It's 7:15 at night. The sun has been below the horizon for quite some time, but it is not yet my bedtime. I go to the cashier and ask her if they are showing my movie. She gives me a puzzled look, checks the queue, and luckily finds the tickets I am looking for. After asking my age she assures me that I have nothing to be ashamed about, nothing to fear. I then pass through the doors and embark on a journey I have been waiting for more than a decade to begin.
Back in 2004 Nickelodeon, Stephen Hillenburg, & company released the very first feature film of the SpongeBob Squarepants franchise: The SpongeBob Squarepants Movie. The cartoon had been around for less than five years at the time, and many people did not expect much from its box office release. However, it did do very well for a television cartoon movie grossing more than $32 million opening weekend and receiving average scores of 66/100. This might sound mediocre compared to Oscar winning films, but this is incredible for a small budget children's film. Numerous Kids' Choice Awards, two Emmys, six Annie Awards, and two BAFTA Children's Awards later, can SpongeBob's latest film live up to the hype?
SPOILER ALERT: Some plot details are revealed, but there is honestly not much to unveil. This is a movie review; what did you expect to happen?
The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water has a very similar plot to the original SpongeBob movie. The Krabby Patty secret formula is missing, and as a result Bikini Bottom is out of Krabby Patties. Despite Plankton's poor attempts to steal the formula, he is not the person who stole the formula. It magically disappears from SpongeBob and Plankton's hands as they fight over it, and no one knows where it went. The entire town immediately switches into a Book of Eli/Mad Max post-apocalyptic wasteland, and the two enemies have to team up to go find it.
After their long journey through time and space SpongeBob and Plankton are still unable to find the correct formula, but they later manage to convince Patrick, Squidward, Sandy, and Mr. Krabs to follow them to the surface to find the formula. A big brouhaha goes down between the gang and the person who stole the formula, and you'll have to watch the movie to find out the rest of the specifics. Or simply Google it yourself.
The 2015 SpongBob film does numerous things well. The movie effortlessly switches between animated and live-action objects, and you can not even notice the difference. When the crew is in the real world, they are animated in a lovely, textured, and colorful way that makes them very pleasing to the eye. They look almost like your favorite rubber toy as a child. Unlike many cartoons that use the score to tell you how to feel, the SpongeBob Movie's score does not foreshadow events nor does it tell you how to feel. It quickly moves with the action, and accentuates it perfectly. The fast pace will keep children from being bored, but there are numerous puns and allusions to adult films throughout the movie. Some that we noticed were:
- The Shining
- Doctor Who/ Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure
- Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
- Book of Eli/Mad Max
I know what you all are going to say, but I am going to be nit-picky here. Children's movies are never expected to be critically acclaimed, but The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water did not handle a few aspects well. While the movie does move fast enough for children to stay focused, it moves a bit too fast during certain parts. Dozens of jokes are thrown out, immediately disregarded, and the story progresses fast enough to make one a bit loss at times. A few major plot elements are predictable, which is a bit disappointing. The original movie had musical masterpieces such as "The Goofy Goober Song", but anything similar to it is missing from this year's. Plankton and SpongeBob sing a song about teamwork and the ending/time travel sequence song is "funky", but it's not the same. I want something I can rock out to.
There is not much to be said about The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water. It's a quick, 93 minute movie of our favorite cartoon sponge and his friends getting back their precious formula. Patchy the Pirate does not show up, Antonio Banderas does, and there are no goofy goobers to be found. Whereas 2004's The SpongeBob Squarepants Movie felt like an actual television cinema feat (well kind of), 2015's attempt seems more like an extra long TV episode. I'm not saying you shouldn't see it, but you would not be missing much if you waited until it lands on Nickelodeon. I watch SpongeBob. My nieces and nephews watch SpongeBob. My friends watch SpongeBob. The 25 year-old cashier that handed me my ticket watches SpongeBob. Will you?
9:10: I leave the movie theater relatively unphased. As I head to Chipotle to buy some mediocre not-Mexican food, my best conclusion on the SpongeBob movie goes through my head.
9:13--Summary of the movie I just watched: I had to pee.
— Tyler Sepulveda (@Beatlesunion) February 6, 2015
The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water opened February 6, 2015 and is now in theaters nationwide.
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