Movie Reviews

Movie Review: 'Red One' – Catholic Review

Published

1 year ago

November 18, 2024

Movie Review: 'Red One' – Catholic Review

NEW YORK (OSV News) – Why not make a Christmas-themed action flick starring Dwayne Johnson as Kris Kringle’s chief bodyguard? The answer to that question is revealed in “Red One” (Amazon MGM).

The attempt to put Santa Claus (J.K. Simmons) in the middle of a lot of frenetic brawling and then wrap the whole thing up with a climactic sleigh chase leads to a hopelessly unbalanced tone in this ill-conceived holiday offering. Despite a conversion story for one of the main characters, moreover, this is far too hard-edged a production to be in any way family-friendly.

After St. Nick is kidnapped, Johnson’s Callum Drift and his team trace the breach of North Pole security that enabled the abduction to gifted but mercenary internet hacker Jack O’Malley (Chris Evans). Since cynical Jack has, since childhood, denied the very existence of the Jolly One, however, it soon becomes clear that, for all his moral shortcomings, he was acting inadvertently.

Belatedly realizing what a catastrophe he’s helped bring about, Jack agrees to help Callum and his boss, Zoe (Lucy Liu), catch the real culprit. But straight-arrow Callum has taken an instant dislike to this shady scoundrel, and only agrees to team with him under orders from Zoe. So the newly-minted odd couple take up the chase.

Clues eventually lead them to one of Santa’s long-standing adversaries, a shape-shifting witch called Gryla (Kiernan Shipka). With Santa neutralized, she plans to ruin the impending holiday by punishing every person on his naughty list. Needless to say, that means a host of potential victims around the world.

The mayhem Gryla’s nefarious plot unleashes remains thoroughly stylized throughout and the values put forward in an almost preachy way by Chris Morgan’s script are respectable from a Judeo-Christian perspective. Thus Gryla is about retribution, but Santa, who sees the inner child in even the most wayward grown-up, is about mercy and forbearance.

As for Jack, isn’t it high time he worked on being a better father to his mildly misbehaving son, Dylan (Wesley Kimmel)? The lad’s mom, Olivia (Mary Elizabeth Ellis) — to whom, we learn, Jack was never married — certainly thinks so.

All well and good. Yet, cinematically, director Jake Kasdan never finds his footing. Nor does it seem likely that he ever could have, since early scenes alternately set in Aruba and at the site of Santa’s captivity may have viewers of a certain age imagining the effect of Father Christmas wandering into an episode of “Miami Vice.”

To put it another way, Dasher and Dashiell Hammett simply do not mix.

Additionally, “Red One” is a good reminder that not every Yuletide movie is geared toward youngsters. In this case, the screenplay’s vulgar vocabulary, while certainly not excessive by Hollywood standards, does flag the proceedings as strictly off-limits for kids.

The film contains considerable bloodless violence, fleeting partial nudity, references to a character’s out-of-wedlock birth, about a dozen instances each of mild swearing and crude language, at least one rough term and a couple of crass expressions. The OSV News classification is A-III — adults. The Motion Picture Association rating is PG-13 — parents strongly cautioned. Some material may be inappropriate for children under 13.

‘Hoppers’ review: Pixar’s best original movie in years

Published

6 hours ago

March 3, 2026

Press Room

‘Hoppers’ review: Pixar’s best original movie in years

“So it’s like Avatar?” one character quips in Disney and Pixar’s “Hoppers,” bluntly translating the film’s high-concept premise for the sugar-fueled kids in the audience. And yes, the comparison is apt. The story follows a nature-obsessed teenage girl who manages to quite literally “hop” her consciousness into the body of a robotic beaver in order to spark an animal rebellion against a greedy mayor determined to bulldoze their forest for a freeway.

It’s a clever hook. The kind of big, elastic idea Pixar used to make look effortless. “Hoppers” does not reach the rarified air of “Up,” “Wall-E,” or “Inside Out,” but after a stretch of uneven originals like “Turning Red” and “Luca,” and outright misfires such as “Elemental” and “Elio,” this feels like a genuine course correction. The environmental messaging is clear without being preachy, the animals are irresistibly anthropomorphized, and the studio’s once-signature emotional sincerity is back in sturdy form.

Pixar can afford to gamble on originals when it has a guaranteed cash cow like this summer’s “Toy Story 5” waiting in the wings, but “Hoppers” earns its place in the catalogue. Director Daniel Chong crafts a warm, heartfelt film that occasionally strains under the weight of its own ambition, yet remains grounded by character and theme. Its meditation on conservation and animal displacement feels timely in a way that never tips into after-school-special territory.

We meet Mabel, voiced with bright conviction by Piper Curda, as a child liberating her classroom pets and returning them to the wild. Her moral compass is shaped by her grandmother, voiced by Karen Huie, who imparts wisdom about nature’s sanctity. True to both Pixar tradition and the broader Disney playbook, this beacon of guidance does not survive past the opening act. Loss, after all, is Pixar’s favorite inciting incident.

Years later, Mabel is still fighting the good fight, squaring off against the smarmy Mayor Jerry, voiced with slick menace by Jon Hamm. He plans to flatten the glade where Mabel and her grandmother once found solace. Mabel’s resistance feels noble but futile. The animals have already mysteriously vanished, the machinery is coming, and her last-ditch plan involves luring a beaver back to the abandoned forest in hopes of jumpstarting the ecosystem.

That’s when the film gleefully pivots into mad-scientist territory. At Beaverton University, Mabel discovers her professor, voiced by Kathy Najimy, has developed a device that can project human consciousness into synthetic animals. The process, dubbed “hopping,” allows Mabel to inhabit a robotic beaver and infiltrate the forest from within. It’s an inspired escalation that keeps the film buoyant even when the plotting grows predictable.

Her new posse includes King George, a lovably beaver voiced by Bobby Moynihan with distinct Bing Bong energy; a sharp-tongued bear voiced by Melissa Villaseñor; a regal bird king voiced by the late Isiah Whitlock Jr.; and a fish queen voiced by Ego Nwodim. As is often the case with Pixar, even in its lesser efforts, the world-building is meticulous. The animal hierarchy, complete with titles like “paw of the king,” is layered with jokes that play for kids while slyly winking at adults.

The plot ultimately follows a familiar template. Scrappy underdog rallies community. Corporate villain twirls metaphorical mustache. Emotional third-act sacrifice looms. At times, you can feel the machinery working a little too cleanly. Pixar, and Disney at large, has grown increasingly reliant on sequels and established IP, and “Hoppers” does not radically reinvent the wheel. In an animated landscape where films like “K-Pop: Demon Hunters,” “Across the Spider-Verse,” and “Goat” are pushing stylistic and narrative boundaries, being safe and sturdy may not always be enough.

And yet, there is something refreshing about a Pixar original that remembers how to tug at the heart without squeezing it dry. “Hoppers” is playful, peppered with cheeky needle drops, and builds to a sweet emotional catharsis that may or may not have left this critic a little misty-eyed. It feels earnest and engaged.

“Hoppers” may not be top-tier Pixar. But it is a welcome return to form, a reminder that the studio still knows how to marry big ideas with a bigger heart.

HOPPERS opens in theaters Friday, March 6th.

Movie Reviews

‘Hoppers’ review: Who can argue with hilarious talking animals?

Published

19 hours ago

March 3, 2026

Press Room

‘Hoppers’ review: Who can argue with hilarious talking animals?

Just when you think Pixar’s petting-zoo cute new movie “Hoppers” is flagrantly ripping off James Cameron, the characters come clean.

movie review

HOPPERS

Running time: 105 minutes. Rated PG (action/peril, some scary images and mild language). In theaters March 6.

“You guys, this is like ‘Avatar’!,” squeals 19-year-old Mabel (Piper Curda), the studio’s rare college-age heroine.

Shoots back her nutty professor, Dr. Fairfax (Kathy Kajimy): “This is nothing like ‘Avatar!’”

Sorry, Doc, it definitely is. And that’s fine. Placing the smart sci-fi story atop an animated family film feels right for Pixar, which has long fused the technological, the fantastical and the natural into a warm signature blend. Also, come on, “Avatar” is “Dances With Wolves” via “E.T.”

What separates “Hoppers” from the pack of recent Pix flix, which have been wholesome as a church bake sale, is its comic irreverence.

Director Daniel Chong’s original movie is terribly funny, and often in an unfamiliar, warped way for the cerebral and mushy studio. For example, I’ve never witnessed so many speaking characters be killed off in a Pixar movie — and laughed heartily at their offings to boot.

What’s the parallel to Pandora? Mabel, a budding environmental activist, has stumbled on a secret laboratory where her kooky teachers can beam their minds into realistic robot animals in order to study them. They call the devices “hoppers.”

Bold and fiery Mabel — PETA, but palatable — sees an opportunity.

The mayor of Beaverton, Jerry (Jon Hamm), plans to destroy her beloved local pond that’s teeming with wildlife to build an expressway. And the only thing stopping the egomaniacal pol — a more upbeat version of President Business from “The Lego Movie” — is the water’s critters, who have all mysteriously disappeared.

So, Mabel avatars into beaver-bot, and sets off in search of the lost creatures to discover why they’ve left.

From there, the movie written by Jesse Andrews (“Luca”) toys with “Toy Story.” Here’s what mischief fuzzy mammals, birds, reptiles and insects get up to when humans aren’t snooping around. Dance aerobics, it turns out.

Per the usual, “Hoppers” goes deep inside their intricate society. The beasts have a formal political system of antagonistic “Game of Thrones”-like royal houses. The most menacing are the Insect Queen (Meryl Streep — I’d call her a chameleon, but she’s playing a bug), a staunch monarch butterfly and her conniving caterpillar kid (Dave Franco). They’re scheming for power.

Perfectly content with his station is Mabel’s new best furry friend King George (Bobby Moynihan), a gullible beaver who ascended to the throne unexpectedly. He happily enforces “pond rules,” such as, “When you gotta eat, eat.”

That means predators have free rein to nosh on prey, and everybody’s cool with it. Because of bone-dry deliveries, like exhausted office drones, the four-legged cast members are hilarious as they go about their Animal Planet activities.

No surprise — talking lizards, sharks, bears, geese and frogs are the real stars here. They far outshine Mabel, even when she dons beaver attire. Much like a 19-year-old in a job interview, she doesn’t leave much of an impression.

Yes, the teen has a heartfelt motivation: The embattled pond was her late grandma’s favorite place. Mabel promised her that she’d protect it.

But in personality she doesn’t rank as one of Pixar’s most engaging leads, perhaps because she’s past voting age. Mabel is nestled in a nebulous phase between teenage rebellion and adulthood that’s pretty blasé, even if a touch of tension comes from her hiding her Homo sapien identity from her new diminutive pals. When animated, kids make better adventurers, plain and simple.

“Hoppers” continues Pixar’s run of humble, charming originals (“Luca,” “Elio”) in between billion-dollar-grossing, idea-starved sequels (“Inside Out 2,” probably “Toy Story 5”). The Disney-owned studio’s days of irrepressible innovation and unmatched imagination are well behind it. No one’s awed by anything anymore. “Coco,” almost 10 years ago, was their last new property to wow on the scale of peak Pixar.

Look, the new movie is likable and has a brain, heart and ample laughs. That’s more than I can say for most family fare. “A Minecraft Movie” made me wanna hop right out of the theater.

Movie Reviews

Review | Hoppers: Pixar’s new animation is a hilarious, heartfelt animal Avatar

Published

1 day ago

March 2, 2026

Press Room

4/5 stars

Bounding into cinemas just in time for spring, the latest Pixar animation is a pleasingly charming tale of man vs nature, with a bit of crazy robot tech thrown in.

The star of Hoppers is Mabel Tanaka (voiced by Piper Curda), a young animal-lover leading a one-girl protest over a freeway being built through the tranquil countryside near her hometown of Beaverton.

Because the freeway is the pet project of the town’s popular mayor, Jerry (Jon Hamm), who is vying for re-election, Mabel’s protests fall on deaf ears.

Everything changes when she stumbles upon top-secret research by her biology professor, Dr Sam Fairfax (Kathy Najimy), that allows for the human consciousness to be linked to robotic animals. This lets users get up close and personal with other species.

“This is like Avatar,” Mabel coos, and, in truth, it is. Plugged into a headset, Mabel is reborn inside a robotic beaver. She plans to recruit a real beaver to help populate the glade, which is set to be destroyed by Jerry’s proposed road.