Movie Review: "Wreck-It Ralph"

Wreck-It RalphWhile no animation studio can rival Pixar yet, in my opinion, Disney Animation is coming the closest. When you go to see a Pixar film, you expect a certain quality, and more or less, you get it. When you see a Disney Animation film, you expect again, a certain quality, and so far, you get it. I've seen, from my recollection, three of their major animated films: Bolt, Tangled, and Wreck-It Ralph. I think the only once I've missed may be Meet the Robinsons. So far, Disney has proven to have solid films, sometimes a bit less subtle and artful as Pixar, but still filled with good stories, solid characters, and typical Disney feel-good stuff.

Wreck-It Ralph proves to be no exception. However, it has the added benefit of appealing to my generation. The generation that basically grew up with friends like Mario, Sonic, Ryu, and more. It takes the world of video games, specially arcade games, and shows how it really works underneath. Arcade consoles are worlds, characters are actual beings who work for a living, and power cords are a means of transportation. A strength of the film is that it gives us a good taste of our favorites, like Bowser and Zangief, without overindulging us. It's satiating, not stuffing. Instead, we get original characters set in original gaming worlds. Yes, Fix It Felix has a Donkey Kong feel, and Sugar Land looks like the board game Candy Land. But, to my knowledge, these aren't games that existed the film, and are the main settings for the story.

Ralph was a pretty good character, and his motivation of wanting a better life, always feeling second rate, is something many of us can likely relate to. The girl was interesting enough. And Jane Lynch's character was just too blatantly Jane Lynch, I don't know why they animated her so much like the real person. After my roommate, whom I saw the film with, mentioned that McBrayer from 30 Rock voiced Felix, I pretty much couldn't separate Felix from that show's Kenneth. I felt his voice inflections, mannerisms, and personality were almost indistinguishable.

And that's part of what separates Pixar from Disney, to me. Disney will model after real life, real people, and even get rights to use actual video game characters. Same with dreamworks, but they adapt stories a lot, and are either hit or miss. Pixar is just original, which is why I like it so much.

There were nice touches in the film. The way animated characters moved, the sounds they made when jumping, were very nice. The end credits were excellent and pixelated. I liked how glitches were explained, because I remember having those kinds of glitch issues. And the twist to who King Candy really was caught me by surprise. I didn't like how closely modeled to McBrayer and Lynch their characters were. And although I wish we spent more time in video game worlds we know, I think they made the right decision on focusing most of the time in sugar land. Overall, another solid effort from Disney Animation, and hopefully they'll keep on going on this same track, with Steamboat Willie whistling along (in his pixelated form, no less).

And, we got a short film this time, called Paperman. A simple story of infatuation at first sight and paper planes, it showcased some truly beautiful traditional animation. It was pretty to look at, but lacked the heart that Pixar captures in those few moments.

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