The Lego Movie

The Lego Movie, 2013, Warner Bros. Pictures. Directed by Chris Miller and Phil Lord. Starring Will Ferrell, Morgan Freeman, Will Arnett, Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks and Liam Neeson.

In the late 90s and early 2000s, films based on toys were made slightly differently than how they are today. In a world of Pokemon 2000, Bratz the Movie and Barbie of Swan Lake, the emphasis was most definitely on marketing the brand, kiddiewinks forcing their poor parents to watch under-budgeted and over-hyped feature length adverts for a new piece of plastic which would be most likely forgotten about in a week or so (I should know, I was one of those kiddiewinks. Sorry about that Mum). 

But then Transformers happened. Despite being too long, too enamoured with the military and somehow made giant CGI robots hitting each other dull, it coined a baffling amount of money and changed the expectation and aesthetic of toy films. Gone are the days of sloppy animation and short running times, now films like GI Joe and Battleship have budgets in the hundreds of millions and massive set pieces which have little to nothing to do with the toy they’re selling you.  Seriously, GI Joe 2 blew up all of London, which itself is quickly becoming a trend (what’s wrong with London, movies? Don’t you like the bikes or something?) They’re also overwhelmingly cynical, trying to hide their toy origins with whole scale destruction and strangely dour plots. Toy movies are indistinguishable from the rest of Hollywood action, any spark of genius whittled away to nothing to make the toy fit the mould.  

  

Yay, millions are dead and the entire country’s

infrastructure and soul has been destroyed! Go GI Joe! 

So when a massively budgeted film about Lego was announced for a Valentine’s Day release, I was surprised to see how much people truly loved it. Mark Kermode made it his film of the week, my Facebook feed was littered with gushing reviews; even the man in Starbucks demanded that I see it that day. And after watching it and needing two weeks to digest it fully, I can finally say with thoughtful conviction:

OH MY GOD YOU GUYS THIS MOVIE ROCKS!

Ahhhhhh! It’s so damn good!

Ahem.

Directed by Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs maestros Chris Miller and Phil Lord, The Lego Movie seems to have a real debt not to Transformers, but to Aardman, its relentless charm coming from a real passion for film making and the medium they’ve chosen. Though it’s totally computer animated, it always looks like Lego, the way that Aardman films always look like plasticine. It appears that the film’s one rule is that it must always be made of Lego, right down to the flames, background buildings and crashing waves. It may sound cheap, but the effect is a brilliant, immersive and three dimensional one.

But don't try an recreate this at home, it'll only lead to heartbreak and alcohol

Its endlessly creative use of the medium to builds an entire Lego universe, encompassing the old with the new with gleeful abandon. Looking around, the only bits of Lego I have in my house are the Wii games for Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars and Indiana Jones. Lego has evolved with its core audience of children (and unemployed graduates, apparently) to keep a sense of play and creation at the heart of its brand in an iPad world. And The Lego Movie totally understands this, showing Superman, Darth Vader, Batman and Gandalf alongside unlicensed characters like Space Guy and Construction Worker Man. Original characters like President Business (voiced by Will Ferrell in one of his better roles of late) and Vitruvius (a brilliantly cast Morgan Freeman) fit so well in with this madcap array of famous faces it’s hard to imagine Lego itself without them.

It is an antidote to the super serious and boring toy films of recent years; it’s full of background gags in a way that reminded me of Monty Python, before those jokes became tired from out of context use by nerds who think parroting one-liners is a decent replacement for a sense of humour. It also gently reminds people that whilst it is possible to fully delight in children’s toys and films, taking those things away and obsessing over them to the point where you yourself can find no fun in them anymore is probably not healthy. Or interesting. So I’m not going to talk about the flaws in the film (but the ending is a bit iffy, somewhat implying that girls will always ruin the boys fun, always) and I’m not going to search for great insight in the minute details. All I’ll say now is that it’s massively bonkers, enormously good fun and you’re guaranteed to leave the cinema with a huge grin on your face, singing Everything Is Awesome with only a trace of irony.

Everything is awesome indeed.