Hatrack River Forum: Monster House *spoilers*

This is topic Monster House *spoilers* in forum Books, Films, Food and Culture at Hatrack River Forum.

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Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :

This film is such a total throwback to 1985.

That's both a good and bad thing.

This film is fun, funny, and exciting in a manner very similar to The Goonies.

But, that brings up an important question: Why was it animated?

The human characters might as well have been live action. The House, while well designed never quite takes full advantage of the medium.

The plot is simple enough: Wistful Kid, Funny Fat Kid, and Prep Girl With a Heart of Gold team up to save their neighborhood from a living, seemingly carnivorous house.

That much you know from the trailers.

But...there are delightful surprises in store. Certain things are definitely -not- what they seemed to be in the trailer...and as a result one hasn't seen all of the big reveals and scares. Not by a long shot.

The voice talents all work well. DJ, Chowder and Jenny all sound like genuine kids. Maggie Gyllenhall is perfect as the bad babysitter. Jon Heder has a hilarious cameo as a sort of geek god. Kathleen Turner has a brief but pivotal voice cameo.

There are a ton of snappy one-liners, funny policemen, and an enjoyable build-up of the House's mystery.

That said, the flaw of "why is this a cartoon?" is joined by a terrible loss of momentum during the climax. The scene is 10-15 minutes too long. By trying to pile on thrills, the opposite effect was obtained...it drags, drags, -drags- before finally petering out.

Worth seeing as a matinee.

Posted by James Tiberius Kirk (Member # 2832) on :

quote:
But, that brings up an important question: Why was it animated?

Maybe because Pixar and Dreamworks have been so sucessful with CGI. I would guess that CGI family films have done much better at the box office than live-action ones.

That, and the fact that one of the movie's most important characters is the house itself. It has to function both as a character and a set piece simultaneously. First, it has to be portrayed convicingly (CGI might look fake, animatronics are expensive). Second, the young actors and actresses would have to be experienced enough to react convincingly.

--j_k

Posted by Puffy Treat (Member # 7210) on :

This was filmed with "Polar Express" style "performance" capture. In other words, it's live action wearing a CGI skin. [Wink]

The "house" FX didn't take full advantage of the possibilities animation offers, so it still ended up looking sort of fakey and off-putting during the climax.

Posted by Dr Strangelove (Member # 8331) on :

I didn't really enjoy it that much. It was weird in a not-so-enjoyable way for me. I thought it had quite a few plot holes.

Posted by Snail (Member # 9958) on :

quote:
This film is such a total throwback to 1985.

1985? The year or the Manic Street Preachers song?

Anyway, I saw this a few days ago and wasn't impressed. I too wondered why this had to be animation instead of live action.

I don't know... The plot and everything seemed very standard to me. There were some good dialogue bits but overall it was meh. Not exiting enough, not "plotty" enough, not fun enough. The final climax was badly done.

Also, in a film where the overall message seemed to be that "Bullying fat people is bad" then why did they not make the fat boy the main hero instead of the standard sidekick? If "love is blind" or something then why couldn't it have been he who got the girl?

The most hilarious part were the parents leaving just in the beginning.