Penguins of Madagascar

Dir: Eric Darnell, Simon J. Smith

2014

***

I'm no fan of the Madagascar films and in my opinion they got worse as they went on. There are quite a few short films involving the characters too, each one as bed as the next. However, I've always quite liked the Penguin characters, so when they decided to give them their own spin-off movie I was interested but apprehensive. Thankfully, they remembered what it was that made the Penguins so popular in the first place. I'm not sure about the origin story, it's almost too sensible of the rather silly and haphazard foursome but the film soon finds its rhythm and never stays sensible for too long. It starts off where Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted left off and even highlights the film's flaws. It quickly becomes its own thing, so much so you wish they'd have dropped the 'Madagascar' from the title. The voice work from Tom McGrath, Chris Miller, Conrad Vernon and Christopher Knights is brilliant once more, they're a far better ensemble of voice actors than any other animation I can think of who are generally big name stars just for the sake of it. That said, they are joined by big name stars Benedict Cumberbatch, John Malkovich and Ken Jeong, although I would argue that although popular, all three men have distinctive voices that make them desirable for such a production. It's nothing massively original but it is continuously silly with some great one liners. It has a certain stamina about it that the Madagascar film did not. It's a bit harsh to suggest that Pacific Data Images studio closed because of Penguins of Madagascar, it may not have made as much money that was needed to keep the business afloat but it was good and their previous film Mr. Peabody & Sherman was also good, in my opinion it was the horrible and unnecessary Shrek sequels and the Madagascar films that made people turn to Pixar and Dreamworks other animated films. The style and simplicity of this kind of animation seemed to lend itself well to Penguins when I always thought the opposite with Madagascar. I really like the TV show too, although the show and film are unrelated. Ironic really that a studio that churned out so many horrible sequels to films that weren't that good in the first place, ends on the one film whereby a sequel would have been really nice. I'll get over it though I'm sure.