Sign In or Join to save for later Genre: Family and Kids Running Time: 100 minutes What parents need to know Parents Need to Know LEGO Batman: The Movie -- DC Superheroes Unite LEGO: The Adventures of Clutch Powers LEGO Ninjago: Masters of Spinjitzu Top advice and articles What parents and kids sayBack to full review Back to full review Snap to it, or block it? A parents' guide to 'The Lego Movie' Every kid with a toy box, every parent who’s ever winced from landing a bare foot on a two-by-two red block, every grandparent who’s bought a minifig for a birthday knows that “The Lego Movie” opens Friday. But is it right for everyone? We snap together some of your likely questions. (Warning: Many spoilers ahead.) The prosCritical reviews have been almost universally positive, with Time magazine calling it "the funniest, cleverest, most exhaustingly exhilarating animated feature in ages." There's plenty of pop-culture references to keep the adults amused and the movie's world is nicely representative of your typical kid's Lego collection.
Milhouse from "The Simpsons" mingles with Superman, Lady Liberty, "1980 something space guy," a mermaid, a panda and other Lego figs, and other household items such as Krazy Glue and used Band-Aids ("the cloak of Ban-Dai-Ed") play roles. The consEmphasis on "exhaustive." It’s like it was written by a Lego-loving kid hopped up on Chocolate Frosted Sugar Bombs who was inspired by one of the “Batman” movies — the action is frenetic and hyper. All kids who play with Legos may want to see it, but it's not right for the younger tykes. And the 3-D is unnecessary. Is it right for kids of all ages?We're going to say no. While it’s rated PG for “mild action and rude humor,” there are a lot of hyperactive battle scenes, car chases and explosions. The Batmobile is shot until it blows up, as is Wonder Woman’s invisible jet (but that’s pretty funny, since … it’s invisible). And there are intense scenes — scary skeleton-faced robots attack, a characters’ parents are threatened, our heroes are strapped into chairs and “tortured” with green light flashes.
A kid behind us wailed when a submarine exploded, another couldn't stop asking her parents about a character who was beheaded with a penny. Parents need to evaluate their own child's comfort level. Nine-year-olds will be in happy hyperfrenetic heaven, preschoolers should stick to "Frozen." Do I need to pony up for 3-D?Emmet and some of the other characters are flung into the audience due to various explosions, and red Lego blocks often rain out at the audience. But the third dimension doesn't suck the audience onscreen into its crazy cartoonish world. If you've got the money and want to get the full "Lego Movie" experience, the 3-D isn't a bad addition. But if your local theater's only showing it in 2-D or you want to save a few bucks, don't let your kids guilt you into feeling bad about it. How are the voices?Chris Pratt's enthusiastic voice as unlikely hero Emmet is in almost every minute of the movie, and he's likable and funny. Kudos also to Morgan Freeman in a perfect Morgan Freeman role as the wizard Vitruvius and Will Arnett as a growly, frattish Batman.
You'll have fun recognizing the other voices too, especially Jonah Hill, whose Green Lantern could've used a much bigger role, Elizabeth Banks as a fighter not unlike Trinity from "The Matrix," and Will Ferrell as the nasty villain. Best lines“His face is so generic, it matches every other face in our database.”“We need more ideas so dumb and bad no one will ever think they could possibly be useful.”“I told the weird cat thing to stall.”“You don’t know me, but I’m on TV, so you can trust me.” WarningThe movie's big song, "Everything is Awesome!" is as cursedly addictive as "It's a Small World." The Lego Batman Movie Running Time: 104 minutes Lego DC Comics: Batman Be-Leaguered The Lego Movie: Everything is Awesome EditionChris Pratt, Emily Banks, Morgan Freeman, Will Ferrell, Will Arnett, Liam NeesonUS DVD: 17 Jun 2014Amazon The Lego Movie is a branded piece of entertainment about little plastic bricks who are limited only by imagination.
My experience with Legos probably exceeded the recommended ages listed on the box but, as the movie notes, age is no restriction on fun or creativity. Despite my penchant for not mixing up the pirate people with the space people, these “children’s toys” provided an outlet for telling stories and later, designing architecture. Those little blocks, so simple in their interconnected design, have been used to build everything from houses and castles to the Batcave and Millenium Falcon. Given the Lego brand’s worldwide recognition and cross-media markets, it’s something of a wonder that it has taken this long for Hollywood to take on the little plastic people. In an era when movies are more often than not aiming for the common denominator of guaranteed massive opening numbers, another movie based on a licensed product sounds like a two-hour excuse to prep taking some Advil (or equivalent headache medicine). It’s therefore another pleasant surprise by co-writers/directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller (Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, 21 Jump Street) that they can take this exercise in commercialism and make something so honestly entertaining.
Lord and Miller have successfully embraced the Lego company’s philosophy of boundless, imaginative play. This anything goes philosophy makes The Lego Movie one of the more successful brand-to-film translations, not only because it successfully sells its product, but because it sells the enjoyment of the product and is itself an enjoyable experience. It’s pure fun for kids and adults. The plot centers around an average, run-of-the-mill, non-distinguishable Lego drone named Emmet. Emmet is just one of the pack. He doesn’t stand out, he just going about his day job, following the instructions and enjoying life in Lego Town. For Emmet (Chris Pratt) and everyone in Lego Town, everything is awesome under the jurisdiction of President Business (Will Ferrell). However, when Emmet discovers a non-traditional Lego piece and gets the opportunity to be recognized as something special, his ordered world becomes creative chaos. There’s a dualist philosophy here between following the instructions and letting creativity reign.
One’s desire to break through the wall can open up a creative wellspring, but it also has the potential to destroy the structural integrity of society. The movie boils it down to doing what you are told and being capable of making your own choices. President Business rules life by prescribed instructions; meanwhile, the movie’s League of Heroes are freethinkers, building from the pieces as they see fit, mixing and matching different Lego sets and opening Emmet’s mind up to the endless Lego combinations that exist. Emmet is able to build upon what he has learned and eventually think up solutions himself, using both creativity and order to establish a balance. He may have been designated as a “gifted child” (that is, “slow”) by his mentors, but he earns the status himself by the time the happy-ending rolls through. Like any good parents, Lord and Miller take care to establish that rules are meant merely as building blocks for creativity and one’s own personal development.
Emmet is very childlike, behaving as a model citizen, doing as he is told, controlled, essentially, by his parent, President Business. Indeed, many of Emmet’s exclamations, including the pervasive “This is awesome!” feel like something a child would say while developing his or her own creations and stories. President Business and his associate, Bad Cop (Liam Neeson), play into more of the domineering parent archetypes. Other characters that populate Emmet’s quest include Vitruvius (Morgan Freeman), Wildstyle (Elizabeth Banks), and Batman (Will Arnett), representing the different varieties of Lego creatives, but also playing a parenting role to Emmet’s development. Much of the dialogue could just as likely be a conversation of a child playing with a (sarcastic) parent as it could to serve the plot. This meta-awareness is key to the film’s success, as many of the jokes are able to play to both children and adults. The story’s thematic material seems to have extended over to the creative process for the film itself, as it follows a basic story but largely has an anything goes attitude.
Each cast member voices his or her character with just the right amount of self-awareness, simultaneously rolling their eyes and providing assistance to Emmet’s journey from average to special. The design of The Lego Movie stays true the reality of the blocks, with every CG set piece having the potential to be built from Lego bricks in the real world. The cinematography makes the bricks look closer to the actual plastic pieces collecting dust in a box in your basement, rather than bright and shiny computer modeled ones, keeping with the film’s aesthetic of anything is possible, if you only had thousands of hours to build all this stuff. The writers and designers have fun with this idea, switching everything from hairpieces for body parts, to the heroes using pieces to build and rebuild their world. It also allows the writers to get away with some cartoonish violence that would never make it into most other animated (let alone live-action) PG rated features. The “Everything is Awesome” home version comes in standard, high, and three dimensional definitions.
Colors are bright and sound is clear. There’s nothing really to complain about from a technical standpoint. Extras include a commentary featuring the directors and cast goofing of, a making-of featurette, deleted scene animatics and an “Everything Is Awesome” sing-a-long, just in case your kids missed the four lines to the song. Three short films on the Blu-ray continue to further riff on the meta-ness and “anything-goes” attitude of the feature. Another set of features shows children (and their parents) how to build some of the set pieces in the film. This ultimate edition also included a Vitruvius figure (able to be broken apart and re-assembled to your heart’s content) and a 3-D artwork of the protagonist, Emmet. The Lego Movie is both creative and fun. Lord and Miller once again successfully both undermine expectations and overachieve with kid-cum-adult approach to humor, perfectly encapsulating a world where children and parents play together. The Lego Movie: Everything is Awesome Edition