Moi, moche et méchant 3

24 July 2017 Film of Choice at The Plaza Dorchester this evening - Despicable Me 3. So this is the third outing for Gru and his girls, and his weird dog, and his many many minions. I for one am happy to get back to the old team, I found the Minions film a little too much Minion. This outing gives us another outrageous villain, a guy called Balthazar Bratt, a character completely stuck in the 80s with his music and his dance moves and armed with expanding bubble gum as his weapon of choice. Throw into the mix the discovery that Gru has in fact got a twin brother called Dru and you've got a pretty watchable film. I can't say it was outrageously funny but I did giggle throughout. The humour is very Benny Hill in its slapstick delivery and throw in the sheer determination of Agnes that the existence of unicorns is true, you have quite an endearing film to keep you entertained for a while.

This film tells the story of the ex-villain Gru, who teams up with his twin brother whom he has never met, in order to fight against the former famous child star in Hollywood who has become a horrible villain.

"Despicable Me 3" is so much fun! The plot is super funny as usual. The cinema laughed hard many times. Every character is cute, even the villains. Using bubblegum as a weapon is a novel idea, and it's actually fun. The mansion is crazily nice, abs the minions are cute as usual. I enjoyed it lots, and the many children in the cinema enjoyed it too.

I thought Despicable Me 1 and 2 were great fun, movies that you could watch over and over every few months or so and still laugh. Despicable Me 3 I hardly laughed at all, and can't see myself watching it again anytime soon. That's not to say it wasn't fun. The Minions were kind of funny as usual but the overall plot and script wasn't as witty and charming. Mr. Gru is not really a good guy or villain in this one. The interaction between him and his new found brother provided a few laughs. His new wife tries hard in her new role as mother to Gru's kids, maybe that could have been played up more. I've heard another reviewer say this was an unnecessary sequel, and that's hard to disagree with.

Despicable Me 3 is another obligatory sequel to an animated box-office smash, and it plays out as such: the story's essentially the same as before but the big twist is that South Park co-creator Trey Parker stars in this movie as the lead villain. He does a good job with what he's given, but you wonder WHY he took up the part in the first place!? Was there any real motivation for him doing this besides the money? I think not.

What can I say? It's perfectly harmless family entertainment that makes up for a very... 'because-movie' type of film. This pic gets 3/5 stars.

While there are several interesting things going on at a rapid fire rate, there seems to be no real center to this thing. Even in an animated film, we want a story and characters that we recognize. The animation is awesome and I enjoyed the Mean Kid actor and his adult incarnation. I quickly became bored with the minions. They have no soul or interest to me.