Review of Curious George (2006) by Jake M — 26 May 2017

Curious George (2006) Takes it's beloved source material and uses it to tell a very simple and adorable tale that keeps the same spirit and charm of the books. Personally I think this movie is severely underrated and deserves more of a viewing then I think people give credit for.

If you're expecting the movie to follow the same story as the book then you'd be wrong cause the movie's story is a lot more different than the book. It plays out more like a friendship bonding film and teaches a very valuable lesson about curiosity and how far it can go to even inspire people.

For someone who has a curious mind, the message really spoke to me and I love how our main character (Ted) learns this to his benefit. The cuteness of the movie may throw some people off, but I for one loved how everything is done in such a calm and refreshing tone.

The only thing doesn't necessarily work is the overall narrative. Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad story and it does work as a serviceable plot for all the other elements to play on but sometimes it feels like some of the story elements that were trying to get explained are kinda halted or not done especially well.

The characters much like the story are also serviceable with the exception of the main characters. Ted is portrayed as a simple man who works at a local museum. Thanks to Will ferrell's talent, he helps give the character some personality and the situations he gets into with George definitely bring in a lot of laughs.

George is by far one of the cutest cartoon characters I have ever seen. He's practically the heart of the movie's message and just seeing him getting into many different obscure situations is downright adorable and it brings me back to being a kid again.

The rest of the characters are really only there to serve the movie. Their names are not totally identifiable, but each of them still have their likable personality and play a role in the main story. However, there are a few characters like Junior that seemed unnecessarily thrown in since they don't really forward anything much.

Thankfully their roles are short and don't distract too much from the main characters. The animation is mostly hand drawn but it expertly combines a great deal of CGI effects which definitely makes for some outstanding eye candy.

The colors are so vibrant and lovely to look at from the backgrounds to the design of the characters. I also like how the characters are given a slight update compared to the illustrations in the book.

It almost makes them look like they came straight out of "Clifford the Big Red Dog". One thing that I thought was very clever was how in the end credits they show animatics of the original illustrations in the Curious George books.

The music is done beautifully and helps capture the feelings of wonder and curiosity. The songs by Jack Johnson are amazing and I love everyone of them. My personal favorite is "Upside Down" but I think that's everyone's favorite realistically speaking.

A lot of the songs in the movie have the orchestral track playing over the actual recorded song. It surely does help give some power to help make the songs extra charming but also kinda epic at the same time.

Sure, this movie may not have a very strong story, But it has a great message wonderful main characters, Amazing animation and probably one of the best soundtracks in a animated movie since "Tarzan".

To me, it's an instant classic and it has inspired me on so many levels as well as speaking to the little kid inside of me (A-).