Hey guys, before we're going into the movie review, i want to start off with my confession of my review. In early 2020, i had a good start with three movies, especially that i was planned to take a look at Bloodshot, but as you already know, we got hit hard, very badly from the virus from China, which we're forced to shut down, but not for me, cause i really want to see it on the big screen, despite the awareness from the virus, but due to the panic with outbreak, not only my Bloodshot is cancelled, but so does nearly every films in 2020, due to either being pushed to one year later, released in digital download or even in stream like Netflix and Disney+. And i got very pissed to put the blame for not only China, but so do to everyone for shutting down and im always calling "End of the World" virus due to numerous bodycounts as we know.
So, i want to say, im very sorry for my meltdown and my hiatus of my review without telling. Not to mention, i have so many review plans, but ended up put them in halt. So lets hope for the best to going back in my review business with either my holding plans or even plenty of movies in 2021,
So now im done with my confession, lets get started of my review.
Hey everyone, my name is Anthony and welcome back to my movie review.
As i said in my top list of last year, 2019 is so-and-so, despite some messed up moments with bad remakes, an inexcusable ending of my favorite series like Star Wars in sequel trilogy and sad ending of the series for box-office bomb like The Lego Movie series. But it does have some great stuff like Ford V Ferrari, Joker, Godzilla King of the monsters (aside from bad human stories) and Avengers Endgame that it changed the movie history for not only its one of the best film we've ever seen, but also topped the history of highest grossing film of all time.
That is, until we have a film that it came out for no reason before i was anticipating to see Ford V Ferrari a few weeks later, i've witnessed a film that came out of nowhere that i won't even touching it, until i rent it to see this.
"Arctic Dogs" is a 2019 animated film that was written/directed by Aaron Woodley, produced by Monika Bacardi, Andrea Iervolino, Joonbum Heo, Youngki Lee, Jae Y. Moh, and Jae Woo Park, then co-written by Matt Lyon, Bob Barlen, Cal Brunker and Bryan Thompson.
When i heard this movie, i was all like "What the?! There's a movie was announced and released immediately in the first day of November 2019?! How did it get here in wide release?!". I mean if you ever seen a trailer, let along the reviewers, this looks like you wanna see it from either Animat's Review or SaberSpark, which they already reviewed it last year before me?! And what's with the cast in the movie, i have no idea how did they brought our familiar faces like Jeremy Renner (aka Hawkeye), James Franco, Heidi Klum, John Cleese and Alec Baldwin. I mean this sounds something straight out of rejected MCU or Dreamworks movie, but not like this!
Ok ok, i know im getting exaggerating for why this movie came out abruptly before any films like Ford V Ferrari or Doctor Sleep, but this is something that no matter i looked it, it has to be seen that either is typically bad or very bad as "FoodFight!".
So, how bad can this movie be?
Well, lets find out...!
The Story
I can easily believing that the story is just too generic for this movie of underdog in arctic.
The plot is about Swifty, who started as a boy who has snow camouflage for his appearance and enjoyed to see the three experts delivery named "Top Dogs", as time went on, he works in ABDS (Arctic Blast Delivery Service) to believe he's part of Top Dogs, when in reality, he's just an arctic fox that he's not good enough to be like them and forced to work with the machine to bring out boxes to the Top Dogs, but one day while attempt to do his delivery by himself, he stumbled upon the evil genius named Otto Van Walrus where his goal is to dig to spreading a dangerous gas at the village and kidnapping Top Dogs, its up to him and his friends to save the land without the dangerous heating gas.
Granted, the story of being a dreamer to be the next expert delivery is ok, but the execution was a total embarrassment with all the bad writing, mainly due to Swifty being an over exaggerated dreamer that he believes to be best ever, but in reality, he just comes off as too desperate to be likable, possibly didn't follow the rule or even being a jerk.
Don't even get me started with the writing, the writing just comes off ridiculously poorly written and immature. This movie is obviously predictable for break next speed, pointless romantic and everything about it is just boringly bland. Not to mention, it also tries to give us the meaning with messages of "stepping up the dreams", "Be yourself" and the obvious environment message. Its as if the writer is trying to do the combination, but its al over the place and again, they don't know what they're doing.
And the jokes... Oh god the jokes...! The humor is just so bad that its just way to desperate too to be funny, instead, these jokes are either plain childish and probably had no idea what to do for the use of pop culture references.
Not to mention, as a one in a half hour movie, it also going to slow down with some calm moments and in the action movies that i've been begging to say "Stop it and get going!".
The story is messy to follow along with the messages, but the writing is atrocious with poorly written jokes and losing its meaning.
The Animation
Despite the writing is a joke, but the animation itself of this movie is... Lets just say, cheap, but not the good kind of cheap, i mean something that it looks nice for small budget, but in reality, it feels like it should've been came out in 2010.
For starter, the presentation looks soo early 2010, the background looks pretty typical to taken place on North/South pole, snow village and a lot of mountains of snow and a generic evil vehicle from Walrus. They look ok, but with a cheap budget, its not as good.
As for the character designs, i admit, they look not bad, just a generic anthrophobic animals like anyone that we likes, but its just that sometimes they look rather unsettle, even for a cheap CG animated movie, sure most of them that i find them cute, while others looks bland.
And as for the movements of animation, the renders works fine at the times, but for some reason, they don't even bother to verify some problems that we may easily witnessed at various moments, which is something that i wasn't joking when i've seen some errors. Like this is something it needs to be patched before it was released, but instead as we know, they rushed the animation and im easily guessing the budget is for the familiar celebs than the film itself.
If they don't know what to do for the writing, maybe they also don't know how to process the animation properly than rushing up!
The Characters
If you though the writing of the story was poor, well i hate to say, so do to the characters.
First is Swifty (played by Jeremy Renner, aka Hawkeye), he's the obvious dreamer who wishes to be like the Top Dogs, but he's just a douchebag based on his selfish and stubborn personality that he wanted to be the big deal of ABDS. Which is pretty obvious that he's focused on his ego that he doesn't know how the business works for his "dream". And no, Jeremy deserves better to be staying in MCU than being involved with this film.
And there's Otto Van Walrus (played by veteran member of Monty Python, John Cleese), i find him to be not bad, John did a nice work of his role since we're familiar with either Monty Python or other films out there. But Otto's role is just very bellow based on being a typical evil genius walrus to destroying town with his drill with his forgettable motivation. Not to mention, i think they're clearly ripping off Mr. Waternoose from Pixar's Monsters Inc, mainly because of the villainous character design, like mainly the obvious use of spider legs and maybe the motivation. Not only Monsters Inc, but he also ripping off the minions from "Despicable me", thanks to the puffins are acting like... You know, the minions?? (Now i think of it, maybe i should watch Despicable me series in the future...)
The rest of the characters aren't as talking about, mainly due to their one-dimensional personalities, like PB (played by Alec Baldwin) who's a pessimistic and introverted co-worker/best pal, Lemmy (played by James Franco) who's a stupid idiot with immature jokes and culture references, Magda (played by Anjelica Huston) who's a serious big boss, Bertha and Leopold (played by Keidi Klum and Omar Sy) are the European conspiracy theorist that they're so bad that they made me feel offended and uncomfortable (as a French-Canadian autistic person), and Jade (again, played by Heidi Klum) who's the obvious love interest and the engineer with the brain.
These characters are just obnoxious for the bad writing and bad jokes. And not mention, i feel sorry for our familiar celebs for being involved with this stupid film.
Spoiler Alert or if you don't give a S*** to see the rest of this crappy movie
The final act of this movie is as i said before, it just dragged on for the poorly written dialogue to made us feel emotional and even the cringe inducing jokes.
After the reveal of Otto Van Walrus's evil plan, Swifty and his friends are coming in to not only rescue Top Dogs and Jade, but also dealing with Otto to prevent the gigantic drill, but they got into the cell at first, after successfully survived from deadly boiling water (i think...), our heroes reached to their town where Otto is activating his giant drill to destroying the land, so Swifty (thanks to his camouflage appearance by taking off his clothes in his tighty whities) has to going after Otto by himself to self-destruct the drill, after the beaten up with humiliation ways, Swifty eventually deactivates the drill and made it into self-destruction.
Everyone is saved and they lived happily ever after and except for me for being regretful for renting it...!
*sigh* And now for my final opinion of this film...!
Overall, Arctic Dogs is the film that it has no reason to be existed, cause again, they introduced the movie without a teaser or anything, they just quickly released the film in the first day of November, with broken down writing, immature jokes that it feels like it was written from a different world, the presentation is so bellow average, the characters are not as likable or relating and the voice acting is just sad for our favorite celebs to make a money.
Speaking of money, its no secret that they released the film in a very bad timing that again, they never teasing this movie, which they earned only $9.9 million that it barely going over $50 million of budget, which il be very appreciated to never having it as a franchise than any other bad ones out there!
With this embarrassing film, im gonna give this one a 2/10 in a WTF level.
So everyone, please, do yourselves a favor and learn from my mistake since i renting it, do not, and i do mean, DO NOT Watch this movie! Its not worth of your time and money spending of this cheap-tastic film, otherwise, i am sorry for your regretful movement or your curiosity. Like geez, review this movie for my curiosity and joking with is a terrible mistake in my career...!
Either way, so this ends of my movie review (thank god...), if you guys have your opinion or any suggestions, let me know at comment bellow and support me on KO-FI.com/blackevil.
Thanks for reading, and im Anthony, signing out
