BEFORE: From kiddie lit I move to video games for one night - I'd been looking for a way to work this one in. Linking from "Mr. Popper's Penguins", Jim Carrey also has a cameo in "Anchorman 2", which I hope to see this weekend, and so does John C. Reilly (last seen in "The Thin Red Line").
THE PLOT: A video game villain wants to be a hero and sets out to fulfill his dream, but his quest brings havoc to the whole arcade where he lives.
AFTER: Essentially, this is "Toy Story" set in an arcade (kids, an arcade is where we used to have to go to play video games, back in the Stone Age before PlayStation and XBox were invented) - in much the same manner, we see what the characters do in their downtime, when the kids aren't looking. But this plays right into my running theme of identity, because Ralph is a videogame villain who wants to be a hero.
Do villains ever see themselves as villains? I mean, Lex Luthor believes he's keeping the world safe from Superman, and Dr. Doom wants to take over the world so it can be run properly with him in charge. Are they truly evil, or just misguided? Do they see themselves differently from how others see them? They must. So to paraphrase Jessica Rabbit, maybe Ralph's not bad, he's just pixellated that way. Ralph even goes to a support group for villains, Bad-Anon, where villains declare that being bad is good, and learn to feel good about being bad.
But Ralph eventually tires of living in a dump and wrecking the same building day after day, so he travels through the surge protector (which is portrayed as an enormous train station, nice) to find another game where he can earn a medal and prove himself. Identity plus purpose again - you are who you are, but you're also what you do, and you can change what you do, thereby changing what you are.
There are more video-game references in this film than even I picked up on - Ralph travels to a first-person shooter game ("Call of Duty"? "Bio-Shock"? damn, there are so many) and then to a candy-based racing game called "Sugar Rush" - influences of MarioKart Racing, with a hint of Candy Crush. There he meets a glitchy girl with maybe the best character name ever - Vanellope Van Schweetz - and they form an uneasy alliance/friendship to try and win the racing game and get back Ralph's medal.
There were some good twists here, some that I saw coming and a few that I didn't - which I take as a good sign of a strong story. The main voice cast was perfectly cast, everybody sounded like they should have, based on their looks. Fix-It Felix Jr. was a sort of Mario-like character, only without the stereotypical Italian accent, and he's a carpenter, not a plumber - but we get the reference, right? "Junior" is no doubt a reference to Donkey Kong Jr. (which should have been called "Monkey Kong", if not for a spelling error in Japan - don't believe the hype when they say they meant he was dumb like a donkey...)
There used to be a great arcade game based on "Tron", where you played 4 different levels based on different parts of the movie - they should make something similar based on this movie, if they haven't already. Maybe the Fix-It Felix game would be too much like Donkey Kong-meets-Rampage, but Sugar Rush would be a blast to play. Great to see "Tapper" in a film, even if it was root beer he was serving. But come on, video game companies - I own a PS 2 + PS 3, a couple Nintendos, and an iPad - why can't I play Q-Bert on ANY of them?
I'd like to get back to playing more video-games once I'm done with this project (IF I'm ever done...). I did manage to squeeze in some time on "Lego Pirates of the Caribbean" over the break, and after that I've got "Lego Batman 2" and "Lego Harry Potter" waiting in the wings. I'll probably end up playing "Lego Marvel" and "Lego Lord of the Rings" before I'm done - but I also never finished "Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories" or "GTA: San Andreas", let alone "GTA 4" and "GTA 5", which I never even started. At this point, it's not looking good for those games.
Also starring the voices of Sarah Silverman (last seen in "The Muppets"), Jack McBrayer (last seen in "The Campaign"), Alan Tudyk (last seen in "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter"), Jane Lynch (last seen in "Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events"), Ed O'Neill, Mindy Kaling, with cameos from Dennis Haysbert, Joe Lo Truglio, Rachael Harris, Adam Carolla, Edie McClurg, Horatio Sanz, Maurice LaMarche.
RATING: 7 out of 10 cheat codes
I watched this movie a while ago, and honestly Disney's non-pixar CG division has had some really great films in the last few years(Bolt, Tangled), this was less engaging than some of those. I was really happy to see all the video game cameos, but after that I felt my interest dwindling. I think I may have fallen asleep at some point and missed a bit of the film.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the film introduced me to the J-pop group AKB48, which I guess is extremely popular in Japan, but just past my time (in Japan) and only of interest to me as a curiosity.
When Ralph travels to the first person shooter, the armor he wears appears very similar to Halo, a game which I bought when it was released for the PC, but never played.
Ouch... I wouldn't call Bio-Shock a first person shooter, but I guess that is essentially what it is.
And the thing about Monkey Kong is an urban myth. Donkey Kong was named to use the word "donkey" for the concept of stubborn or silly.
And being the completionist I am, I have partially finished GTA IV (finishing the main story line), as well as GTA III, San Andreas and Vice City, but being there are loads of side quests, getting 100% would take years, so I have no hope of doing that.
I haven't played Vice City Stories, but Vice City is high up on my top ten list of all time best video games. http://www.giantbomb.com/profile/zanshin/lists/favorites/53150
I will get on GTA V once they release it for the PC.
I know that's what Donkey Kong's creator says NOW about the use of Donkey vs. Monkey...but I suspect that's a cover story.
ReplyDeleteIt's much easier for me to believe that somebody made a simple typo than they were making a symbolic point about donkeys being stupid, which is sort of common knowledge, but had never before been used that way in language, with that noun being used as an adjective.
He should just admit he made a spelling error. It makes more sense.
My usual method of settling urban legends - checking Snopes.com has proven inconclusive. They lean toward believing Miyamoto's story, but the stories that point to a blurry fax leading to a mistranslation persist.
http://www.snopes.com/business/misxlate/donkeykong.asp
Well, the thing is, I know the word "monkey" in English is very well known in Japan (and donkey is pretty well known too), so it is extremely unlikely he would have made such a mistake, and doesn't seem like a "D" would be mistaken for an "M". Monkey doesn't make much sense either, as the word Kong basically covers that aspect.
ReplyDeleteWhen you factor in the translation aspect of it, donkey, ass and stubborn all go together, at least in the dictionary.
One other point I meant to bring up is that any "villain" would never really see themselves as doing evil. That is why I dislike Gene Hackman's portrayal of Lex Luther (perhaps not his portrayal, but the lines he was given) where he refers to himself as a criminal out to destroy good) but current Lex Luthor (mostly from the animated series) justifies his actions as being necessary to achieve his goals.