The toughest part about reviewing movies is all the words involved. Ha! No, but seriously, on a film like Surf’s Up, where just about nothing inspires passion I’ve got to dig deep into my reviewer bag of tricks to keep this thing fun. Here we go. Hang ten! Sorry, last one, I promise.
The guy I saw this with liked it, but I think that’s completely due to expectations. He went in thinking it would be horrible, and it was merely “not good.” As for me, I’m not sure what I thought going in. I like penguins, so that was good. I like funny animation. In general I have no strong feelings either way about surfing. So I guess I was fairly undecided about how Surf’s Up would play out. And now I’ve decided. It’s just okay.
The main penguin is voiced by Shia LeBeouf. He’s a surfing fool. He loves it. Sadly he’s growing up in a place where surfing is not the priority; he lives in a very cold climate. If you can guess that the story doesn’t end with him never surfing someplace better you’re still awake. That’s good. I can work with awake.
Shia gets discovered and then Jon Heder’s character comes along (as a chicken). Here’s the first problem, Heder’s annoying and pointless. Not as a person or an actor, but in this role. I’m thinking they wrote him in as the wacky sidekick but instead he’s the anti-punchline specialist. The movie is at least 45 percent less funny whenever the chicken character is on screen.
The dude, Jeff Lebowski (Bridges) plays sort of a surfing mentor to Shia. I’ve already given you way more plot than I ever do, but that’s mostly because I had to mention the voice work. The dude is good by the way, I always like Jeff Bridges, even if he’s a fat penguin.
Surf’s Up faces the same problem that four out of five animations do – fine for kids but merely so-so for adults. There are about a dozen “adult” laughs here, and no surprises, which makes the whole thing pretty inevitable. Shia is good as the voice; he’s got funny inflection when called upon. The movie also looks really good. The surfing action actually made me want to surf, I never thought it would be animated penguins that pulled that off. Good work there animation team! Now if only your writers hadn’t hung you out to dry…
See Surf’s Up with a kid, that will work out for you. The kids will like this one. I can’t imagine any circumstance in which you’d see this otherwise as it’s not a game changer. Penguins and surfing wasn’t a bad premise, but the movie never really gets going. Sometimes that’s the way it guys, better luck next time fellas.
