Kris and I were bored last night, so we went to a late movie. "Madagascar", the new animated film from Dreamworks was showing at the right time, so we went. I had no real desire to see it, but it has been promoted heavily, and as my wife said it was being described as, "The Shrek of the Summer."
I don't know how to begin to explain how terrible this movie is. Since Dreamworks made Shrek, I guess they have the legal right to compare any movie the want to Shrek. This movie isn't even crap. Its a like a weak fart. Enough to annoy people and make them walk away, but not make much of an impact. Since I don't want anyone to see this limp piece of celluloid, I don't feel bad explaining the movie and telling you how it ends.
We open in a Zoo in NY where a Lion, Zebra, Hippo, and Giraffe live and are all friends. They love their life entertaining the crowds, but none so much as Alex, the Lion. They also are waited on paw and hoof (terrible pun) getting their favorite foods, including Alex getting steak. Of course, the Zebra (Marty) dreams of something outside of the zoo, and this dream is encouraged by some penguins who are also trying to escape to get to Antarctica. (The penguins are great, but too little to carry the movie) So one night he leaves to see the sights. His friends chase after him, (along with penguins and some amusing monkeys who appear twice in the film with some great poo flinging lines and then are never heard from again for the duration of the film) and find him at Grand Central Station. Of course, a lion in Grand Central calls out the police, and they are all promptly tranquilized. (The one great visual part of the movie is the psychedelic-trip on tranqs.)
Zoo officials now think that they wanted to escape, so they ship them off in boxes to Kenya. But in transit, the diabolical penguins attack the humans, commandeer the ship, and in the process, the friends all fall overboard in their boxes and wash up on the beaches of...
MADAGASCAR! OK, at this point we are a good 50+ minutes into this film. Total yawn fest. And the jokes they are trying suck. Just terrible. David Schwimmer voices the giraffe, Melman, and I wanted him to get eaten by a lion so much it was unbearable. When the boxes feel in the water, I was praying he would drown. No such luck. He takes up screen time for the whole movie. (And where are the monkeys? Gone. Funniest guys, gone.) But there is a reason we can't have the monkeys, cause on Madagascar, we meet up with a huge group of Lemurs, and their King, who are being terrorized by Hyenas. The king is a crazy-silly Pakistani stereotype, like the Simpson's Apu on whippets. He gets HUGE amounts of screen time to be almost funny but not quite. Alex scares the Hyenas who have never seen a lion, and save the lemurs. The friends begin to accept their lot in life, but Alex can't eat, cause there is no steak. His herbivore friends are just fine, but Alex gets more and more hungry. Eventually he sees his zebra friend and the lemurs as walking steaks, freaks out and tries to eat them, and is so ashamed that he banishes himself to the other side of the island with the hyenas.
If it weren't crappy enough, his Zebra friend can't stand to not have his friend in exile, and goes to save him. Of course the other friends come along, get attacked by the Hyenas, and Alex saves them (despite previously wanting to eat them). In the end, they all live in harmony when the penguins show up and make sushi for Alex so he can eat meat. (Fish haven't been in this film, haven't walked and talked, and therefore are just soulless things totally acceptable for eating.)
So, what is this movie about? What is Dreamworks trying to tell us about life with this story? Its about homosexuality, and they are promoting the right wing christian perspective that being gay can be cured. That's right, I said it. And I'm going on a rant, so don't get mad at me. Besides, this is Dreamworks stereotype, I'm just pointing it out.
Think about it. There is a big lion (butch gay guy) and his zebra friend (straight guy). I mean, the "lion" is even an actor in the zoo, who sucks his thumb, and doesn't ever try and eat the girl Hippo. Not his type. But its OK, cause the Hippo represents the overweight, unattractive fag-hag, so she's just his friend. The "lion" is in "captivity" (strong influence of society, family, and religion), so he doesn't realize who he really is. When he gets out in the wild (freedom and no societal repercussions) with his zebra friend (who likes to be chased by the lion and shows him how to run on all fours), the lion starts seeing the zebra differently. Now hes just a piece of "meat" (cause they would like you to believe that all gay men want nothing more than to have sex with you). There are two scenes as Alex starts to "come out" where he wakes up licking and biting the Zebras butt. I'm not making this up. And its the zebra's fault for leading him on. What was the lion supposed to think? So, when he reveals his true colors as a "meat eater", he is ashamed, and goes into exile with the other hyenas, who are all crazy slightly-swishy guys. Most of his friends are ready to leave him, but the zebra knows the lion isn't really happy over there on his own being a "meat eater", and goes over to bring him back to the fold. The other friends join in the "intervention" and in the end, the lion hides his gayness to be accepted by his friends, outside of the occasional "meat" he gets on the side (which is sushi, a widely know "gay" meal.)
So, if you want to indoctrinate your kids that gay people should be changed, go see Madagascar. If you want to uphold the draconian views of the uber-evangelical, pay $6 to see this movie. Personally, I thought it sucked.
I've just come back from an opening day viewing of Pirates of the Caribbean, with Kris, Alisa and my mom. We have been looking forward to this installment of PotC for quite some time. Over a year really, from when we saw the first teasers for the movie. I was a fan of the first movie, and have watched it many times.
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