Ralph Breaks the Internet

Pulling the Ol' Plugola
or
Life Among the Block-Heads

It's surprising how you can not want something until you need it.

For instance, "Lounge Seating." My first experience of it was at an early proponent of it, and the layout was haphazard and piece-meal—a flat floor with a bunch of barcaloungers underneath the screen. I found it uncomfortable and distracting...(or maybe it was because I was watching Baz Luhrmann's version of The Great Gatsby). Not even the new experience of being able to raise my feet —without interfering with the seat of the audience-member in front of me—into a semi-reclining position could dissuade me that this was not a step forward in the movie-going experience. Anyway, it was my first introduction to the trend and I found it lacking. But, then my thinking is that you go to the movies to see movies, not to eat popcorn (how can you eat popcorn when you're scribbling notes?). Ever since, I've curled my lip at the idea of "luxury seating" the way a dog curls its lip when it considers a raccoon.

But, I've now come around the other side of the debate after having watched Ralph Breaks the Internet, Disney's sequel to Wreck-It Ralph. "Lounge Seating" was a god-send, and a salvation. I knew I was in for it, when the super-quad-surround sound of the theater was prominently scrunched to the left side of the hall (to the point where the dialog out of the front speakers could be legible only if you stuck your finger...or a Milk-Dud, raisinet, rolled up Red Vine?...in your left ear) to the point where the dust from the vibrating plaster walls on that side were covering up the "row letters" on the aisle carpet.

There are Pop-Up's, Pop-Up's everywhere...

From what I was able to discern, Ralph and Venellope (voiced, as before, by John C. Reilly and Sarah Silverman) have become inseparable pals when they're not at the day-jobs as video-game characters in the copies of "Fix-It Felix" and "Sugar Crush" inhabiting the video arcade of the "Family Fun Center" of Mr. Litwak (voiced by Ed O'Neill). Ralph couldn't be happier, but Venellope is starting to get tired of the routine, the same-old, same-old of the three tracks that "Sugar Crush" provides—ya know, sort of like watching a lot of Tom Cruise movies (is this the one where he rides a motorcycle?...oh, right, he does that in ALL of them).

Then, disaster strikes. The steering wheel used by players to drive the "Sugar Crush" cars breaks—Ralph is indirectly involved this time—leaving Venellope "gameless." What to do, what to do. Well, as Litwak has installed a wi-fi router into Fun Center, it's only a matter of time before Ralph and Venellope travel to the Land of the Internet to see if they can find a replacement steering-wheel and get things going again. How they get to the Internet is a tortured path-way that made me think that somebody just applied the pop-psych landscapes of Inside Out and just applied it to dial-up.

The opportunities for satire are as seemingly endless as a YouTube conspiracy video, but given permission and copyright issues inherent in using those company names, the satire is as tough as a NERF™-ball. Ebay, YouTube, Amazon are all mentioned, but Google is confined to a character named Mr. KnowsMore (voiced by Alan Tudyk) who does searches around the Internet, like a kiosk lady at a mall—why they didn't just call him "BING™"* would take enough lawyer's briefs to create its own cease and desist order.

Through the search process, Ralph and Venellope find that they can bid on one of these "Sugar Crush" steering-wheels over at Ebay, but when they get there, they find themselves bidding against another user—all the avatars of real-world users are represented by bi-ped's with block-heads, which gives you an idea of how YOU rate in this movie—which they out-bid with a winning sum of $27,001. Their brief joy at getting it is extinguished when they go to check-out, and find that they don't have any of these dollar-things (being as they're just video-game characters who don't get out much) and are told they have to come up with the cash in 24 hours or they will lose the item.

They go about securing the funds in two ways: from one of the annoying pop-up sellers that zap in everywhere—this one named J.P. Spamley (voiced by Bill Hader), Ralph and Venellope learn they can earn money by playing video-games (imagine!), and their assignment for more than enough to claim the steering wheel is finding an easter-egg in the form of the top prize of a GTA video-clone called "Slaughter Race," the car belonging to the character Shank (voiced by Gal Gadot). Their efforts to get the car has unintended consequences—Shank hooks them up with a viral video channel called BuzzTube...and Venellope develops an interest in wanting to be one of the Fast and Furious in "Slaughter Race."

Ralph's appearance on BuzzTube brings him to the attention of Yesss (voiced by Taraji P. Henson) who uses him to increase traffic to the site, while he gets a pay-out for the number of "like's." Venellope helps out by doing her own pop-up selling, which lands her in...wait.

Let's stop there.

Sooooo...the barcaloungers, back to them. Why my obsession with them? It was around this point in the movie where I found myself sliding down my seat as if I was being pummeled into the very naugahyde fabric of it, from my upright position until I was practically prone. Not sure why; it could have been a number of things. Maybe it was that Venellope ends up at the Disney web-site, and I started to feel like I was being sucked into a corporate version of a black hole where mergered properties start to fold in on themselves, creating a sickening disorientation, like a meta-coma (I laughed when I saw the Disney site being called "Oh My Disney™," thinking it might be a satirical jab of "OMG" where "God"="Disney." But, no, the Disney website is—in reality—"Oh My Disney"). When its acquisitions are trotted out—Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars, Muppets, but not Fox (too soon for product to be produced, it seems), I sank a little further by the sheer heavy gravity that was being displayed.

And then, a bit of salvation—Venellope meets the Disney princesses™ (and the filmmakers put up the funds for the original voice-artists—the extant ones) and it is as funny and bitchy and irreverent as one would want and the movie gets a nice shot of counter-marketing to off-set the rest of the film's celebration of its own acquisitiveness. The film will, of course, continue on with its life-lessons, its action packed resolution (complete with a creature that seemed like a nightmare out of World War Z) that is the de rigueur denouement of these things, but the highlight of the film is the left-field Princess placement.

And one knows—one just knows—that Disney is thinking of how they can capitalize on it with their own stand-alone movie.

Yeah, spoil it, why doncha?

* As Stephen Colbert once said: "Bing—what you use when you want to 'Google' something."

Wreck-It Ralph

Written at the time of the film's unleashing....

Who Framed Wreck-It Ralph?
or 
Being Two-Bit in an 8-Bit World

It's not that I didn't "like" Wreck-it Ralph.  I did.  I just wasn't moved by it, nor did I care one bit about any of it—not the movie, not the characters—any of it.

Oh, there's a lot to admire: the animation is amazing, albeit to a limited world inside a video game (it can't be too complicated in its design as it's supposed to reflect the limited world-view of a flat 8-bit world refracted in 3-dimensions); the expansions and contractions of those worlds are quite cleverly done—the expansions of those environments being of the commingling of those worlds before the lights turn on in the video arcade, the characters commuting in a Grand Central Station hub to their various scenarios, and the contractions being in the limited animation movements of some of the characters. The voice-acting is fine, headed by John C. Reilly, Sarah Silverman, Jane Lynch, Alan Tudyk, and Jack McBrayer (of "30Rock"). The cameos by various amusement game characters are amusing—the Pac-man ghosts, Sonic, Qbert—which gives the whole thing a tinge of Who Framed Roger Rabbit,* Disney Animation has done a great job of it under the tutelage of Pixar's Jon Lasseter.

But, as great as it is, it's hardly inspired, the central conceit being all those video game characters have lives and concerns when no one's looking, which is the idea behind the "Toy Story" franchise. But, instead of that series forming a concept of the toys banding together to get along in The Big Toy-Box, the issues of the segregated video game characters are decidedly trivial and territorial. They inhabit an 8-bit world, but their concerns are decidedly two-bit, as in the story's central story-line. "Wreck-it Ralph" is the villain of the game "Fix-it Felix"—inspired by "Donkey Kong" but not (Mario, remember?) and he's dissatisfied with his life as a villain. He wants to be a hero, but is never given a chance and his intended role keeps him ostracized in the "Felix" community. He's shunned, gets no respect, and isn't even invited to parties. His "villain support group" provides no comfort. So, Ralph decides to expand his horizons (if video games have horizons) and starts visiting other games, like a WOW game with a butch commander in curvy leather (Lynch, of course), then navigates to another game "Sugar Rush" (no doubt coming to a Game Stop near you) where perky princesses race in a candyland world (and one of the racers is voiced by Silverman, not of course).  

There are some wonderful things that could be done here as far as the migration of traditional characters in non-traditional environments, but what's here doesn't have a lot of imagination as far as plot, the complications or the resolution. Ultimately, it's a bright, pretty snooze-fest (I felt the need to feed myself quarters to keep from nodding off). But ultimately I just wanted to move on, feeling like I was losing a life—the only one I have!—just waiting for the blessed relief of "Game Over."

The game-screen of "Fix-It-Felix" and its inspiration "Donkey Kong"©

* ...although you wonder where some other characters are, like Prince of Persia, Mario, Halo, and then you remember "Oh, yeah, they have their own movie franchises" (mostly inactive) and their places are "suggested" by other characters.

Zootopia

Kumbayopolis ("You've Got to Be Carefully Taught")
or
The Silence of the Sheeple

I have to confess that I've delayed and delayed seeing Zootopia for awhile because whenever I've gone, there have only been four seats left in the theater and it was usually half-filled with...children. And children are...sticky.

And...they're under-educated.

This one, from Disney, has to be for children, right? After all, why should adults be taught a simplified lesson about prejudice—they practice it every day. They've become experts.

So, Zootopia isn't The Lion King, with its inherent tribalism, this is a satire, along the lines of "Animal Farm," where we get to see our foibles and predilections grafted onto beasts (like they wanted or needed them) with a "Can't we all just get along" message, and forgetting that the animal kingdom is, in fact, "red in tooth and claw"—for the simple reason that the subjects get hungry every now and again and they have no viable economic system, not even in the trafficking of pelts.

Through a quick introduction via school play (written and performed by young bunny Judy Hopps—voiced as a child by Della Saba) we learn the history of this cartoon-world where animals evolved into a productive world of potential, out of the savagery that once was. And just as they have risen above such blood-thirsty territoriality (except for those poor unicorns that seen to be absent), so, too, can we have a whole new small world (after all) where even she, a humble bunny, might realize her dream of becoming a police officer and help those in need and do good in the animal world. Even if there never has been a bunny police officer before because...you know, bunnies are cute...oh, sorry, only bunnies can use the "c" word around each other, as it's considered offensive. Or patronizing. Or...well, don't do it.

Judy's train-ride to The Big City is beautifully animated
and feels like an opportunity for an "I Want" song.

Anyway, despite the ministrations of her parents (Bonnie Hunt and Don Lake) to stay in BunnyBurrow (population: steadily increasing) and be a carrot farmer like everybody else,* she goes to the Mammalian Police Academy where she trains (in a sequence equal parts The Silence of the Lambs and Full Metal Jacket), excels against all odds, and graduates with full honors to be sent to the City Central Police Department at Zootopia.

But graduating with honors doesn't make things easy: Judy is looked down upon—she IS pretty short—and just because she's made it that far doesn't mean she can hack it out on the street. Even if she's given a chance. For instance, her first day on the job, when the Chief (Idris Elba) hands out assignments on the hot "14 Missing Mammals" case, she gets assigned work as a meter-maid. 

A meter-maid.

But, plucky rarebit that she is, she makes the most of the job, setting a record for number of traffic-tickets given out before noon and, despite her own prejudices about the type of animal, reaching out to help a fox (Jason Bateman) facing specism when he and his son go to get a treat at an ice cream parlor only catering elephants. Judy feels good about herself in that she's overcome her prejudice of foxes, until she finds out that the fox...is a fox, the son is an adult posing as one, and it's all an elaborate scam of major proportions becoming minor portions.

It was about then that I got a little consciously irritated with Zootopia, but let us continue...

Judy is irked by her naivete and the fox's deviousness, and so (in a display of her own deviousness) she blackmails the larcenous fox, Nick Wilde, into helping her get clues to solve the ongoing 14 Missing Mammals case. That mystery, where fourteen of Zootopia's citizenry have gone missing, will reveal itself to have ties to the prejudice theme of the story,** its ramifications extending throughout the strata of the society, even to the political structure, of Zootopia. Here's a movie about prejudice that even The Trumpster might like, as it warns about a government trying to enforce PC sensibilities through social engineering. At least, that is what will be cherry-picked to focus on.

 

Me, I'll cherry-pick other things. That underlying plot-point seems a bit odd, because the movie wants to warn the kiddo's away from treating people based solely on their own individual fears, while also reinforcing those prejudices, and creating new ones by making the true villain of the piece be an agenda-laden least likely suspect.

Nick and Judy attend a mole-wedding with echoes of The Godfather

It's animated little heart is thumping cartoonishly in the right place, but its message is a little messy, compared to what is presented, and made light of, in the visuals. If anything, Zootopia, is one of the most specist places in this or any other dimension. Take, for example, the structure of Zootopia—it's trains have sections catering to different sized animals and nobody blinks—the trains have separate entrances/exits for giraffes and mice, and, yes, it's practical, but, on the other hand, it smacks of...well, would they actually be called "Jim Crow" laws in a world of mammals?

And the neighborhoods of Zootopia are even more segregated than they are in our time and place. The mice have a tiny-town that the larger animals (if they're allowed in) galumph through like Godzilla with gerbil trails of overpasses and travel-tubes. Again, it's practical given the size considerations, but in this Kumbayopolis with the "why can't we all just git along, little doggie" philosophy, it's a cartoon art-work done in mixed messages—the words say "don't treat mammals differently" while the pictures are pointing out just how different everything is.

And, leapin' lizards, that's just the mammals, nothing is made of any fish (although Judy's train passes by "FishTown") or reptiles, who must certainly cry "fowl" over their lot in this mammalian babel. Fish would certainly be considered "special needs" in this environment. Prejudice is rife in this place, but it is ignored as long as everybody keeps to their sector and causes a problem. It's the same passive-aggressive racism that is in our world—out of sight, out of mind and not my world/not my problem. We look after our own.

This is a cartoon, I shouldn't be thinking this stuff. And the movie talks and talks and talks about treating everybody the same, while the visuals put a lie to it. What the movie is concerned about is "the outliers," the predators, who would inspire fear in the "prey" animals and fear inspires prejudice in the herd. And Zootopia is all about herd instinct. And that's the thing about prejudice. It is born of "the tribe," "the herd," "the posse," and "the 'hood." It's "us" against "them" and drawing boundaries between the two—houses, fences, walls. Prejudice disappears when it's taken down to the singular, because at that point, it is neither reason or excuse. It's just one on one and at that point, the only excuses are ourselves and of our own making. It takes strength to admit that maybe your problems might not be in the stars, the fates or other people, but, just like Hamlet, in yourself. 

A sequence in a secret "holding area" has a strong "Silence of the Lambs" vibe
(while reminding one of an after-hours "Petco")

Tribalism creates prejudice. But, alone, the individual is weak. One of the things that beats my prejudice is commuting. Think of it, all those individuals, all in their own vehicles with one goal in mind. 99.9% of the time they get there, without any mis-hap that impedes the progress of the whole. That is an amazing work of the collective, and most of the time it works, with nary any communication between the participants. It's that goal that gets us places, creates cities and communities, gets things done. We are capable of making great things, even if it's a cartoon, and we all brings individual gifts to make those things a reality.

That's what I think, any way...but I'm prejudiced.

* My aptitude tests said I had a good career ahead of me in forestry.

** Not unlike Silence of the Lambs, again, which wraps its girl-power agenda in a story about a particularly grisly serial killer, who targets women solely, and showing in all extremes, the pervasiveness of sexism.