Think Free
by BoB Grimm
b gr imm@ ne wsr e v ie w.c o m
“How in the hell do you still have the ball?”
Dog days
The same can be said for the sewer stuff, which actually might terrify kids under the age of 8 and perhaps some of the softer, sweeter adults in attendance. There’s a snake down there that initiates new A bunch of comedians lend their voices to some members of the Flushed Pets crew by biting or eating cartoon characters, and the results are moderately them, and that particular snake’s fate is something entertaining. Hey, it’s not a ringing endorsement, akin to the one suffered by Bambi’s mom. but The Secret Life of Pets is good for a laugh or Directors Yarrow Cheney, making his feature two, and the occasional whacked-out moment that film directing debut, and Chris Renaud (the qualifies it as a semi-original animated movie. Despicable Me movies) practice a very frantic OK, still not a ringing endorsement. pacing style that becomes a bit of a headache at Louis C.K. voices Max, a Jack Russell terrier times. Much of the movie goes by at whiz-bang who loves his master, Katie (Ellie Kemper of speed, although the action is fairly coherent. Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt), with that undying The animators have come up with a fun loyalty that makes dogs so damn cool. Katie brings vision of New York City, with apartment buildhome a new brother for Max, a big brown shaggy ings squished into each other and a compressed dog named Duke (Eric Stonestreet), and it creates Manhattan skyline. They manage to make the city some turmoil in the household. look friendly and crazy at the same Max and Duke eventually wind time, which is probably the way up in the hands of Animal Control, many of the city’s residents would and eventually fend for themselves describe their mega-famous home. in the sewers of Manhattan. There One of the greater joys of the they become enemies of the movie is hearing Louis C.K. toning Flushed Pets, a group consisting things down for PG animated fare. of alligators, lizards, snakes and It turns out he has a gift for playing Directors: Yarrow Cheney, furry critters led by Snowball the a dog, and Max even looks a little Chris Renaud Rabbit (Kevin Hart on a sound like him. And since he’s such a Starring: Louis C.K., Kevin booth tear). passionate endorser of New York, Hart, Ellie Kemper The advertised premise for the he’s right at home in a movie where film suggests the movie might be that locale is the setting. And he’s about what our pets do in the house when we leave just sort of really cute playing a dog. home. That part of the film is out of the way early Conversely, Hart goes for something a little in the movie’s opening minutes. (They basically more evil with his bunny rabbit, giving the killer eat all of our food, have parties, and listen to punk bunny from Monty Python and the Holy Grail a rock.) The rest of the movie is the band of pets in run for its money. With this, and his recent pairing Max’s neighborhood trying to find him and Duke with Dwayne Johnson in the sort of OK Central when they get lost. Intelligence, Kevin Hart is having himself a sort Some of the sequences are borderline deranged. of better than average, slightly better than fair-toMax and Duke wind up in a sausage factory, where middling summer. they gobble down hot dogs in an almost hallucinaWhere does The Secret Life of Pets rank in the tory scene set to Grease’s “We Go Together.” This list of animated movies released so far in 2016? Well doesn’t feel like the stuff of kids’ movies; it’s a below Zootopia, and somewhat short of Finding sequence that seems as if the animators took a little Dory, but still OK. No, you don’t need to run out LSD break, came back to their computers, and and see this one, but if it should play in front of your dreamt up some wild shit. face somewhere in the future, there’s a good chance you will enjoy substantial parts of it. Ω
The Secret Life of Pets
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RN&R
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07.14.16
