Review of Wreck-It Ralph (2012) by Dukejon — 09 Jun 2013

A film based on video game characters coming to life? Video games are so popular it's amazing that nobody has made a film like this before. Everything starts off well, the graphics and animations are outstanding and there's a great mix of different styles from different eras (8-bit, 16-bit, etc, with appropriate animations the nicelander people are particularly well done). Everything is introduced well and the first half an hour is a brilliant exercise in spotting the video game cameos. For someone who's been interested in games for a while I loved the more obscure references such as the metal gear exclamation mark.

However once we get to the sugar rush land things start to go a bit wrong. Vanellope starts off cute and the voice work by Sarah Silverman is very good, but unfortunately the character becomes quite irritating with all the breathless rushing around. We also have another story arc going on in the background with Felix and Calhoun but this is quite boring. What the film lacks is a strong comedy sidekick like the donkey in Shrek. I also feel that the film spends too long in Sugar Rush after a while you get bored of.

All the chocolate lakes and candy canes and wish they'd take the story to another game for a while. The story is also quite predictable and I was surprised to find myself getting quite bored long before the end. It's a shame because I felt they could have done so much more with the video game premise the entire section in sugar rush who have easily been set in Alice in Wonderland, for example, given the look of the environment and characters.

Overall the film is a mixture of Toy Story and Monsters Inc but isn't as good as either.