Sketch is a fun movie that I think could've benefited from some script revisions and editing. There's a lot going for it; I saw this movie at TIFF and the announcer mentioned that director Seth Worley has a background in VFX - it shows.
This movie - the fourth such imaginary creatures come to life movie in 2024, weird ain't it - has some truly impressive CG creations. The movie may be low budget, but the art style of these creatures lends itself well to simple creations. They have texture and make sense in the context of the story, and are undoubtedly the best part of the movie.
Tony Hale is also really good in this, it's nice to see him in a leading man role and I think he plays this character - a grieving single father - quite well. He seems to be the most balanced character, despite film's characteristically snarky script Hale gets a lot of great sentimental moments.
The movie also has a good message and manages to tie itself up quite neatly and in a way I think all good family films should. It explores complicated emotions pretty well. It's a movie unafraid to get creepy at times and really reminds of how family films used to be; often tinged with darkness, because ultimately, life isn't all sunshine and rainbows.
I think what bothered me most about this movie was the script. It's a funny movie, yes, but you know when someone just can't tone it down and keeps cracking jokes, to the point where it's exhausting? I feel like Sketch has that problem. There are also A LOT of "wait, did you just say ____," jokes that occur WELL INTO the final act that I just found tiring after a while.
The movie also has kids. A lot of them. Two of them, the main boy and girl, are fine. They still can't help the movie's overly "MCU" tendencies of winking and joking at every opportunity. But there's one kid - Bowman - who gets WAY too much screen time and I find super obnoxious by the end of the movie. I'm sorry - he's not a great actor and he doesn't know how to interact with the CG creatures. There's a scene where he's supposed to be covered in them where it's evident he doesn't really know what he's looking at and it's super distracting.
There was also a noticeable issue with the sound; too loud and too quiet at times. Maybe it was my theatre, but I suspect it was the mixing. I feel like the movie's score was honestly pretty bad; it never really captured the tone it was supposed to go for and reminded me more of Evil Dead Rise than anything...which just didn't fit.
Overall, this is a fun movie, and it really reminded me of family adventure films from the 80s, 90s, and early 2000s. We definitely need more of these, but this is a debut film and it has the hallmarks of a director to watch for, but who is clearly just starting out.
