Mind Your Business: Reviewing Monsters vs. Aliens

Posted In | Columns: MindBiz

Pay attention humans. I have been witness to what you call a 3-D stereoscopic animation. I call it a wonderful holographic documentary of the impending invasion of your world.

On a recent Saturday, I captured 15 humans and forced them to watch Monsters vs. Aliens. It was horrifying to see them all laughing hysterically from beginning to end.

Monsters vs. Aliens is truly the first movie to live up to the promise of what 3-D movies can be. The visuals were truly amazing. Even better, the rest of the movie was just as good.

From the opening 3-D dimensional shot looking through the rings of Saturn, to the tongue-in-cheek, wink-at-the-audience paddleball-in-the-face shot and every other big action sequence, the use of 3-D felt right, added to the story and made this a movie you MUST see in a 3-D theater. I locked my humans into an IMAX theater and we all agreed that it was absolutely the best stereoscopic 3-D we had ever seen. Unlike the old make-you-cross-eyed glasses, these were comfortable, clear and amazing, even for my four eyes.

Since this movie was designed and edited specifically for 3-D theaters, those of you seeing it in standard 2-D will see a slightly different movie, says co-director Rob Letterman. "We made sure we were telling our story first in 3-D. And then, when we did the 2-D cut, what we changed were such things as pacing: for example, 3-D shots need to go longer because the human brain cannot absorb all of that information as quickly as 2-D. So what works in 3-D may not have the same energy and pace in 2-D."

The use of music was also smart, funny and added to the story. From snippets of Close Encounters to Beverly Hills Cop to E.T., the audience was laughing just from the choice of music. Luckily, they were laughing with the movie, not at it.

The movie is Susan "Ginormica" Murphy's story. Susan (Reece Witherspoon) is about to marry local self-obsessed weatherman Derek Dietl (Paul Rudd). When she is hit by a meteor, she grows to nearly 50-feet-tall. We follow Susan as she is captured by the government, meets a group of imprisoned monsters and fights an alien invasion, all while trying to salvage her relationship. Her character has the biggest arc when she realizes her own strength, both internally and externally.

Hope Sherman, 40-something mom, commented about Susan's character after the movie, "This is a great monster movie, even for girls. It's very empowering for girls."

Often, that type of comment would mean death for the boys market, but each of the boys in our group loved it as well. They also all agreed on one thing: B.O.B. is their favorite character.

B.O.B., aka Biocarbonate Ostylezene Benzoate, is the indestructible result of combining a genetically altered tomato and a ranch-flavored desert topping. Perfectly voiced by the funny and eternal party-boy Seth Rogan, this is not the blob of my childhood.







Comments


Great family movie!

I was amazed. For my 4.5 years daughter it was 4th movie experience and the first one where she sat through the whole movie without getting bored in the middle and asking to go for a walk. For my almost 3 year old son it was 1st time and the movie was able to hold his attention till the very end as well. And, I got a lot of questions from my children coming during and after the movie and the next day.
Yes, not a lot of belly laughs for me or for my children (understandably) but most of it I watched with the smile on my face and the warm feeling in my heart.

Victor (not verified) | Mon, 10/05/2009 - 23:29

For those of you who are wondering, the mysterious pin on...

For those of you who are wondering, the mysterious pin on General Monger's chest is the head of Shrek.
Mark Simon (not verified) | Wed, 04/01/2009 - 23:00

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