Review of Pixels (2015) by Leon B — 12 Dec 2015

Review:

Adam Sandler always seems to star in these mediocre movies which make millions of dollars at the box office. This movie had a really good concept, in terms of using the old video games, which I personally grew up with, but the rest of the plot is far fetched and quite silly. Having Kevin James as the president was a bad choice but there was a couple of funny moments, especially with the little orange character, Q'Bert. Anyway, the movie starts of with a young Brenner (Adam Sandler), Cooper (Kevin James) and Ludlow (Josh Gad), playing video games in a amusement park. Brenner then enters the 1982 Worldwide Video Arcade Championships which also has the Guinness Book of Records attending, along with Nasa who will be recording the nights events so they can send a probe into the solar system, hoping that it can connect to extraterrestrial life. REALLY! Anyway, Brenner has to beat Eddie "The Fire Blaster" (Peter Dinklage) to become champion but he fails to beat him at Donkey Kong so he has to make do with second place. The movie then switches to the present day, we're Brenner is a mobile electrician and Cooper is the president of the United States. When an army unit gets attacked by a mysterious spaceship, which turns out to be from the game Galaga, the president turns to his best friend Brenner to try and work out a method to sort out the problem, as he had a talent when it came to the old video games. There other close friend, Ludlow, works out that the Aliens took the video tape, that was sent to them from Nasa, as a declaration of war and as the tape was sent to them in video game format, they were sending video game characters to destroy earth. They also give earth 3 life's, like any ordinary video game at that time, so the first one with 3 wins would win there destructive game. Anyway, they turn to the Fire Blaster to help them save earth and the humans that they have taken as a reward. They also get help from Violet (Michelle Monaghan), who works for the president and Q'Bert who was a gift from the Aliens because they won a couple of there matches. This movie could have really worked if it was taken seriously. The film company was lucky to get the rights to use so many of the old video game classics but the director didn't take full advantage of the opportunity. The silly jokes throughout the movie, we're really poor and the corny ending really let the movie down. With that aside, I did stick with the movie because I didn't know what direction the director was going to take the whole video game element of the film. I liked the Pac-Man game with the cars and the Donkey Kong game looked pretty impressive but I just couldn't take the childish humour, which is in many of Adam Sandler movies nowadays. Watchable, because of the arcade game content!

Round-Up:

This movie was directed by Chris Columbus, 57, who brought you some all time classics like Home Alone I & II, Mrs. Doubtfire, Nine Months, Stepmom, the great Bicentennial Man, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets and Percy Jackson & the Lightning Thief. He's got quite an impressive portfolio, which is why he was given this hard project to direct. Visually, he did do a great job in terms of making it look real and as he didn't write the script, I can't blame him for the silly storyline. I'm slowly beginning to dislike Adam Sandler, 49, movies because his latest films have been pretty poor. I haven't seen the Cobbler yet but I wasn't impressed with Grown Ups 2, That's My Boy, Just Go With It or the awful Jack & Jill. Blended was watchable, mainly because of the scenes with Terry Crews, who he teams up with again in the upcoming Ridiculous 6, which also stars some top class comedians. Anyway, there's no rumours about a sequel for this movie so I would like to see a serious director take on a fresh movie with this old video game concept.

Budget: $88million.

Worldwide Gross: $244million.

I recommend this movie to people who are into their action/sci-fi/comedies starring Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Michelle Monaghan, Peter Dinklage, Josh Gad, Brian Cox, Sean Bean and Dan Aykroyd. 4/10.