***Please note this review may contain spoilers***
Rating: (PG)
Director: Clay Kaytis and Fergal Reilly
Starring: Jason Sudeikis, Josh Gad, Peter Dinklage
Rotten Tomatoes Critics Score: 63%
When The Angry Bids Movie was first announced, I was expecting it to join the list of numerous other terrible video game adaptations, if not being cancelled first. A movie based on a mobile game that has long grown out of it’s once tremendous popularity wasn’t exactly high on my list of movies to expect something good out of. After finally watching it, I can say it certainly beat my low expectations.
The Angry Birds games don’t really have a expansive lore or story guiding it, which gives the creators of the movie a blank slate to work it. The movie manages to fit in enough clever references to the game that it doesn’t feel completely detached to the quirks of the game. The movie stars the main icon of the games as the protagonist, the red bird, simply called Red. Red lives in a tropical island filled with happy birds who are content with their simple and happy lives. Red, on the other hand, is not very happy. He has serious anger management issues for which he is sentenced to anger management classes. This is where we meet the rest of our main cast, Chuck and Bomb.
Josh Gad’s Chuck is easily one of the best parts of the movie. His lines are constantly hilarious and his shenanigans charming. Bomb isn’t too bad either and the fourth member of the class, Terrance, is barely used. One of the best parts of the movie is how every bird has great voice acting, with Chuck once again being the standout performance.
The biggest problem with the movie is that even though it’s only about a hour and a half long, it still feel way too long. The movie starts out funny with a string of hilarious scenes involving Red and then the rest of the main cast. Once the pigs arrive the movie takes a dive down and get’s pretty boring. The pigs are not funny and Red not liking the pigs plot point overstays it’s welcome. The pigs welcoming party sequence is way too long and once the pigs start dancing i start wishing the movie had micro-transactions to speed things along. The movie once again takes a turn for the interesting once the birds decide to fight back, but it never quite hits the heights of the beginning of the movie.
The Angry Birds Movie, much like the game it is based on, is a little fun, sometimes entertaining, sometimes funny, but overall a shallow and unfulfilling experience. It’s a movie with a half hour worth of jokes and plot filled into a hour and a half runtime. Despite all that, a hilarious voice cast, memorable characters, and some standout moments makes this one of the better video game movies.
