It mainly plays a back seat to the inner-turmoil between the four brothers which is the main focus of the film. Leo and Raph have the majority of the screen time with Don and Mikey taking a back seat, even to the likes of April and Casey.

Style wise, it looks very good, with some excellent fight sequences. Although overall the film went by very very quickly. Voice Acting was good too, nice to see Patrick Stewart in the mix too.

Basically if you liked the original movies than you'll be in for a treat. If you're one of those people that thinks they should all have red bandanas and swear all the time then this might not be exactly what you were hoping for.