Another brick in the wall

Rating: 4/10 (9 September 2008)

Truth be told - I don't like Dreamworks/Pixar movies. Some are better, some are worse but for me it usually feels like watching the same formula again and again, only this time with a panda/robot/fish/ant/crap protagonist. I would skip Kung-Fu Panda easily, but whad'ya know, the "making of" was rather interesting, which made me ignore my tingling spider-sense and giving it a try. Truth be told - the movie looks very good (as expected), and I'm a sucker for these marvelous 2d animation eye-candies which seems to be popping around in those 3d movies. And so the animation is great, the character design is inspiring and everything Appears to be working out well. Well - too bad looks ain't enough in order to make a movie. it might suffice for a screen saver, a poster or even a rather interesting "making of", but that's as far as it goes. Sadly most of the plot is rather dull, same old jokes, same all goofy animal who just doesn't seem to find its place, but hey, polls and statistics claims that about 50% of western children are overweight to obese. Most of them have broken dreams of becoming things they can never be, so why not selling them the illusion that any fat loser can be the "Supreme Dragon Fighter"? Pack a few lame jokes along the way, and you're good to go. Usually in similar films when the clueless loser is supposed to undergo a path that will make him the ultimate hero, he either practices and improves or finds out about some "magic quality" he had within himself all along. In this movie, the makers of the movie didn't bother themselves to make a choice, so the Panda hero easily shifts between the options, not really qualifying for any of them. He gets better and seems to know stuff even though he had almost no time to practice, and when that doesn't suffice he suddenly turns into "fat people don't get hurt, only bounce your attacks back with their fat" mode. Such behavior could have been tolerated farther if the jokes or the plot would cover up for it, but they don't.
This entire movie... no, the entire 3d "family action comedies" genre (or whatever name the studios choose to call them) seems to be repeatedly chewing, then puking itself, and so on and so on. Rather sad (sad, you see, not funny) if you think of all the talented artists and animators who do a great job, but are forced to dance to the rotten melody of untalented, uninspired impotent directors and writers.
This movie manages to get 4/10, solely due to its looks and visuals.