Review of Rise of the Guardians (2012) by Harriett E — 31 Aug 2013

A personal favourite of mine. Rise of the guardians is a beautiful animated film all about the legendary figures of childhood. The main character Jack Frost is a mischievous, carefree teenage who is just trying to find himself, an aspect in which everybody can relate to. This film is a truly a heart-warming piece that any one of any age will enjoy.

I found that although the films animation is top notch though I felt the story was slightly weaker compared to the rival animation company's such as Disney or Pixar. The story itself is very straight forward and focuses on Jack. A Lonely spirit trying to find himself, Guardians ask for his help when the villain Pitch Black threatens the children, he finds his centre along the way and defeats the villain. I felt like they barely scratched the surface of what they could have done with the film or added more of a twist.

I also have to praise the voice acting of Alec Baldwin and Jude law for their outstanding performances. Baldwin played the character North with so much passion and cheer making me truly believe I was with Santa. Jude Law played an English bogeyman with a calm yet seductive tone making his character "Pitch Black "seem that much more intimating. I would say that there are a lot of different accents in the film but I found that it worked well.

Speaking of the Bogeyman, I found this DreamWorks production is one of its darker ones. I noticed that Pitch Black is actually a fairly scary character, whether that was the seductive tone his voice or just how intimidating he could be. I found the way he moved through the shadows and appearing out of nowhere jumpy and if I were a kid I would have been scared. I showed this film to my 5 year old cousin and he got frightened by Pitch so much he decided to stop watching and go find his mother, then again I was pretending to be scared by him as well which probably didn't help... opps.

(SPOILER ALERT).

Also he didn't give a second thought of killing Sandman and showed no sign of regret after, if anything he seemed to stop at nothing to get what he wanted, near the end of the film to me it looked like he was about to kill Jack before Sandman intervened.

(SPOILER END).

Some scenes really did tug at my heart strings, for example when Jamie is talking to his stuffed rabbit, something I myself did as a child when my belief in the Easter Bunny was fading. Also when Jack got his first believer, the lighting, the colours, the animation of Jacks reaction was just spot on. Overall I recommend this film to families with young children looking for light hearted yet funny film. Or if you just want to revisit your childhood. One of my favourite animated pieces.