Minions Review - A Masterclass in Silly Animation

Funny is hard. The problem with funny is that funny is subjective, meaning that some people may find one thing funny and another thing not funny, but others may find one thing not funny and another thing funny and as a result of that trying to make funny ends up being a matter of who you want to please with the funny you are producing and whether or not the funny you are producing is even funny at all.

You can't come up with a definitive answer to what people find funny, but you can generalise. For example, big, colourful, silly, over the top humour usually resonates more with children than adults, therefore most animated children's films you go and see will be just that, colourful and silly. There are exceptions, obviously. The best animated films (from studios such as Pixar and occasionally Dreamworks) can get a balance of madness for the kids as well as more subtle, smart, intelligent humour for everyone else.

Minions is not one of those films.

That's not to say it's bad. In fact, I think Minions is the perfect example of how to make a daft kids film. Obviously, the animation looks gorgeous, but that's something most animated films can do in this day and age. What gives Minions the edge is the direction of the animation. Every single movement is perfectly executed for maximum laughs. Many people dismiss comedy and especially slapstick comedy, as stupid and not 'true art', but Minions demonstrates that there is definitely a technique behind slapstick, one that is hard to master, but once acquired, is very hard to beat.

Minions is far from perfect, however. The plot is basically non existent and there's hardly any character development at all, not even in the human side characters. The main Minion characters are fairly charming and the previously mentioned human characters provide some good jokes, but don't add to the story of the movie in any way.

In fact, as a film, Minions is really quite weak and is only held together by the quality of the slapstick. This obviously won't do anything for you if you don't appreciate that style of humour, but for anyone who does, Minions is an excellent showcase for it and the perfect example of how to do it right

Minions - Overall Score: 6.5/10

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