Tag Archives: wreck-it ralph film

Review: Wreck-It Ralph wrecks the box office

I saw Wreck-It Ralph this weekend and apparently so did everyone else.  It’s about Ralph, the villain in an old 8-Bit game called Fix-It Felix Jr, who is fed up of being the bad guy, so he game jumps and decides to find his own destiny.

The Good:

Where to start… where to start… the humor is great, lots of stuff for the grownups who grew up with 8-bit games.  When they’re in Game Central Station there are a lot of characters from other games, Wreck-It Ralph is the Who Framed Roger Rabbit of video games.  I enjoyed seeing all the other characters throughout the movie, as well as the other arcade machines that pass time in the arcade.

The animation is top notch.  Each game is a separate world and the characters that inhabit that world behave and look differently.  An example is Ralph’s world, the inhabitants of the apartment of Niceland behave in short quick movements, almost with a staccato beat, which is very evocative of the 8-bit world in which their video game takes place in.  Then we go on to Hero’s Duty where everything is in high def with lots of action going on in the background.  Next we visit Sugar Rush where the world is made up of some form of candy.  A standard movie takes time establishing one world in which the protagonist lives in, with its own set of rules in the case of sci-fi or fantasy, but with Wreck-It Ralph we’re treated to at least three other worlds, amazing that the filmmakers were able to accomplish that.

My main praise for this film has got to be the story.  The story is what grabbed me immediately, from the beginning Ralph is a relate-able character and his journey is one that is simple yet complicated in its own way.  The arc of the story is very very similar to Brave and The Iron Giant.  The ending especially reminded me of The Iron Giant.

The Bad:

I don’t think I have anything to put here.  Only that people will immediately dismiss this film as being a cartoon and not an animated film.  “I don’t watch cartoons,” to those of you whom this applies to… I say, stretch your brain, and allow yourself to experience something new, it might shock and amaze you.  And if it doesn’t, then you have no soul and you should have a doctor look in to that.

Overall:

I cannot recommend this movie enough.  There’s something for everyone, it’s a throw back to the 8-bit games that pioneered video game entertainment industry, as well as a commentary on the state of video gamer entertainment today, but above all it’s touching and moving in the right places.  I predict a best animated feature nom.

Another bonus is the short Paperman that we got before the main feature, what a pleasant little treat.

It’s also great to see all the other video games, here are some to name a few; Bowser, Paperboy, Ryu, Ken, Blanka, Pac-Man, M. Bison, Zangeif, Chung-Li, Sonic, Q*Bert, Frogger, Princess Daisy…