Movie Review: Sing   January 11th, 2017

I recently went and saw the new animated movie “Sing”. It was no “Zootopia,” which of course is a high bar, but it was pretty good.

I liked how the world looked believable with all the different animals and they played around with the different species, like gags with fish jumping up a water ladder next to stairs. They played with size differences with the animals as well, like tall giraffes and a couple of small mice.

The animation was quite good and I liked the character designs, and laughed at some of the exaggerated long necks and bodies of the sheep and llamas.
The story was nice and it had some good character-driven plot. It was cute and had a lot of sweetness to it, which I appreciate. I’m happy I saw it.

I was thinking more about “Sing” today. I saw someone it to “Cats Don’t Dance,” which is fair as both movies feature a cast of funny animals putting on a musical show. What is interesting with “Sing” however, is that there is no actual villain in the film.

The premise of the show is to try and save a failing theater, which is a familiar trope, and while the bank wants to repossess the property if they don’t get their money, there isn’t someone, such as a rival business owner or developer, who say wants to tear it down and replace it with a mini-mall.

There is a chaotic element where a Frank Sinatra-esque mouse is pursued by wise-guy bears who he cheated out of gambling money, but for the most part the plot revolves around the characters facing their own issues. There’s the jilted porcupine struggling to find her own voice, the middle-aged pig housewife who wants to recapture some glory of her younger days, the elephant with crippling stage fright, the gorilla with father issues, and even the koala director who may be a lovable dreamer, but is also a huckster.

It’s refreshing to see a film where characters’ struggles and story arcs are enough without needing to invent villains. I’m reminded of another film where this was pointed out to me, in 2014’s “Chef.” It was nice to see a story where everyone was rooting for the main character and the journey about family, creative rediscovery an Americana road trip and celebration of food was enough without needing ridiculous manufactured drama. There are advisories in both films, but they serve to motivate the characters to something better, rather than needing to be the bad guys.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 11th, 2017 at 2:49 am and is filed under Movies and TV. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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