Missing Link Is Mostly Agreeable But It's Also A Step Down From Past LAIKA Films

Missing Link is a very traditional sort of family movie, a stark contrast to many animated American family movies that pride themselves on constant wink-winks and self-referential nods to the audience. That's not the angle Missing Link wants to go down, no siree, instead, it's a classical globe-trotting adventure story with flashes of a Western and an old-timey slapstick comedy (think Laurel & Hardy) thrown in for good measure. All of these old Hollywood influences result in writer/director Chris Butler making a movie that tries to stick to just the basics, but it does that job too well, resulting in a film that far too often registers as passably agreeable rather than exceptionally memorable.

The Shadow Of The Nightmare Before Christmas Looms Large Over Corpse Bride

The fact that Sweeney Todd and Big Fish exist in Tim Burton's 21st-century filmography is kind of astonishing when you look at the rest of the output he's produced over the past 16 years. Sweeney Todd and Big Fish are great, well-crafted films and the other stuff he's put out is....not. The very nadir of his career as a director has managed to arrive in the form of those absolutely abysmal Planet Of The Apes and Charlie And The Chocolate Factory (the latter film being the first motion picture I distinctly remember seeing in a theater despising) remakes. So, in the realm of Tim Burton's 21st-century works, where exactly does his 2005 effort Corpse Bride (which he directed with Mike
Johnson) fall?

Kubo And The Two Strings Is A Majestic And Beautiful Adventure

Boy, if you're a movie loving youngster right now, or someone that just likes good cinema, you've basically hit the jackpot this month. Each of the first three weeks of this month have managed to deliver a noteworthy family film that's managed to not treat younger audiences like morons and has decided that families deserve strong storytelling too. The presence of such films makes the existence of Nine Lives (which was also released this month) somewhat more tolerable, I guess. The newest motion picture in this trend of high-quality August 2016 family movies is Kubo And The Two Strings which also happens to be the newest film from animation studio LAIKA, the place where Coraline and ParaNorman originated.

Trolls, Pets And Kevin Spacey As A Cat Abound In New Family Movie Trailers

With a high profile family film like Kung Fu Panda 3 coming out this Friday, it's to be expected that a number of family films have released trailers in order to get them seen in front of prospective audiences coming out to see Po the Panda. We got four trailers to look at today, so let's get started with my favorite of the bunch...

Kubo And The Two Strings
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4-6qJzeb3A

Holy hell, how is this being done with stop-motion animation? Every frame of this trailer is absolutely beautiful to look at, but thankfully, there's not just style that one can gawk at in this trailer. I love how this trailer doesn't try to fill every second with hyperactive noise and/or jokes, but rather, establishes the plot, atmosphere and characters in a pleasant manner. All of that, plus, a roster of excellent voice actors (Charlize Theron! Ralph Fiennes! Rooney Mara! Matthew McConaughey!), and that excellent Beatles cover, and yeah, it's super easy for me to dub this as one helluva trailer. Consider Kubo And The Two Strings officially one of my most anticipated movies for the year.

Did ya like the atmospheric beauty of that Kubo trailer? Well, the rest of these trailers substitute that for bathroom humor and dancing to pop songs so....yay?

The Secret Life Of Pets
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZJVc_JTI_w
Marking the fourth trailer for The Secret Life Of Pets in the span of seven months (and we've still got five months to go until this movies actually released!), this one brings more of a concrete plot to the proceedings, depicting Max (Louie C.K.), a dog, feeling his life upended when his owner gets a new mutt, Duke (Eric Stonestreet). Basically, it's the same character dynamic Toy Story and Over The Hedge have already done, and this trailer really brings nothing new to the table in terms of plot points or gags. It also looks like they're getting as much mileage as possible out of that heavy metal poodle joke, huh?

The Angry Birds Movie

I was relatively kind to The Angry Birds Movie when its first teaser arrived back in late September, but that goodwill towards its marketing has vanished with this new trailer. All I can really say about this one is that if you've ever had the compulsion to see a movie where Danny McBride spits urine into the eager mouth of Josh Gad, it looks like we've got a movie for you!

Trolls
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDnRVKPjj8k
Oh my God.

This is real.

Small, easily marketable and toyetic characters dancing to a modern dad pop song (in this case Watch Me Whip/Watch Me Nae Nae)?

We've reached peak DreamWorks folks.

Hey, remember how good the How To Train Your Dragon movies were? Yeah, those were awesome.

Nine Lives
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPxI4yOKdgc
Early candidate for most bizarre project of 2016? I'll say yeah. Was this made by someone nostalgic for the days of late 90's live-action Disney family films (the kind made on the cheap and quick like You Favorite Martian and the That Darn Cat! remake), cause that's the kind of cinema this trailer evoked to me. I kind of wish with a premise ripped straight out of a Tropic Thunder trailer parody they went with a more oddball premise than more of this "dad needs to learn to spend more time with his kid" tripe. I'm also pretty certain nothing Christopher Walken does here will top this beautiful insanity from Gigli:

Hooray For The 10th Anniversary Of LAIKA!

While Illumination Entertainment prides itself on endless Minion marketing extensions sequels, Blue Sky Studios is sucking the already dead Ice Age franchise beyond dry and even PIXAR can't escape the allure of Toy Story 4 and Cars 3, there really is something kind of incredible about LAIKA,the Hillsboro, Oregon based animation studio responsible for Coraline, ParaNorman and The Boxtrolls. Founded 10 years ago this month, the studio released their first feature, Coraline, in February 2009 to huge critical acclaim and surprisingly strong box office and have followed that up with two features that don't the scale the box office heights of Despicable Me, but consistently get great reviews and awards nominations (all of the studios films have been nominated for Best Animated Feature).

The Boxtrolls Review

Thinking Inside The Box

I admire the fact that LAIKA seems willing to have a wide variety of tones in their cinematic work. While DreamWorks Animation proudly boasts of trying to make each film emulate the comedic stingily of Shrek as closely as possible, LAIKA has a distinctive atmosphere for each of their three features. Still, that kind of efforts doesn't excuse the prominent flaws found in The Boxtrolls, a film with plenty of charm, but a surprising lack of focus.

New Trailers: What's Black And White And Beating Up Josh Brolin?

Three new trailers went up today, for a wide variety of film. For your convenience, I decided, why not just compile these bad boys into one mega-super-awesome trailer article?