Tuesday 8 September 2015

Review: Penguins of Madagascar (2014)

You know those movies you watch for the sole reason that one of your favourite actors or actresses is in it? I’m not the only one who does this, right? Jenna I know you do this too! I might have gone a step too far this time. We’re all a little fed up of Madagascar by now, are we not? I don’t think I could take any more of King Julien, and if I hear that song (I don’t even want to name it) one more time I might just cry, but the other night I watched Penguins of Madagascar.

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Because Benedict Cumberbatch voices a wolf. Bonus, Benedict Cumberbatch doesn’t know how to say penguins! Sigh. Even I know I did a terrible thing. But do you know what? I really enjoyed it! The film, too. Ha.

I guess you could say that Pengwings (sorry) of Madagascar follows the same principle as Minions. It takes a bunch of cute, loveable, but minor characters from a major movie and gives them the limelight for an hour and a half. The penguins were actually my favourite characters in Madagascar, in my defence. And boy, Madagascar takes some effort to type! I’ll be a pro by the end of this review.

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The film itself starts with an origin story of sorts of how Skipper (Tom McGrath), Kowalski (Chris Miller), Rico (Conrad Vernon) and Private (Christopher Knights) joined forces, and rapidly moves into the main storyline of their lifelong, but unbeknown nemesis, Dr. Octavius Brine, AKA Dave (John Malkovich). Dave might just be my favourite villain ever, I was actually crying with laughter at some of his lines. His little octopus henchmen all have very human names, but each time Dave shouts out a command, it ends up being an actual actor or actress’ name. Such as!

“Nicholas, Cage them!”
“Drew! Barry! More power!”
“Hugh! Jack! Man the battlestations!”

You get the gist. They might eek out a cringe from most, but puns and dad jokes are my favourites. I might even have to dedicate a blog post to some lines like these I’ve thought up myself. Can anyone start me off?

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The penguins are supported by an organisation known as North Wind (yes, there’s a fart joke in there) which is headed by a wolf known as Classified (Benedict Cumberbatch). That’s not his name apparently, it’s Classified. Team North Wind try to take over the operation with their fancy gadgets, but I’m sure you can guess how that ends.

Honestly, I was really glad I watched this in the end. It was an entertaining hour and half and much better than I thought it would be. Give it a go!


2 comments:

  1. I had a fun time watching this also. Need a rewatch before I review since I was interrupted by some unforseen circumstances and missed huge chunks of it. I did see those puns. Those were well done. I cracked up, too.

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    1. It was definitely better than I was expecting it to be :)
      - Allie

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