What It Is Every so often, an inter-dimensional warlord (Ron Perlman) wreaks havoc in the ancient Chinese kingdom of Sanxingdui with hopes of stealing the mystical item known as the Jade Blade. Standing in his way are five superheroes who wear golden masks that give them superpowers. One of the warlord’s opponents dies, resulting in the mask choosing a new successor, a worthy one. The dilemma is that the beggar, Charlie whom the mask chooses, is a modern American thief. In this animated feature, can Charlie fight evil alongside his new friends or is he doomed to fail in the face of such overwhelming odds?
What We Think This movie is highly recommended for children. In my opinion, it strived towards being cute which it managed to achieve but in doing so, it appeals to an even younger audience which isn’t a bad thing. I won’t even get started on the character designs of the main cast because they were simply the best! I’m sorry my friends, but I thoroughly enjoyed some of the creature designs. My absolute favorite was Holeface who I thought was a very cool monster. The designs of the masks each character wore were equally spectacular as they provided a glimpse into each character’s psyche. It could be the animation style, but I found the movie felt like it was inspired by some video games that follow a similar formula and capture some of the core ideas.
The animation’s frames were all still very pleasant to look at and caught my eye for various reasons. There are a few elements that tickled my fancy. For one, I appreciate the effort that went into creating this animation and the painstaking hours dedicated to the film and the animated realm having been done is exemplary. It does show.
Let’s touch on some of the less favorable aspects. I’d argue that this very much is a children’s movie but a few of the gags are a little too sophisticated for a kids’ movie, so I wouldn’t necessarily rate this too poorly. That said, I would not be accomplishing what I intended if I didn’t address the issues that caught my eye. It is undeniable that the animation was created on a tight budget, in many scenes it is rather obvious. It’s quite clear that background characters were simply copied and pasted, several of the B-list characters had some very bizarre and disturbingly bad designs (I’m talking to you mob boss who has an enormous head, and some places lacked textures and the scenery was uncared for. Plus, I don’t know what they used for recording the voice acting if it was an editing blunder, but the actor’s line recordings were very uneven in volume. At times I could barely make out what the characters were saying.
The script was interesting. It was not great. There were too many low points in the plot characters seemed rushed, the development was strange at best, and the dialogue was simply cringe. It is genuinely difficult to sympathize with Charlie, the main character since he is filled with flippant sarcasm and only possesses an uncontrollable urge to speak at inappropriate times. Then, there were the actions he did, which didn’t seem to be well planned, and made the entire movie extremely difficult to follow. In addition, several jokes would completely baffle all children. I still question the age group of the audience when, at one point, Ron Perlman’s baddie prepares to decapitate a fish lady. Like, come on Ron! Children are watching!
And the voice acting. Oh my Lord, this must be some of the most pathetic voice acting I have heard from Ron Perlman. While I truly like him as an actor, my giddy, he sounded like a zombie. Perhaps I’m being too unfair because I know it must have been difficult to truly enact some of the ludicrous lines he had to say, but come on. I believe most, if not all, of the voice acting in this movie, should come under the same scrutiny.
The actors sound as if they do not care about their roles at all. The only one putting any real effort into his lines is Patton Oswalt, who tries to give his character some life. You know it is bad when a character’s father dies this happens at the start of the movie so it’s not a big spoiler and it is difficult to see any emotion even if you are only listening to the person’s voice. The less said about the background voices, the better.
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