There was once a story from the eighties that may or may not be true. During this time every toy license was getting a show, so a bunch of executives got together. One was tired of the practice and joked about making a show based off Legos. The other executives however, actually thought he was being serious and were considering the idea. This story ends with the first executive yelling at the others for actually considering the idea.
Why tell that story? To acknowledge that anything created for the sake of money is always ridiculous. Hearing the title, The Lego Movie, will turn most people off. However, those people are the kind of people you should be dragging to the theater so that they can enjoy one of the best movies of 2014.
The Lego Movie is about a world where Lord Business (played by Will Ferrell) has taken a weapon called the Kragle from the wizard Vitruvius (played by Morgan Freeman). However, a prophecy is told where someone called the Special will find “The Piece of Resistance”, which will stop the Kragle. Eight and a half years later, a construction worker with no special qualities who works for Lord Business named Emmit Brickowski (Chris Pratt) spots someone digging through some rubble and tries to stop her. He accidentally falls and finds “The Piece of Resistance” and teams up with the thief, named Wyldstyle (played by Elizabeth Banks). Considering this plot synopsis is fairly generic, one expects a dull children’s movie. However, this has got to be one of the most creative family films in years and keeps in spirit of Legos.
The first thing you’ll notice is the animation, which is a hybrid of CGI and stop motion animation. It looks excellent; everything is made from Legos from the water to the explosions. The animation is really slick, and the details on the Legos are so good that you see individual scratches and dents. The chase scenes in the film are really well animated, especially when a character has to build something really fast.
The main positive trait that could be said for this film is the writing. With a franchise like Lego, the possibilities are really open. The writers are taking advantage of this. The Lego universe consists of vastly different worlds. This allows the writers to have a modern city and then a Wild West realm without any loss of consistency. How the writers’ show how the realms are connected is something everyone in the theatergoers will not see coming. This is going to easily end up being one of the breakout hits of 2014. The writing is genius, and the animation is so elaborate that it’s a wonder many other blockbusters can’t do it this right. Warner Bros. rolled the dice and came out with snake eyes on something they could have phoned in. There’s already talks of a sequel with the original writers and needless to say, I’m all for it.