Dumb Family-Friendly Fun

Rating: 5/10 (3 May 2020)

Pros:
1. Will Smith (Oscar), Martin Scorsese (Sykes), and Jack Black (Lenny) all deliver great voice-acting performances.
2. The film serves as a fantastic allegory for accepting people for who they are, as well as critiquing obsession with wealth and fame. The latter being especially important in this day-and-age where celebrity-worship is ubiquitous.
3. The soundtrack is fun and bouncy and gives the film an airy and light-hearted feel.
4. The humour is mostly slap-stick and lands well for the most part.
5. The ending is largely satisfying and ends the movie on a suitably heartfelt note.
6. Will Smith and Jack Black have really good chemistry with each other.
Cons:
1. The animation is extremely dated and at times, the animation is incredibly distractingly bad.
2. There are a few plot-holes here-and-there: How did Lenny pass as a dolphin, when he's quite clearly painted blue? How did Lenny one-bite through a steel anchor chain? How did Don Lino (Robert De Niro) not know who the shark slayer was at first, when he was being promoted everywhere throughout the media?
3. Angelina Jolie (Lola) gives a rather lacklustre voice-acting performance.
4. Some of the comedy is inserted rather forcefully and jarringly.
5. At the end when Oscar finally comes clean about lying about slaying sharks, everyone just accepts it and he faces no ramifications. It's rather unbelievable.