Wreck-It Ralph: . . . Meh.

Rating: 7/10 (27 May 2013)

Wreck-It Ralph was released in 2012 and is a happy little story about video game characters. Everyone I knew who had seen it said that they absolutely loved this movie, and were thoroughly entertained. Hearing so much great stuff about it I was of course very excited to see it, yet on watching it yesterday I found that it did not meet my expectations.
John C. Reilly voiced the lead of this film, playing the title character. He did a fine job, but as far as animated films go the actors do not have too much of a task. It is true that voice work can be difficult, but it rarely elevates or brings down the movie when it is done well or poorly. Jane Lynch, Jack McBrayer, Alan Tudyk, and Sarah Silverman voiced the other leads of the film, the only notable one being Silverman who did the cute but often irritating voice of Vanellope Von Schweetz.
Rich Moore directed and co-wrote this film along with Phil Johnston, Jim Reardon, and Jennifer Lee. The storyline of Wreck-it Ralph was excellent and the dialogue was hilarious and entertaining, yet it wasn't great. Perhaps it was the directing were Wreck-It Ralph seemed to fail for me, but I am unable to pinpoint where exactly the directing went wrong, if it did. There was also a perfectly fine score provided by Henry Jackman, which fit the whole movie, and made a great backup. I think the greatest fault of this film is that it didn't feel like the director, writers, and composer loved the movie they were making, and didn't put their all into it, and simply made a pretty good movie. The result was an entertaining film that will probably be forgotten rather quickly.
I didn't like Wreck-It Ralph, but I didn't hate it either. I'm not sure why this was the case, it seemed like the perfect formula for a good movie, a great idea with good writing and animation, but it didn't seem to hit me as a movie I particularly enjoyed. Wreck-It Ralph was nominated for Best Animated Film in 2013, but lost out to Disney/Pixar's Brave.
I give Wreck-It Ralph a forgettable 6.9/10