The Lego Movie Review

"Everything is awesome! Everything is cool when you're part of a team!". It's still stuck in my head from Wednesday...

The Lego Movie is directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, the men behind Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs and 21 Jump Street, and tells the story of a guy named Emmet in a world made completely out of Lego. Emmet is a construction worker voiced by Chris Pratt and is an incredibly average Lego figure, trying to fit in. That is until he finds the "Piece of Resistance" and finds himself slap bang in the middle of a prophecy which foretells that he who finds the mysterious piece will bring in an end to the evil plan of Lord Business.

The Lego Movie took me by surprise and is the first great 2014 release. All of the people on the creative team behind this movie really have found something great which could in turn lead to more movies and a very successful franchise, both critically and financially.

The plot itself, as described before, is clichéd beyond belief, and that's why it is so brilliant. Movie goers see films about "prophecies" and "being the chosen one" every single year, The Lego Movie satirically and cleverly pokes fun at all of the clichés of Hollywood movies within it's own story. The film works as a satire as well as a family friendly comedy.

While some of the early jokes did fall unfortunately flat for me, the humour did pick itself up as the story progressed to the point where all of the small children in my movie theatre were silent and the older people were gut-busting. It's an awesome family experience, like most great animations. The longer the film goes on the funnier it gets, leading to some really clever jokes and references that will leave an impression on you.

Chris Pratt does an exceptional job voicing lead character Emmet, who as said before, is literally the most bland and generic person in the world, much like most people who become "the chosen one". He is the most relatable and most interesting character to watch, and that's saying something compared to the rest of the cast, which is fantastic.

It's not just that Morgan Freeman does an excellent job as Vitruvius, a clichéd God/wizard figure, or that Will Ferrell is perfect for the villain Lord Business, or that Liam Neeson is downright hilarious playing good cop/bad cop, it's that the voice work is literally flawless. The voices of these well-known actors fit their characters perfectly and in a lot of ways heightened the jokes.

The animation is amongst the best I have ever seen. It is entirely computer generated but its executed in a way that it looks like stop-motion. This is a masterstroke from the animators as the characters move how Lego people would move, they interact with their environment the way that Lego people would interact with their environment.

There are so many small references to pop culture as well as various ones for other movies. They reference all of the ones you'd expect plus a few that only certain people will understand. I won't spoil any of them for you, go in and discover them for yourself if you haven't already.

If I have a complaint about the film it'd probably be about how much is in it. The references and the surrounding world is awesome, but I do think that they did try to pack in maybe a little too much in terms of the places that they visited. For example, in Wreck-it-Ralph, they had a whole spectrum of arcade worlds to chose from yet they still stayed on the "Sugar Rush" game for the longest time, allowing them to focus on the narrative. I understand that they have lots of things to show off, but a little less wouldn't have gone a miss.

The Lego Movie is a solidly good movie throughout, but becomes a truly great one in the final act. A certain revelation happens which not only changes your perspective on the film as a viewer, but also allows some really heartfelt emotional scenes to happen which work and do have an effect on you.

So it's heartfelt, funny, clever and beautifully animated and is a great movie which you should see:


Rating - A-


1 sentence summary - A great animation which utilises cool characters, satirical writing and emotional moments with great effect!


Thanks for reading,
Matt