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The minions tee up again in 'Despicable Me 2,' a fun sequel to the smash Steve Carell cartoon
(UNIVERSAL)
Sometimes, the second time's the charm.
When the first "Despicable Me" cartoon came out in 2010, it had a truly innovative look and a neat idea — telling the story from the villain's point of view — that made it feel fresh.
But the villain himself felt awfully familiar — a fake Fester Addams, living alone in an ornately gabled mansion. The film called him Gru, but grow on you he never did.
The first movie made money, though — if it didn't, we wouldn't now be treated to "Despicable Me 2." And, actually, it is sort of a treat, with many of the rough spots of the first film finally ironed out.
For example, Gru — now a good guy, kind of the way Jimmy Cagney joined the G-Men — is developing his own, non-Fester identity. The "minions" — the bright yellow, humanoid nubbins that do his bidding — are more distinguishable too.
And, even better, the nicely eccentric art — characters turned into boldly geometric jumbles of cones and spheres, perched on spindly legs — has not only survived, but thrived.
In this new adventure, Gru is recruited by a very "Man From U.N.C.L.E." group — the Anti-Villain League — to help track down the theft of a dangerous monster-making chemical. Lucy Wilde, a tough trainee spy, will be his partner.
But he already has his prime suspect — Eduardo Perez, the owner of a mall cantina and, Gru is sure, the long-vanished, still fearsome super-villain, El Macho.
It's silly stuff, and perhaps too silly for some — at the last minute, Al Pacino, who was providing Perez' voice, suddenly quit over "creative differences." Mull that one over yourself; personally, I'm flashing on Orson Welles' famous "frozen peas" moment. (Go YouTube it.)
Benjamin Bratt smoothly stepped in, though, and joined a good vocal cast that includes Steve Carell repeating his work as the oddly accented Gru, Kristen Wiig as Lucy, and new arrival Steve Coogan (busy week for Coogan and Carell) as the deep-wattled boss of the AVL.
They're all fun, as is the animation, which once again has a very different, and indefinably European flair (the French animation studio for the first episode, Mac Guff, was later gobbled up by Illumination Entertainment, the producing company, and returns here).
A number of terrific visual moments stand out, too. Like Gru's triumphant, "(500) Days of Summer" walk through town after he falls in love. Or a marvelously over-the-top dance Perez does, in between dishing up salsa. Or the little mad minions themselves (the film makes good, prankish use of its 3D).
The film's script, unfortunately, isn't nearly as inventive as its look; absolutely nothing happens in the last hour of the film that you can't have predicted within the first 20 minutes. And there's something a little sexist in the way many of the female characters are treated.
But this is still not only a fun cartoon but — that rare thing — a sequel which actually improves on the original. Word is, the studio already has plans for another installment. For once, that doesn't sound like a threat.
Ratings note: The film contains some potty humor, and a briefly bottomless minion.
Directed by Pierre Coffin, Chris Renaud. With the voices of Steve Carell, Kristen Wiig. Now playing in New Jersey.
★ ★ ★
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