Day 28, Movie 24

The Despicable Me (2010)

An animated comedy about a nefarious criminal mastermind (sorta) name Gru who is….well…despicable.  After an up and coming criminal mastermind named Vector steals a pyramid word within the mastermind community is that it is time for Gru to retire.  Gru destined to not be out done by Vector sets out to steal the moon by shrinking it, but it seems that his nemesis has got a step on him at every turn as Vector manages to steal the shrink ray from Gru before he can pull of his plan.  Gru ends up having to recruit 3 young orphan girls to help him get his shrink ray back and at this point the movie changes tone from a simple heist style movie to one of a family less man learning to love and develop a family of his own.

This is a humorous movie and is more of a Pixar lite movie because it lacks the emotional depth and story of a Pixar film.  Some of the humor seems pratt fall forced and I understand that it is a movie geared towards children but when you have a solid movie like this one, you feel cheated when they resort to cheap laughs.  But hey I admit, I am no the target audience.  Steve Carell does a fine job as Gru and there are good jobs turned in all around but as I have come to expect, Jack McBrayer is annoying as usual.  I am just glad that he only had bit voice rolls to tone down his obnoxious tendencies.

I enjoyed this film and it is good to see someone other than Pixar put out a solid animated movie.  It seems ripe for a sequel.

Score: 7.5/10