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Wednesday, June 1, 2005 | ||
What do you think of this story? | The fab four-footed friends
Although the main thrust of the story is fairly simplistic and inane, the new animated feature from Dreamworks, Madagascar is full of hilarious asides and tongue in cheek humor that entertains in spite of itself. Basically, it concerns four Central Park Zoo animals, a lion (Ben Stiller), a giraffe (David Schwimmer), a hippo (Jada Pinkett Smith) and a zebra (Chris Rock) who inadvertently escape back to the wild and discover the difference between being kept in captivity like pampered pets and being out in the big world. Four sneaky penguins, who have been tunneling their way out of the zoo, begin the whole mess and have some of the best scenes in the movie. Along with a pair of chimps, one who speaks like an aristocrat and the other who can only communicate in ape sign language, the whole group of escapees get crated up and put on a ship after wreaking havoc in Times Square, Grand Central Station, and the subway. The film takes every advantage along the way to go for the big jokes, and most of them work with perfect timing. There are several mini-parodies peppered throughout, but I wont reveal them. Thats part of the fun of this picture. The kids may not get them, but its really there to amuse the adults. (By the way, I know that this is a movie for children, but why do people insist on bringing infants too young to even sit up? They only end up screaming and crying, probably because they are having their first primal scene.) The only thing that slows down the nutty action is when the story gets maudlin and sappy. Nat King Coles What A Wonderful World gets carted out for the millionth time to jack up the sentiment. Its a beautiful song, and maybe the kids are new to it, but its a lame attempt at something deeper like The Lion King. Still, its a brief interlude that segues back to what this show is all about, goofiness. The mugging created for these animals is great entertainment. They cavort and distort their angular bodies like only cartoons can, avoiding every pitfall and disaster with insane ease. Their eyes bug out or shift madly about when things get hairy. They all have attitude to spare, especially the lemurs. There are about a thousand lemurs in this movie and they are all party animals. The self-proclaimed king of the lemurs voiced by Ali-G, is the tudiest of all. He leads the crowd in the movies one musical number, shouting, I like to move it, move it! Dont be surprised if you hear that one a few more times over the summer. I can hear a dance remix in my head right now. Watching animated animals behave like us crazy humans has always been amusing and even a little bit revealing. Madagascar doesnt lay us bare so much as it revels in our idiosyncrasies. Its a film thats smart enough for grown-ups and cute enough for the kids and wacky enough for everyone.
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