BEFORE: 3 days left in March, and it looks like the month that comes in like a lion is going out like a rodent of some kind. From talking chipmunks I move to talking guinea pigs. And linking is a snap, since Amy Poehler did the voice of a chipmunk last night, and she appeared with her husband Will Arnett in "Blades of Glory", and he's got a role in tonight's film.
THE PLOT: A specially trained squad of guinea pigs is dispatched to stop a diabolical billionaire from taking over the world.
AFTER: I liked this better than the Chipmunks film, if only for the reason that these rodents don't have those high-pitched, sped-up, hard-to-understand voices. The movie doesn't waste a lot of time telling us the origin of these smart, talking secret agents, it just throws us right into a mission with them.
The explanation for how THESE animals can talk - besides the fact that there wouldn't be much of a movie if they didn't - turns out to be somewhat similar to the device used in "Up", to make the dogs understandable. It's a plot contrivance, but unfortunately an impossible yet necessary one.
Kids probably don't mind, they don't get all hung up on things like "Why are the guinea pigs talking?" like I do. Can you tell a kid, "Because it's a movie, that's why!" or does that tend to shatter their dreams? I guess I didn't have a problem with animals talking in films like "The Jungle Book" or "Bambi" when I was a kid - so I guess you can just see the world differently when you're a tot.
I remember there was a series of Blockbuster Video ads a few years ago, with a CGI guinea pig voiced by Jim Belushi and a rabbit voiced by James Woods - they ran during the Super Bowl, if my memory serves. For some reason I thought this film was directly related to those characters - or was directed by the same person. Nope, it looks like another one of those intellectual property lawsuits waiting to happen.
I didn't mind the far-fetched plot - up to a point. When the evil plan was finally revealed, it sort of led nowhere, and was a huge stretch. (More so than talking secret-agent guinea pigs, even...) Again, kids probably wouldn't notice, but I did.
Also starring Zack Galifianakis (last seen in "The Hangover"), Bill Nighy (last seen in "Underworld: Rise of the Lycans"), and the voices of Sam Rockwell (last seen in "Choke"), Jon Favreau (last seen in "Couples Retreat"), Nicolas Cage (last heard in "Astro Boy"), Penelope Cruz (last seen in "Blow"), Tracy Morgan (last seen in "Superhero Movie"), Steve Buscemi (last seen in "Rising Sun"). Cameos from Niecy Nash and Loudon Wainwright III.
RATING: 6 out of 10 microchips
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