The Croods: A New Age 2020 Film Review

 

Animation fans I want it known right of the bat that i've never seen the 2013 animated film The Croods but there have been so few new animated films released this year on the big screen that I just had to check this film out. I do know that The Croods does have it's fair share of fans and so i'd love to know what a fan thinks of this film however since i'm not a fan that means that I can come at this film without any goggles that blind me to if the film is good or not and so here is my review of "The Croods: A New Age" enjoy.

Now here is where I would normally tell you what the plot of the film is as well as give you my opinion on the story that the film is trying to tell however this film doesn't have a story whatsoever. Which for me is a huge red flag because they spent nearly seven years on and off developing this film and so at some point you would have thought that someone would have brought up the fact that the film doesn't have a story and due to the fact that the film has no plot it made it even harder for me to connect with the characters or even like them in anyway whatsoever which is always a bad thing no matter kind of film i'm watching.

Starring in this film is Nicolas Cage as Grug Crood , Emma Stone as Eep Crood and Ryan Reynolds as Guy. Also starring in the film is Catherine Keener as Ugga Crood , Clark Duke as Thunk Crood , Kailey Crawford as Sandy Crood , Cloris Leachman as Gran , The Ten Degrees Of Pure Awesomeness That Is Peter Dinklage as Phil Betterman , Leslie Mann as Hope Betterman and Kelly Marie Tran as Dawn Betterman.

The acting in the film I thought was pretty average i've seen these actors in other and better films and so i can say that this isn't these actors at there best. With that said however would you really expect great acting from a film that features a prehistoric family and so with that mind the acting was pretty much what I expected given the set up but I do wish that the acting was a lot better just because I know these actors can do better and so it feels like that they chose not to turn in a good performance for this film but that's just what I think tho.

Doing the animation for this film is DWA Glendale which I assume stand for Dreamworks Animation Glendale but I could be wrong tho. The animation for me was one of the better things about the film just due to how nice and crisp everything looked you can clearly tell that however is animating these characters has alot of love for the characters and the world that they live in and that passion and love for these characters really does show though in the animation.

Now in what is a very rare thing for films being released in 2020 this film was released on this think called the big screen which you can only view when you go to these things called the cinemas. I know that these cinemas are vastly becoming the stuff of legend but I think that it was brave of Dreamworks and Universal to release this film on the big screen given that the word is still going to hell and releasing this film digitally behind a paywall would have made alot more sense given the current state of the world right now.

This film is the longest in development sequel from Dreamworks Animation since the film was first announced all the way back in 2013 and was originally meant to have the first film's original writers and directors Kirk DeMicco and Chris Sanders back to both writer and direct this film. However despite having a release date of November 3rd 2017 which then goy pushed back to December 22nd 2017 the film got cancelled on November 11th 2016 but that didn't last long as in September 2017 it was announced that the film was back in production but the film would see quite a few delays until it was finally released on November 25th 2020.

So yeah from when this sequel was first announced to now they had seven years on and off to crack this film and make it as close to perfect as they possibly could. Which makes it all the more heartbreaking when you see that they didn't do that in fact what they ultimately could be be described as average since all of the issues that I have with the film are basic things and it's those things that the film makers didn't bother to address.

Despite this films many flaws it does have a few things that redeem it the first of which being the character of Dawn who as mentioned is played by Star Wars actress and future star of Raya And The Last Dragon Kelly Marie Tran. Dawn was honestly one of the few characters in this film that I actually liked with the others being Eep and Guy on top of that Dawn is just so adorable she must be protected a all costs.

This film has a running time of one hour and twenty seven minuets and forty four seconds which I honestly feel is the right amount of time for this film. I say that because even tho the film lacks a story the world that this film takes place in is really interesting and like I said some of the characters are likeable and so this running time is honestly the perfect amount of time for this film in my humble opinion.

Now then boys and girls this film is listed as a comedy and so that means that I have to talk about the jokes that are in the film. To me the film wasn't that funny yes there are some decent jokes in here and some characters do get alot of funny lines but there are also alot more bad jokes and alot more unfunny lines which is a shame because there are alot of funny actors and actresses in this film and so to me it's really telling when actors and actresses who you know can get a laugh don't manage to get one in a film but that's just what I think tho and after all all comedy is subjective.

Overall while I cannot say if this film is as good or better then the first film since like I said at the start of the review i've not seen the first film. Judging it purely on it's merits i'd say that this film is pretty average since for every bad thing that I found in the film I would find something that I liked in the film and this has been reflected in the review and I can't say that this film has made me want to watch the first film and so this film gets a solid 5 out of 10 from me.

All of the images that I used in this review came from either the official Dreamworks Animation fandom wiki page , the official The Croods fandom wiki page or Google Images. Honestly I have no idea which is the best website to use if you want images from this film or The Croods since all of the images are roughly the same quality across all three websites and so I say use whichever website you want to use.