New Penguins of Madagascar Movie Received Mixed Reviews From Major Critics
20th Century Fox and DreamWorks Animation released their new comedy/animation film, “Penguins of Madagascar,” into theaters this past Wednesday and all the top,major critics have submitted their reviews. It turns out that about half the group liked it with mixed results. It got an overall 53 score out of a possible 100 across 30 reviews at the Metacritic.com site.
The film stars: John Malkovich, Chris Miller, Peter Stormare, Tom McGrath, Ken Jeong, Benedict Cumberbatch, Annet Mahendru and Christopher Knights. We’ve posted blurbs from a couple of the critics,below.
Michael O’Sullivan from the Washington Post, gave it a nice 88 score, stating: ” The screenplay by John Aboud, Michael Colton and Brandon Sawyer has a fizzy, pop-culture pizazz, tempered by a distinctly vaudeville sensibility. It’s smart, but not brainy; dumb, but never inane.”
Walter Addiego over at the San Francisco Chronicle, gave it a 78 grade. He stated: ” There’s plenty here to tickle the kids, and that’s what counts.”
Christy Lemire at RogerEbert.com, gave it a 75 score, stating: “The pacing is so zany, the jokes are so rapid-fire and the sight gags are so inspired that it’s impossible not to get caught up in the infectious energy of it all.”
Bill Zwecker from the Chicago Sun-Times, gave it a 75 grade. He stated: “From the opening frame right up to the whirlwind finale, you will be treated to non-stop action, clever dialogue and quite a bit of zany energy. If I’d fault anything about this fun romp, it’s that the filmmakers tried to jam-pack too much into one movie.”
Ben Kenigsberg from The New York Times, gave it a 70 grade, stating: ” The decision to focus on the series’s comic relief has resulted in the loosest and perhaps funniest film of the brand.”
Elizabeth Weitzman over at the New York Daily News, gave it a 60 grade, saying: ” A sassy script and good-natured voice work from Benedict Cumberbatch and John Malkovich should keep kids and grownups entertained over the holidays.”
Claudia Puig over at USA Today, gave it a 50 score. He said: “This is a joyless, frenetic film that is very rarely funny.” Betsy Sharkey over at the Los Angeles Times, gave it a 50 score, claiming: “The pun is a gun for Penguins’ writers. Not a sharpshooter rifle, but a machine gun that unloads a nonstop quip barrage, mowing down the real promise of this 3-D animation action comedy.”
Tom Russo from the Boston Globe, gave it a 50 score, saying: ” It’s a movie content to stay within the show’s comfort zone, changing things up mainly with flashier, 3-D visuals, a couple of which are dazzlers, and a theme that doesn’t connect in any notable way.”
Michael Rechtshaffen over at The Hollywood Reporter, gave it a 50 score, saying: “While there are plenty of madcap antics to fill a feature, all that manic energy ultimately proves to be more exhausting than exhilarating.”
Jeff Labrecque at Entertainment Weekly, gave it a 42 grade, stating: “Aims primarily for the kiddies, racing from one frenetic action sequence to another like some haywire Walter Lantz cartoon.”
Geoff Berkshire from Variety, gave it a 40 score,saying: “The graceful camerawork, precise editing and high-quality animation still can’t disguise the lack of imagination that went into the overall conception and the repetitive sameness that creeps into every bind the penguins find themselves in.”
Joe Morgenstern over at the Wall Street Journal, gave it a 30 grade. He stated: “The story line, a sequence of very loosely connected events, sustains a state of almost pure brainlessness with its indifference to dramatic development and the dictates of logic, even the fantasy logic of cartoons. It’s as if most of the script had been generated by algorithms.”
Inkoo Kang from TheWrap, gave it a 30 grade, saying: “The unfunny, unmoving, and uninspired Penguins never persuades us of its need to exist. Sure, there’s a muddled lesson at the end, as tacked on as a Post-It on a piece of week-old cake.”
Finally, Lou Lumenick over at the New York Post, gave it a very bad 25 score, saying: ” A lazy, noisy ADHD-addled collection of animated clichés guaranteed to give anyone older than 5 a headache, even if you don’t see it in optional 3-D.” Stay tuned. Also, get your favorite Movie stuff, and more by Clicking Here.
