The Simpsons Movie: Hilarious

Rating: 10/10 (19 August 2008)

18 years after it first hit the small screen, one of the world's best TV shows finally blasted onto the big screen in the form of The Simpsons Movie. Dan Castellaneta again provides the voice of Homer Simpson, who pollutes Springfield after dumping a heap of pig excrement into the lake, leading to the town being sealed off in a giant dome. It's then up to Homer and his family to save Springfield from a disastrous fate.
The Simpsons Movie is one of the funniest films I have ever had the pleasure of watching. When I was watching it in the cinema I was laughing at least once every minute and it's very rare that I laugh that much at a movie. In fact, I was laughing five seconds in when Ralph Wiggum appeared inside the 0 of the 20th Century Fox logo, singing along to the fanfare.
The animation in the movie is most definitely a step-up from the animation of the TV series. With added shading, it's perfect and the fact that it's all hand-drawn makes it all the more amazing. But, like the TV series, the dialogue and the character's mouths are sometimes not 100% in sync with each other, although it's not very noticeable.
When I was watching the film I felt like I was just watching an extended episode of the series. This, of, course, was inevitable and there was no way it could have been avoided, but if this was shortened down to 22 minutes and shown on TV as an episode, it would have been the best Simpsons episode ever. Like any TV-film adaptation, The Simpsons will be compared to its maker and the movie definitely lives up to and has the same feel as the series.
For me, what makes a family film good is that the entire family can enjoy and by family I mean both adults and children. The Simpsons Movie certainly has enough jokes for both to laugh at, although it does push the boundaries of "family" film when it unexpectedly shows 10-year-old Bart's penis and also Homer sticking up his middle fingers.
The Simpsons Movie is one of the funniest films I've ever seen and has great animation. I give it 10/10.