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The Lego Movie 2 (2019)

Started by DukeDeMondo, February 16, 2019, 10:51:02 PM

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DukeDeMondo

There's no thread for this, is there? I couldn't find one if there is.

The Lego Movie 2, anyway. This is the thread for that.

I am a big, big fan of The Lego Movie. A lot of people are, I know, I know a lot of people are big, big fans of The Lego Movie and I'm one of them. Big, big fan. I don't know how many times I've seen it now, but I've seen it a lot, and every time I see it I find that it still dazzles and astounds and delights almost as much as it did first time around. I think it's one of the very best comedies of the past twenty years. Absolutely no doubt in my mind about that. When Serge conducted his "Top 100 Comedies Of All Time" poll, I had The Lego Movie in my top 10. Maybe even my top 5. I can't remember. I think it's a fucking stunning piece of work. Just absolutely fucking teeming with brilliant ideas and phenomenal jokes and memorable characters and wild scenarios. 

So it was with my nerves very slightly jingle-jangling that I took the wee girl in my life to see this Lego Movie 2 this afternoon. She's also a big, big fan of the original, is the wee girl in my life. Big, big fan. So that's what we did today. I was excited, both of us were, but I was a wee bit fearful also, for although I'm never done preaching on about how you can't tell fuck all about a film from the trailer, the fact is that the trailer for The Lego Movie 2 wasn't very good at all, and that brought a certain sort of a weight to settle in my guts. I didn't really know what we were in for, to tell you the truth.

Anyway.

It's not The Lego Movie, so. This The Lego Movie 2. It's not that. But it's really, really good. Really good. Almost as dizzyingly self-reflexive and smart and silly and surprising as the original, but it's not quite as densely packed or as restless or as inventive or as sharply satirical or as stomach-fuckeningly funny from the get-go. It takes about 35, 40 minutes for it to hit Peak LOL, I'd say. When it does, though, when it does hit Peak LOL, it's white knuckle stuff from then on out. Joke after joke after joke springing all fucking roads and directions from all four corners of the frame. I don't want to spoil any of those jokes, but the audience I saw it with this afternoon laughed hardest and longest at a line about Elliot Smith, and I laughed pretty long and hard at that myself.

But it did get me thinking. I think my favourite bit was a proper fucking suckerpunch of a gag that had to do with a very highly regarded action picture from the late 1980s. It was a brilliant fucking gag and I near pissed my pants and everyone else's over the head of it, but then I thought, is the wee girl in my life enjoying this as much as I am? She's six years old, the wee girl in my life. Surely to God she must be sitting there utterly bewildered. But she wasn't, she was loving it. I suppose part of the genius of it all, and this is true of the first one too, is that the characters are so compelling and there's so much going on around the fringes of things at any given time that it doesn't really matter if the Main Gag, which might be about Stanley Kubrick or it might be about Christian Bale or it might be about Radiohead, it might be about anything, it doesn't matter if it doesn't land for whatever reason because every moment is so fucking rich, there's always something for you to grab onto instead. Nobody feels left behind. If you don't quite get what's going on in the bottom right of the screen, try the top left. There you go.

Also, thinking about the references and how they were surely careering over the head of the wee girl in my life by the hundreds and thousands, It made me think of how much I loved The Simpsons when I was 10 or 11 years old or whatever, how I would watch the episodes again and again and it didn't matter a fuck that I knew nothing about Citizen Kane or Clockwork Orange or Trilogy Of Terror or whatever the hell, because those episodes were about more than just "do you remember Citizen Kane or Clockwork Orange or Trilogy Of Terror or whatever the hell?"

So it is with The Lego Movie 2. They're good gags if you get them but it doesn't matter if you don't.

However. There are some minor issues. Minor, only, I'd say. The first half incorporates a sort of a riff on Fury Road that overstays its welcome a bit and there's maybe one and a half musical numbers too many for my liking. And it's just not as consistently funny as the first one.

But. It's clearly been made with a lot of heart and a lot of attention to detail, and it handles the live action stuff really well and when it's on fire it's on fire as fuck.

It's about as good a Lego Movie 2 as we could have hoped for. That's what I think about it.

Small Man Big Horse

I can't wait to see this, I loved the first one too but I'll probably wait for the dvd release as Mrs SMBH has no interest in it and the last time I saw a kids film at the cinema (Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse) it was packed with irritating tiny cunts who were so young I thought it'd be a bit out of order if I shouted at them.

Mister Six

I loved the first one (I'll just take this opportunity to repeat my observation that it rips off Grant Morrison's The Invisibles: it rips off Grant Morrison's The Invisibles) but thought the trailer for the sequel looked surprisingly flat and devoid of good gags. So I'm glad that you've enjoyed it so much, DukeDeMondo. I'll be seeing it at some point fairly soon, I think.

BlodwynPig

I've only seen those DFS adverts.

Crabwalk

That's a brilliant and spot-on review Duke.

I'd also add that the closing credits had the entire audience spellbound. Won't spoil it for others but they're absolutely incredible.

Dex Sawash

Feel bad now that I am bound to hate this one as much as the first.

Replies From View

I hated the Lego movie.  Random events sewn together into an arbitrary list and a frantic pace do not magically make something that is worth watching.  Even when it is a long advert for a toy.

I'm always a bit surprised when people pay for things that lean more toward advertising than anything else.  People should be paid to watch things like the Lego movie, just like they should be paid to wear clothes that feature giant logos.  But instead people will happily pay for the privilege.

Crabwalk

The two Lego movies were clearly made with more care, creativity and imagination than 99% of other children's films or comedies of the past 20 years. Any film on this scale is going to ultimately be a corporate endeavour on some level. At least the messages of these films are good and the entertainment factor ridiculously high (for most people).

BlodwynPig

Quote from: Crabwalk on February 17, 2019, 01:39:27 PM
The two Lego movies were clearly made with more care, creativity and imagination than 99% of other children's films or comedies of the past 20 years. Any film on this scale is going to ultimately be a corporate endeavour on some level. At least the messages of these films are good and the entertainment factor ridiculously high (for most people).

But it could be done with real child actors and some paint and look more realistic.

ToneLa

Tags: Meccano fans await their celluloid dream

St_Eddie

Can't wait for the Funko Pop! movie.

DukeDeMondo

#11
Quote from: Replies From View on February 17, 2019, 12:52:24 PM
I hated the Lego movie.  Random events sewn together into an arbitrary list and a frantic pace do not magically make something that is worth watching.  Even when it is a long advert for a toy.

I'm always a bit surprised when people pay for things that lean more toward advertising than anything else.  People should be paid to watch things like the Lego movie, just like they should be paid to wear clothes that feature giant logos.  But instead people will happily pay for the privilege.

I don't really get this argument, to be honest. Like Crabwalk sort of said, I can't think of very much media that I might consume in the course of a day that isn't trying to sell me something at some level. And very, very little of that is anything like as special as this. I think it's massively unjust, reducing something as ceaselessly surprising and joyous and meticulously crafted as The Lego Movie to "an advert for toys."

As for the random elements arbitrarily flung together, surely that was the whole point. It was about the glorious, unfettered anarchy of creation for the sake of itself and about the awesome fecundity of a child's imagination.

I guess where it falls down slightly as far as that goes is when it nods to stuff that would likely be outside of the frame of reference for most children. But then the sequel does address that, kind of, in a throw-away sort of a way.

St_Eddie

When's the Frosties movie coming out?  It's gonna be grrreat.

Timothy

Quote from: Replies From View on February 17, 2019, 12:52:24 PM
I hated the Lego movie.  Random events sewn together into an arbitrary list and a frantic pace do not magically make something that is worth watching.  Even when it is a long advert for a toy.

I'm always a bit surprised when people pay for things that lean more toward advertising than anything else.  People should be paid to watch things like the Lego movie, just like they should be paid to wear clothes that feature giant logos.  But instead people will happily pay for the privilege.

That makes absolutely zero sense. It was a wonderful beautifilly made funny movie. In no sense or way an advert for toys

Replies From View

Quote from: DukeDeMondo on February 17, 2019, 02:50:10 PM
I don't really get this argument, to be honest. I can't think of much media that I might consume in the course of a day that isn't trying to sell me something at some level. And very, very little of that is anything like as special as this. I think it's massively unjust, reducing something as ceaselessly surprising and joyous and meticulously crafted as The Lego Movie to "an advert for toys."

As for the random elements arbitrarily flung together, surely that was the whole point. It was about the glorious, unfettered anarchy of creation for the sake of itself and about the awesome fecundity of a child's imagination.

It's fortuitous that playing with Lego in real life involves flinging things together, but ultimately the Lego Movie is playing out a familiar modern cinematic trope.  I'm similarly not a fan of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, which equally bungs a list of random stuff together.  It's just not a good narrative approach to ask the audience to sit there waiting for the arbitrary list to end, with no sense of how much more of the list is left.  The sugar-fuelled manic pace does my head in.

For me it's not satisfying, and no offence is aimed at you for enjoying it.  It's just that I therefore lack that sense you have of it being "ceaselessly surprising and joyous and meticulously crafted" that would raise it above just being an extended advert for a product.

Replies From View

Quote from: Timothy on February 17, 2019, 03:02:11 PM
That makes absolutely zero sense. It was a wonderful beautifilly made funny movie. In no sense or way an advert for toys

I don't hold that opinion, though - I found it a deeply tedious spew of unrelated wacky crap with no joy in it, just cynical licensing of various franchises and a frantic energy trying to cram too much in. 

So for me it is only an advert for Lego.

Each to their own.

BlodwynPig

Quote from: Timothy on February 17, 2019, 03:02:11 PM
That makes absolutely zero sense. It was a wonderful beautifilly made funny movie. In no sense or way an advert for toys

Apocalypse Now
2001
The Lego Movie 1 & 2
The 7th Seal
Emmanuel 1-7

Mister Six

Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it's not there.

Watch the fucking Emoji Movie if you want to see a cobbled-together pile of shite designed to suck money out of kids' pockets and corporate sponsorship bank accounts.

The first Lego Movie is so packed with brilliant gags of all kinds (verbal, character, sight, etc), so wonderfully detailed, so gorgeous to look at, I find the notion that it's just "a long advert for a toy" - even if that's what it clearly started out as - baffling and mildly offensive.

BlodwynPig

Quote from: Replies From View on February 17, 2019, 03:04:16 PM
I don't hold that opinion, though - I found it a deeply tedious spew of unrelated wacky crap with no joy in it, just cynical licensing of various franchises and a frantic energy trying to cram too much in. 

So for me it is only an advert for Lego.

Each to their own.

Even. if it was The "Unbranded Blocks of Plastic" Movie, these sort of films may be joyous for people who like machine-gun cultural references that make them identify and laugh, but that is somewhat alienating (hence, why I won't watch it). Nevertheless, by itself I guess the average 6-16 year old will get a lot out of this ART FRANCHISE.

BlodwynPig

Quote from: Mister Six on February 17, 2019, 03:07:57 PM
Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it's not there.

Watch the fucking Emoji Movie if you want to see a cobbled-together pile of shite designed to suck money out of kids' pockets and corporate sponsorship bank accounts.

The first Lego Movie is so packed with brilliant gags of all kinds (verbal, character, sight, etc), so wonderfully detailed, so gorgeous to look at, I find the notion that it's just "a long advert for a toy" - even if that's what it clearly started out as - baffling and mildly offensive.

Has there ever been an advert that advertises another product - e.g. THAT SHIT DFS advert that featured these lego characters. LEGO advertising for a furniture warehouse.

Timothy

Quote from: Mister Six on February 17, 2019, 03:07:57 PM
Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it's not there.

Watch the fucking Emoji Movie if you want to see a cobbled-together pile of shite designed to suck money out of kids' pockets and corporate sponsorship bank accounts.

The first Lego Movie is so packed with brilliant gags of all kinds (verbal, character, sight, etc), so wonderfully detailed, so gorgeous to look at, I find the notion that it's just "a long advert for a toy" - even if that's what it clearly started out as - baffling and mildly offensive.

Yeah exactly. Get it why you dont like it but advert for a toy just doesnt make any sense imo. But indeed to each their own.

Replies From View

Quote from: Mister Six on February 17, 2019, 03:07:57 PM
Just because you don't see it doesn't mean it's not there.

Watch the fucking Emoji Movie if you want to see a cobbled-together pile of shite designed to suck money out of kids' pockets and corporate sponsorship bank accounts.

The first Lego Movie is so packed with brilliant gags of all kinds (verbal, character, sight, etc), so wonderfully detailed, so gorgeous to look at, I find the notion that it's just "a long advert for a toy" - even if that's what it clearly started out as - baffling and mildly offensive.

I'm not going to watch the fucking Emoji Movie am I.  I watched the Lego Movie because people here were raving about it.

It was a bit dickish of me to wade into the Lego Movie 2 thread saying I dislike the first film, but I still can't see it the way you see it.  It has an off-putting pace to me that doesn't fit my processing speed, let's say.  I don't want to be offending people, so let's just put it down to differences of opinion and I'll stop derailing the thread.

Timothy

Quote from: BlodwynPig on February 17, 2019, 03:06:55 PM
Apocalypse Now
2001
The Lego Movie 1 & 2
The 7th Seal
Emmanuel 1-7

The Lion King
My Neighbour Totoro
Toy Story
Inside Out
The Lego Movie

DukeDeMondo

Quote from: Replies From View on February 17, 2019, 03:03:09 PM
For me it's not satisfying, and no offence is aimed at you for enjoying it.

Oh none taken, and I certainly didn't intend to cause any offence either. If you didn't like you didn't like it. I should probably give over now for I'm just going to end up repeating myself if I go on any longer. I just think it's absolutely fucking brilliant, that's all there is to it, and it does annoy me when people - usually people who haven't seen it - talk about it like it's some sort of vacuous, cynical nothing of a thing in the line of The Emoji Movie or something like this, because it just isn't. It couldn't be any further from that.

Folk go on and on about how Hollywood never takes any risks any more, about how everything's so formulaic and predictable. Well The Lego Movie and its sequel are proof that risks are being taken, that unpredictable and quite frankly halfways deranged films are still being made, and being made with heart and soul and wit to spare. But oh, it's got Lego in the title so it must be shit.


EDIT: Sorry, I didn't see all those new posts up above there.

BlodwynPig

If the lego are replaced with Bruce Willis and Kate Winslet, does it still have the same impact? (Confucius asks)

DukeDeMondo

Quote from: BlodwynPig on February 17, 2019, 04:01:31 PM
If the lego are replaced with Bruce Willis and Kate Winslet, does it still have the same impact? (Confucius asks)

There is a very brief encounter with a Lego Bruce Willis in the new one, as it happens. Probably my favourite gag in the film.

Replies From View

If that means a Lego Twelve Monkeys is in the works I'll take back everything I've said.


ToneLa

I'd watch Lego Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer

Replies From View

Lego Henry:  Portrait of a Dust-Sucking Cunt

DukeDeMondo

Quote from: BlodwynPig on February 17, 2019, 03:09:16 PM
...these sort of films may be joyous for people who like machine-gun cultural references that make them identify and laugh, but that is somewhat alienating...

That's not really what it is though. There are references to all kinds of things shooting about the place left and right, but there's far more to it than that. For me, the funniest stuff in the first film doesn't really rely on references to other properties at all. The opening scenes, for example, which feel like a less mean-spirited and infinitely funnier Idiocracy, are fucking hilarious and they don't have any sort of direct pop-culture referencing going on. And the bit where Batman reveals he's been recording these grim, autobiographical industrial metal songs in the line of Ministry or someone like this is probably my favourite moment in either film.

"Darkness!!! No parents!!!"   

So it's not the case that it's just "oh look, there's that, oh there's this, or there's something else!" It's not just a string of references. It's not Ready Player One or something like that.