Maybe it was because this has been one of the worst weeks of my life; maybe it was because I missed seeing creatures, even if they were CGI animated creations from Dreamworks, that were out of Jim Henson's creature shop (one could say that the mix of very tiny and cute mixed with a fantsy quest that involves some magical overtones has hints of Fraggle Rock and Labyrinth); maybe it was because I needed some silly pop song renditions by a bunch of overly cute, rainbow-psychedelically colored thing. Whatever it was, Trolls actually did it for me, up to a point. As an adult it was delightful and cheerful, and for kids I can guess it's like getting a bowl of the most awesome tasty scrumdidliumtous cereal of the day: it'll taste great and surgary for now, and then later it'll be time to eat vegetables.
It's not that I don't have criticisms of it as a movie, I know I do: the pacing near the end gets extremely lax - there's no real final big blow-out against the villain, it's borderline a cop-out because, frankly, how would we buy all of these tiny trolls defeating this bad witch of a villain (not the goblin king, who's a likable dunce, but the woman at her ear trying to get him to have "Trollstice" so all the trolls in the kingdom can be eaten for the sake of 'happiness') outside of the power of jubilant and over the top singing of a recent pop hit (in this case that earworm "Dance Dance Dance" or whatever it's called). And at other points, like a convenient moment a character goes turncoat to do that ratting-out-the-good-guys part that has been seen in countless movies, the filmmakers go into formula.
But what's successful to me about this is the energy, the color, the total glee and joy that is apparent with these filmmakers (and don't forget what Truffaut said, that it's crucial to see either total joy or pain when seeing what the creative process must have been like), and I think that these creators set out to make a silly-smart musical comedy and succeeded. You might get some deep lesson from it about why it's important to be happy, and to that end I'm sure it'll never be as strong as something like Inside Out, which is also about emotional fulfillment and goes into terrain that pushes expectations by embracing sadness. This doesn't do that so much, though at the least it does acknowledge that trolls like the main guy troll Branch (the one voiced by Timberlake) should understandably feel sad and betrayed by the world they're in if total shock and tragedy comes upon them.
I think it may also be a law of low expectations, which I had going in. I was simply hoping to get some vibrant colors and maybe some good voice work. What I got was more than that in the writing, which was very quick and clever and got in with a good joke or line or reaction from a character and didn't stay too long, and the animations in the songs is wildly creative and matches the jubilant tone of the movie: when the main girl Troll Poppy (Kendrick, duh) sings her first song when going on the quest to save the other trolls, the animators keep changing things up and moving along the story (somewhat) and by adding jokes it certainly never makes things dull. And I liked the whole part of the story with the lowly servant goblin girl who has a quasi-kinda-sorta Cinderella thing, only here it actually makes more sense than (dare I say) an actual Cinderella story usually does.
But most of all, it's funny, and not just a 'oh that's cute' way, but in the way that set ups and pay-offs and genuinely clever, snappy dialog can get laughs from me. So if you got a kid or are a kid, this is not high art, but you'll watch it about 50 times. And if you're an adult, you might find yourself watching it with them, maybe more than the requisite once to get them to be quiet. This was a fun trip!
It's not that I don't have criticisms of it as a movie, I know I do: the pacing near the end gets extremely lax - there's no real final big blow-out against the villain, it's borderline a cop-out because, frankly, how would we buy all of these tiny trolls defeating this bad witch of a villain (not the goblin king, who's a likable dunce, but the woman at her ear trying to get him to have "Trollstice" so all the trolls in the kingdom can be eaten for the sake of 'happiness') outside of the power of jubilant and over the top singing of a recent pop hit (in this case that earworm "Dance Dance Dance" or whatever it's called). And at other points, like a convenient moment a character goes turncoat to do that ratting-out-the-good-guys part that has been seen in countless movies, the filmmakers go into formula.
But what's successful to me about this is the energy, the color, the total glee and joy that is apparent with these filmmakers (and don't forget what Truffaut said, that it's crucial to see either total joy or pain when seeing what the creative process must have been like), and I think that these creators set out to make a silly-smart musical comedy and succeeded. You might get some deep lesson from it about why it's important to be happy, and to that end I'm sure it'll never be as strong as something like Inside Out, which is also about emotional fulfillment and goes into terrain that pushes expectations by embracing sadness. This doesn't do that so much, though at the least it does acknowledge that trolls like the main guy troll Branch (the one voiced by Timberlake) should understandably feel sad and betrayed by the world they're in if total shock and tragedy comes upon them.
I think it may also be a law of low expectations, which I had going in. I was simply hoping to get some vibrant colors and maybe some good voice work. What I got was more than that in the writing, which was very quick and clever and got in with a good joke or line or reaction from a character and didn't stay too long, and the animations in the songs is wildly creative and matches the jubilant tone of the movie: when the main girl Troll Poppy (Kendrick, duh) sings her first song when going on the quest to save the other trolls, the animators keep changing things up and moving along the story (somewhat) and by adding jokes it certainly never makes things dull. And I liked the whole part of the story with the lowly servant goblin girl who has a quasi-kinda-sorta Cinderella thing, only here it actually makes more sense than (dare I say) an actual Cinderella story usually does.
But most of all, it's funny, and not just a 'oh that's cute' way, but in the way that set ups and pay-offs and genuinely clever, snappy dialog can get laughs from me. So if you got a kid or are a kid, this is not high art, but you'll watch it about 50 times. And if you're an adult, you might find yourself watching it with them, maybe more than the requisite once to get them to be quiet. This was a fun trip!