The Lego Movie
As cinematic spin-offs go, The Lego Movie has ruined it for everyone else. I might sweep all other kids’ toy-inspired films into a basket and send them to the charity shop. Forever. Preferably on the moon. In its three bites at the spin-off cherry, Transformers failed to be one iota as entertaining as Lego is in its 100 frantic, fantastic minutes. Parents and grandparents might sigh at the prospect of yet another highoctane, multicoloured kids’ film, but this is as smart, funny and entertaining as the very best.
The story is as simple as the bricks behind it; a classic quest that provides a platform for cast and crew to riff off. Cleverly, the battle – this is Lego, of course there’s a battle – is the one facing everyone who’s ever played with it. On one side, you have the order-loving Lord Business (Will Ferrell), president of Bricksburg, whose citizens live in strict accordance with his instructions. Against him, the renegade Master Builders, who tear up the rules and make what they need as they go along.
Emmet (Chris Pratt) is a textbook Bricksburgian. Blessed with Lego’s most generic face, he’s happy going to work, building, then tearing it down to build the same thing the next day. As the catchy, and only, Bricksburg pop song goes: Everything Is Awesome. And everything is, except for a prophecy revealed by one Master Builder (Morgan Freeman), which tags Emmet as a Special who is going to save the world from some evil plans. After Emmet is pulled out of Bricksburg by Wyldstyle (Elizabeth Banks), he gets to explore sides to Lego he never knew, and hopefully save the world. It draws you along in an irresistible mix of sharp and sweet.
Will Arnett is wonderful as Wyldstyle’s boyfriend, an insufferably smug Lego Batman, and the cute Master Builder, Unikitty, is a perfect totem to every combination your child ever made out of other Lego parts. Pirate ships and space ships make human prrrrrrs as they go. Laser guns go ‘pew, pew pew’. Emmet’s shower spits out those round jewel blocks as water. Every corner you turn has visual gags to cheer, whether new or wonderfully familiar, and a script and story that is funny, sweet and utterly engrossing.
Each iconic Lego piece gets a cameo, from the sharks to the glow-in-the-dark ghosts. Warner Bros-owned superhero movie properties, like Batman and Superman, get prime position. Even Lego’s most ancient ranges get a look in: from a split-second visual of the 1980s Fabuland, I had sufficient nostalgia to buy something on eBay I hadn’t seen since I was five.
The background might be cynical, but what makes The Lego Movie such a giddy thrill is that cynicism is the enemy. But whether you remember playing with Lego yourself, or vicariously through your family, you can’t argue with its warm, later message that playing together is more fun than playing alone.
