Movie review - Madagascar

I think I'm getting old.

From the producers of Shark Tale and Shrek, I should've known what to expect from Madagascar. Slapstick. Lots of them. When Alex the Lion gets happy in Madagascar, he doesn't just throw his arms up and shout 'Yippee!". Alex would throw his hands up, shout "Yippee!", hop up to the highest rock, does an en pointe, rolls down, splashes into a pool and making the nearby animals protest in disgust, snags an empty bottle and sings into it, then gives his best friends a tight hug, all while singing a happy song and happier music playing in the background.

I think I was supposed to laugh at that, but I didn't. The kids around me were laughing. Even the kids' parents were laughing. I fidgeted uncomfortably. I didn't find it funny at all. In fact, I was thinking that the producers did all this just to stretch the show longer - not to mention that it's pretty short at one and a half hour.

Well it's a kids' show. I'm 20 already. I'm not supposed to complain that kids' shows aren't funny. In fact the kids were roaring with laughter. And I just sat there waiting for the scene to move on. But it didn't. Alex was still frolicking around in joy and the kids were still laughing.

I dread that Madagascar's selling point would be humor of that sort. But the penguins saved the day. Oh, I'd watch that show again just for the penguins. And the cute little lemur. Watch out for the lemur.

The animation was slick and colorful, though I find Alex's paws a tad too blocky, but maybe that's why he's the cutest among the bunch. Scenes were realistically done too. The trees in Madagascar, however, had a cartoony feel to them, but that's not a bad thing.

Voice-acting wise, the actors did a great job - well, what did you expect from an all-star cast, with big stars like Chris Rock and Ben Stiller as the main cast? Sacha 'Ali G' Baron Cohen was a riot.

Music-wise, it was... weird. It's pretty much a mish-mash of everything from the past thirty years. You get 'Boogie Wonderland' playing when Gloria the Hippo does her routine underwater dance, 'Staying Alive' when Marty the Zebra roams the streets of New York alone, 'Chariots of Fire' at the beach scene, the National Geographic theme when the lion chases the zebra on the Madagascar grasslands. You've just gotta see it for yourself. I gotta admit that the 'Move it' theme was very catchy though.

Slapstick might not be for me now, but I'd want to watch that show again. Everything is just so happy and colorful and memorable that it makes me want to dance. Highly recommended. Go watch it, it rocks. Especially the penguins.