Bee Movie

November 2, 2007

Rated: PG Runtime: 90 min Rating: 3 out of 5 stars

Jerry Seinfeld wrapped up his sitcom nine years ago. He’s now married with three kids. And the last several years, he’s been working on this animated film. This isn’t one of those animated movies where an actor is just providing the voice; he co-wrote it, co-produced it, and obviously poured a lot of energy into this film.

BEE MOVIE tells the story of Barry Bee. As is fairly common in these type of computer-animation movies, an anthropomorphic animal wants to be an individual, and not just another generic member of the hive/anthill/herd/robot assembly-line.

He’s slotted to be a worker-bee in the hive, but he wants to join the bees that gather pollen outside the hive.

There he meets a human florist, a disturbingly hot animated Renee Zellweger. They strike up a friendship which borders on romance, which fortunately the film never follows to its logical conclusion.

Barry learns in a trip to the grocery store that humans steal honey from hives, and he brings a lawsuit, Bees vs. The Human Race.

This is one of those movies that’s somewhere between kid’s movie and one where the jokes are as much aimed at adults. It’s made by the makers of SHREK, and the best thing about it is, it’s not another Shrek movie.

Is it funny? Mildly; Seinfeld’s brand of observational humor lends itself to Barry’s pointing out of quirks in bee and human society.

The animation is cool; the interior of the beehive is a strange cross between a factory floor and an amusement park. Biomechanical, but in a fun way, not a creepy Giger way.

And when Barry gets out into the man-made canyons of New York skyscrapers, and Central Park, bee flight is exhilarating, and hazardous.

The first half of this movie is a lot better than the second half. The movie slows down during courtroom scenes, and it leads to a muddled ecological message and a bit of a dead-end as far as storytelling. And a finale with some action thrown in that doesn’t make a lot of sense. And curiously, something of a backpeddling on the “non-conformity is good!” message.

The young kids who were in the theater when I saw it seemed to like it throughout. I’d suspect older kids (and some adults) may get a little restless during the second half.

Posted by Mack Guffin | Filed Under 3 Stars, Chris Rock, Comedy, Jerry Seinfeld, Matthew Broderick, PG, Patrick Warburton, Renee Zellweger, Theatrical