Rio is a surprising treat of a movie by Blue Sky Studios, the makers of Ice Age, who are often overshadowed by animation giants such as Pixar and Dreamworks. While most people would expect another Dreamworks rip-off, Blue Sky Studios uses its underdog status to deliver a story of Pixar-level quality.
Rio is the story of a macaw named Blu (Jesse Eisenberg) who has contently lived all of his life in a small town in Minnesota when he finds out that he’s one of the last of his kind. This discovery incites a trip to Rio de Janeiro to find his female counterpart, a free-spirit named Jewel (Anne Hathaway). An encounter with bird smugglers land Blu and Jewel in the middle of the city, and the flightless Blu must find his way back to his owner Linda before the smugglers find him first.
Hijinks and hilarity ensue as Blu and Jewel evade their captors, led by the malicious cockatoo, Nigel. Of course, being the villain, Nigel has to be British, showing that Rio has no reservations about perpetuating stereotypes. The sassy heavily-accented friends who aid them on their journey, the poor orphan boy who only helps the smuggles for the money, and the pairing of Blu’s owner, the quiet librarian Linda (Leslie Mann) with the similarly bespectacled, bird-obsessed scientist Tulio (Rodrigo Santoro), are all groan-worthy cliches that almost bring down the film’s quality.
However despite its stereotypes and neatly-packaged endings, the colorful characters and the talented voice cast behind them override these flaws. Jesse Eisenberg is perfectly suited for the role of Blu, a neurotic and slightly OCD bird who’s domesticated nature leaves him terrified of his native country. You can practically see the animated Blu imitate Eisenberg’s nervous quirks as he panics and leaves a trail of accidental disasters. Leslie Mann does an admirable job as Linda, playing the character with great energy and vigor, and the sidekicks played by George Lopez, Jamie Foxx, and Will.i.am add a great dose of spirit to the film.
Unfortunately, Anne Hathaway seems to be stuck playing beautiful, feisty free spirits with a heart of gold, and her character Jewel is no different. Hathaway does a respectable job at playing Jewel, but it’s nothing we haven’t seen before. While the casting of Jesse Eisenberg as Blue worked out perfectly, the similarities Jewel shares to roles she’s done in the past only makes Hathaway’s acting seem a bit tired and hackneyed.
All of these factors would have made Rio a rather mediocre CG-animated film, but one thing set it apart from the rest: the animation. While the character animation was nothing new, the attention to detail to the city of Rio de Janeiro was simply breathtaking. The beautiful animation was worthy of Pixar or Disney standards, and sometimes even transcended that. The city landscape is exquisitely detailed, and the color that is given to the floats and characters in the Carnivale is nothing short of amazing. Only someone really fond of the Brazilian countryside could have pulled this off, and Blue Sky Studios did so with great care and detail.
Rio is a warm, well-executed film that is often in danger of becoming a mediocre film because of stereotypes and crude humor, but rises above the rest because of the wonderful animation and a gifted cast who pull of the tongue-in-cheek humor. It may not be a masterpiece, but Blue Sky Studios has definitely proved that it is on its way to becoming the not the next Dreamworks, but the next Pixar.
FINAL GRADE: B (almost a B+, it just missed the mark! If I could, I’d go with a B.3)
TRR Movie Revue by Hoai-Tran Bui
The two blue birds are great, the cityscape too, but the rest is mediocre, often to the point of causing uneasiness. By the way, the spelling “Carnivale” — what language is that?
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