Home

HOME

Director : Tim Johnson
Year : 2015
Genre : Animation
Rating : *1/2

While 'The LEGO Movie', 'How To Train Your Dragon 2' and 'Big Hero 6' are animations made for a slightly older child, almost teenage audience, Dreamworks latest CGI comedy 'Home' is a film clearly made for the very young. Now, there's absolutely nothing wrong with movies being made for the toddler demographic; even as I write this 'Shaun The Sheep The Movie' is earning big bucks at the box office as well as a heaping helping of critical praise. But I wish that filmmakers would make movies with a hint of inspiration, maturity or effort rather than giving tiny kids the laziest, bottom of the barrel, generic fare possible. Case in point, 'Home'.

Based on Adam Rex's book 'The True Meaning Of Smekday', the film tells the story of an unpopular alien named Oh! (voiced by 'The Big Bang Theory's Jim Parsons) who befriends a young girl Pip (Rihanna) after his extra-terrestrial race called the Boov takes over Earth and rehouses humanity on the other side of the planet, in the process seperating the girl from her mother (Jennifer Lopez). In an attempt to reunite Pip with her Mum, the incredibly annoying Oh! becomes an outlaw from the Boov and the leader of the aliens (Steve Martin) orders his arrest. What ensues is a race to find the girls mother while avoided the wrath of the Boov. Does that plot sound overly complicated for a little kids film? I didn't even mention a giant space monster who holds a grudge against the purple creatures for some reason!

 

As is the case with any Dreamworks animation, the CGI looks great and 'Home' continually shines with nice colours and shapes. However, the comedy is unbelievably weak, the story is stupid and surprisingly complex for a film aimed at pre-teens, the characters are beyond irritating and the film is filled to the brim with the worst modern animation conventions. From an awful soundtrack which crams in as much horrible pop music into it's running time as possible, modern pop culture references such as selfies and photobombing which will age the film incredibly quickly and characters who are animated in an overly kinetic way. Parsons distinctive voice fits well enough with the central character of Oh! but he is practically taking his overly sarcastic persona from 'The Big Bang Theory' and transferring it to an animated form while Rihanna and the rest of the vocal artists fail to bring anything remotely resembling effort to their performances.

In short, 'Home' shouldn't be watched in the cinema. It is clearly a straight-to-DVD release that is only being pushed for cinemas due to it's rather impressive vocal talent and no other reason. Kids will like it enough but anyone over the age of 10 will be nothing but bored. Dreamworks can do so much better...