Let’s say this for “The Lego Movie”: It’s a shining example within a highly dubious genre. As full-length toy advertisements go, you really couldn’t ask for more. Writer-directors Phil Lord and Christopher Miller are experts at adaptation work, having also given us “Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs” and “21 Jump Street.” Both films show they know how to turn potential disasters into unexpected delights — and the third time is the charm. Unlike you, Miller and Lord considered a key detail: a Lego piece’s personality. Both the excitement and frustrations of playing with stiff interlocking blocks are distilled into their main character, Emmet (voiced by Chris Pratt). From left, Wyldstyle (voiced by Elizabeth Banks, Emmet (Chris Pratt) and Vitruvius (Morgan Freeman in the animated adventure “The Lego Movie” Emmet is an apt hero for a Lego adventure movie: He passes his days carefully following instructions — also apt! — in an ordered existence.
But his life is upended when he meets the rebellious Wyldstyle (Elizabeth Banks), who introduces him to another side of the Lego world — one that Lord Business (Will Ferrell) is planning to take over. Together, they — and various Lego figures like a cop (Liam Neeson), an old man (Morgan Freeman), Batman (Will Arnett) and Superman (Channing Tatum) — have to use all available materials to defeat him. From left, Emmet (voiced by Chris Pratt), Wyldstyle (Elizabeth Banks) and Batman (Will Arnett) in the animated adventure “The Lego Movie” There are some great messages here about teamwork, imagination and courage, but it’s hard to ignore the biggest point of the movie: “You need Legos to do all this cool stuff, so don’t you want to buy them as soon as the movie is over?” Still, Lord and Miller don’t sink into cynicism. Their computer animation embraces the retro look and feel of the toys to both ingenious and adorable effect. (Skip the expensive and unnecessary 3D ticket, though.)
The witty screenplay is written to entertain adults as well as children. And the cast — which also includes Jonah Hill, in one of the best gags as a really annoying Green Lantern — is totally on board. It’s such a good time that kids of all ages will leave the movie buzzing to play with Lego - and that’s a blessing and a curse.'The Shack' Gift With Purchase Buy tickets and get a free song download. 'The LEGO Batman Movie' Gift With Purchase Buy tickets to ‘The LEGO Batman Movie’ and get 50% off a digital copy of ‘The LEGO Movie’ on FandangoNOW. 'Fifty Shades Darker' Gift With Purchase Buy tickets to 'Fifty Shades Darker' and get 50% off a digital copy of 'Fifty Shades of Grey' on FandangoNOW. The LEGO® StoreROCKEFELLER CENTER® 620 Fifth Avenue @ 50th StreetNew York NY 10020 for the time being, please call us at (212) 245-5974. Visit the LEGO Store at Rockefeller Center! LEGO Monthly Mini Model Build Sign up online for the March Mini Model Build starting February 15!
Event takes place March 7-8, and is only open to members of the LEGO VIP loyalty program. Sign up in advance for a LEGO Disney Beauty and the Beast building event! March 4 & 11. February 10-28: FREE Exclusive Disco and Clown Batman™ Minifigures with purchases of $75 or more! Scroll over the calendar to learn more! See Printable PDF version REQUEST AFREE LEGO CATALOG STAY TUNED WITHLEGO NEWS Regal Battery Park Stadium 11 Regal Union Square Stadium 14 Regal E-Walk Stadium 13 & RPX UA Kaufman Astoria Cinemas 14 & RPX Regal Atlas Park Stadium 8 UA Midway Stadium 9 See More Theaters Near Brooklyn, NY THE SHACK: MOVIE PREMIERE BEAUTY AND THE BEAST OPENING NIGHT FAN EVENT BEAUTY AND THE BEAST 3D (2017) BEAUTY AND THE BEAST (2017) ‘The Lego Batman Movie' Character Guide Watch: 'The Lego Ninjago Movie' Teaser Introduces a Reluctant Team of NinjasOkay, first: watch The Lego Movie. It is not a shameless cash grab.
I mean, fine, it totally is. But it’s the opposite of the Bratz movie. It’s hysterical, well-plotted, subversive, poignant and all the other adjectives you can read on Rotten Tomatoes, where it’s currently at 95%. That’s Toy Story numbers.But this isn’t a movie review. And it’s not really a nostalgia-trip post. It’s about the pleasures of building plastic junk.See, The Lego Movie isn’t about Legos. It’s not like “and there are characters, but they’re all LEGOS!” It’s about the spirit of the craft: that horrible tension between autonomy and automatic, the split between do we follow the rules and make something perfect vs what if that spaceship had a fucking crossbow laser. The Lego Movie works, because it’s about the builders — not the products.I loved Legos growing up. Early on, I didn’t have many friends. I was dangerously scrawny and moody, and for whatever reason — and I don’t understand my present psychology, let alone 11 year-old Ari’s — I had an obsessive personality.
The things I successively attached to — mystery series, Star Wars, Legos, music (which stuck, since girls didn’t hate that) — I got into head-first. I became those things. That might be typical of Young Boys, but when you got picked last in a game you didn’t even want to play, it was all I had.In my childhood bedroom, there is a half-decrepit X-Wing hanging above my Magic Treehouse collection. I hate throwing things away; my third grade quizzes still sit in my closet, Just In Case. That X-Wing was my baby. I spent hours and hours begging and pleading for that obscenely expensive box of plastic, and then stayed up nights working on it. It’s actually a little scary, how single-minded I was.The movie shows the pleasures of both. God, the feeling of being useful — of following the rules and nailing it. The joy of constructing a perfect little world, where everything works like it should, where everyone understands each other and nobody feels lost.I always followed the instructions.
I thrilled in doing everything perfectly, by the book. There was probably some level of tic involved, but it made me happy. Following the instructions is an underrated pleasure.I have a theory that all machines orgasm when they complete a task that they were designed to do. So men orgasm when their wieners squirt semen, because that’s their biological programming. And maybe computers have a mini cum when they load a webpage. Maybe every time a doorbell rings, it shivers in whatever metaphysical state you want. The idea is that as complex machines, we want to be useful. Computers want to work (although I am not joking, my laptop crashed as I typed that). Guns want to shoot. Some part of the human thing wants to make more humans.But then there’s the hard part. The part where you don’t get to be a robot. Doorbells have it easy. Because penises be damned — as humans, we don’t have a hardwired purpose.There was a problem following the instructions. Once I finished a Lego model, it was done.
There was nothing to do with it. If a Lego set is just the summation of its instructions, then completion means it ceases to have a purpose. The program has run. You can’t play with it, because it’s not about play. You can’t dismantle it, because then it’s broken — that is, incomplete. It sits on your shelf, gathering dust until you go to college, the subject of the same conversation every 18 months with your mom — “So what do I do with this?” “Okay…” — and suddenly it’s been over a decade, growing heavier and heavier.And me — little Ari, sitting in pajamas on my carpet. Finished with Darth Vader. Finished with the starships. I sat around my inert models. I didn’t understand it, for years. The pieces were in place. Well, sure, but was that life — looking forward to more complicated instructions, fitting bigger pieces where they should go? Was the future a ceaseless progression of tasks to complete? And yep, I definitely found a joy in that.