Rio

Rio opens everywhere on Friday, April 15th.



In a time when most animated films seem to be stepping up their game and offering adults and children delights in equal amounts, Rio, the latest film from the Blue Sky animation studios, really seems to be favouring the little ones. Not that there is anything wrong with pleasing the kids who will make up that core audience of Rio, but kids honestly deserve better than this repetitive and inert film.

After years of being raised in Minnesota by a book store owner (voiced by Leslie Mann), a blue Macaw from the rainforests of Brazil named Blu (obviously, voiced by Jesse Eisenberg) learns he has to return briefly to Brazil because he is the last male Macaw alive and is needed to mate with Jewel (Anne Hathaway). Naturally, upon their arrival during Carnivale, things go awry when Jewel wants nothing to do with the socially awkward Blu (who is so domesticated that he can't even fly short distances) and they are captured by smugglers and chained together at the ankle.

For the remainder of the film the plot will play out repeatedly in the ways listed below, only sometimes differing in order:

-Blu and Jewel escape from captivity or a dangerous situation
-Blu and Jewel fight
-Blu and Jewel meet a character that will take them to a pointless set piece or musical number
-Blu just missed getting back together with his former owner
-Blu and Jewel flirt
-Blu blows it with Jewel somehow
-Blu and Jewel are captured again

Just keep shuffling these elements over and over again after one is drawn from the deck, put it back in the deck, and repeat. That is the maddening structure that Rio seems to be following. Only three characters in the film have any back story, only one of those three is at all engaging, and the rest are just on hand to look cute and blend into the film's admittedly rich colour scheme. George Lopez, Jamie Foxx, and will.i.am., are all on hand as birds that occassionally accompany Blu and Jewel, but they don't do anything. Nothing they do is amusing and they never once make an impact on the plot. They simply point in directions, sing a song, offer useless advice, and Blu and Jewel just follow along blindly.

The film does have two aces up it's sleeve, and they are quite likely the only things anyone over the age of 8 will find funny. Jermaine Clement provides the voice of a villainous bird employed by the smuggling ring. This character used to be an action star, is seemingly modelled after Hans Gruber, eats chicken (effectively making him a cannibal), and has his own Flight of the Conchords style musical number. The other ace comes late in the film in the form of Tracy Morgan voicing a slobbering bulldog. It is a character that really only serves one purpose, but much like Clement, Morgan rises above the material and is able to put his own spin on things.

Rio isn't terrible by any stretch. It is just thoroughly underwhelming. Instead of striving for excellence, the film seems perfectly content with being merely adequate. It is lazy and repetitive, with few laughs for adults (one of which is an off-handed reference to the long forgotten film White Nights), but the core 4-8 demographic will find plenty to enjoy in the silly voices and lavish colours.

Side note: Rio is preceded by a short featuring Scrat from the Ice Age films. This short is funnier and more bizarre than all of Rio. Also, if watching in a 3D house, the short looks great in 3D. The same can not be said for Rio which doesn't have anything added to it at all by being in 3D. Much like this year's Green Hornet, you can take your glasses off for long stretches and it would look virtually the same (and it wouldn't drown out all those great colours).

Rating (out of four stars): **1/2 (the extra half is honestly for the short)