Minions and Monsters Review:

The very common and curious thing worldwide about movie aspirations is standing out from the crowd and throwing away all comforts, if in possession of any.  By setting the pill-sized, denim-strapped Minions on a cinematic voyage, Minions and Monsters endearingly humanise them, while also not robbing them of their slapstick nature. Pierre Coffin and Brian Lynch have penned their love letter to Hollywood in a weirdly bonkers fashion with this film.

The makers are clear about their intentions with the very first frame, where Universal's logo evolution is on display. In the present day, tour guide Olivia (Allison Janney) takes students on a tour to the film museum to tell the story of minions' contribution to films that is largely unspoken of. Cut to a flashback where, amidst the minions' relentless passion to serve a master and scavenging for resources, James (Pierre Coffin), along with his friends, find themselves in a movie unintentionally. There was no looking back, or we thought so, once they met filmmaker Max (Christoph Waltz). The tiny creatures were fun as long as they were cast in comical films. Once the studios decide to make serious films with them, they seem miscast and are eventually kicked out. The dejected minions once again take out a journey to serve a master while James and Henry (Coffin again) stay back to prove their critics wrong. They decide to make a movie on monsters.

Minions and Monsters is a very simple film that operates on the premise of the minions breaking away from servitude and nurturing a dream of their own. The decision to just keep it to that and mix pratfall humour with homages to old Hollywood films both liven up and dull the film at different points. But the laughs are done really well and are embedded within the homages. Take, for instance, the Modern Times trope in which the minions chase a group of bandits and Jesse Eisenberg's hilarious Dort (A parody of Gort from the 1951 film The Day the Earth Stood Still), neatly blend into the story. To add to it, the story has in it organically to put the already clumsy creatures into Keatonesque spaces that are competent both as humour and homage. The Oscar moments in James' head, where he pictures the award as a banana, were particularly rip-roaring. The incorporation of the suffragettes movement in the sub-plot was equally hilarious, especially given how Dort and his minion servants look clueless about any of these things.

Director: Pierre Coffin

Cast: Pierre Coffin, Christoph Waltz, Jesse Eisenberg, Allison Janney

This also comes at the expense of sacrificing the character development of James and Henry, who discover that they can be their own masters. To keep the comedy and tributes coming, the writers seem to have kept the narrative and arcs to a bare minimum. Having seen animated films imparting some of the most profound thoughts of life through their characters, Minions and Monsters are pregnant with a lot of such ideas, merely scratching the surface.    

Another space where ideas remain ideas without effort in execution is the missed emotional payoffs. Now, one may question the rationale behind expecting these things in a fun watch featuring minions. With the makers wanting to do something new, nuanced, and profound with minions while also refusing to do more with the characterizations, it is a classic case of wanting butter on both sides of the bread. The minions parting ways and reuniting to rescue Henry was one such space. Neither James nor Henry nor the rest of the minions ever feels pangs of separation from the other, resulting in their reunion falling flat.

Apart from the laughs and hat-tips, the film was also visually gratifying. The undercranked motion, atypical of the silent-era filmmaking (a hat-tip too), in the scene where the monsters Howard (Phil LaMarr) and Phillips (Bobby Moynihan) chase Henry, elaborate chases and uninterrupted wide framing brought freshness to the narrative. These techniques also helped the film greatly, as minions are tailor-made silent-comedy protagonists.

Despite shortcomings, Minions and Monsters succeeds where it matters the most: Fun. The film strikes gold in comical consistency, visual inventiveness, and its affection for the journey of cinema. The tiny yellow troublemakers compensate for the unrealised emotional potential with a heartfelt tribute to movies and their peculiar, zany physical humour.