Pixels review

PIXELS:

ADAM SANDLER CONTINUES TO DESTROY HIS CAREER AND BRINGS SOME OF THE 80S MOST BELOVED VIDEO GAMES ALONG WITH HIM!

By Nico Beland

Movie Review: ** out of 4

COLUMBIA PICTURES

Pac-Man eating up trouble in Pixels

            So it has come to this, the first review of an Adam Sandler movie on this blog, ever since Adam Sandler and Happy Madison Productions released films like Jack & Jill and That’s My Boy, I took a very long break from his movies, with the exception of Hotel Transylvania, which was pretty good. But aside from that I haven’t seen any Sandler or Happy Madison movie in theaters ever since That’s My Boy, I didn’t see Grown Ups 2, I didn’t see Blended, and I sure as hell didn’t see Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2, but I digress, the same can be said by most of the live-action movies based on video games that Hollywood keeps making, however I did see the Need for Speed movie, I’ll leave it at that.

            But once I saw the trailer for Adam Sandler’s video game disaster movie, Pixels, directed by Chris Columbus (Home Alone, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets), I decided to come out of “Sandler Retirement” and take a look at this movie, after all I love video games, classic, current, and so on, and after seeing movies like Tron: Legacy and Wreck-It Ralph, I don’t see how I could miss this, no matter how many mixed thoughts I might have about the finished product.

            And it’s…another unfortunate misfire, not even close to the quality of Happy Gilmore, 50 First Dates or Hotel Transylvania, but I wouldn't call it one of his worst either like Jack & Jill or That’s My Boy, I liked the idea behind the film though, apparently the movie is based on a short film which I’m very curious to watch, and it’s pretty much a monster movie but replace all the monsters with iconic video game characters like Pac-Man, Centipede, and Donkey Kong, honestly it’s eerily similar to the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man climax from Ghostbusters or a Men in Black scenario, and the entire movie reminded me of films like Jumanji, Zathura, and the upcoming Goosebumps movie.

            In 1982 NASA launched a time capsule into space in hopes of contacting with extra-terrestrial life (Don’t worry there’s no 8-Bit E.T. in this movie!). The time capsule contained images of Earth’s life and culture, such as rubix cubes, popular TV shows, and of course classic arcade games such as Pac-Man, Centipede, Donkey Kong, Defender, and others.

            The capsule did in fact reach extra-terrestrial life, but the message was mistaken as an act of war. So an unknown alien race sent down real life video games to destroy the planet.

            From Pong paddles destroying a palace, Centipede eating people alive, and Donkey Kong throwing barrels, to Tetris blocks destroying buildings, and Pac-Man eating everything in its path to name a few. When all else fails the American government calls upon not the Ghostbusters or the Men in Black, but instead old school gamers from the 80s, Sam Brenner (Adam Sandler-Happy Gilmore, 50 First Dates, Hotel Transylvania), former champion of Pac-Man who now works as a TV repairman, US president and Sam’s childhood friend, President Will Cooper (Kevin James-The King of Queens, Paul Blart: Mall Cop, Here Comes the Boom), theory obsessed and socially awkward genius, Ludlow Lamonsoff (Josh Gad-Frozen, The Wedding Ringer), master of Centipede, and Eddie Plant (Peter Dinklage-The Station Agent, Game of Thrones, X-Men: Days of Future Past), king of Donkey Kong are recruited by Lt. Violet van Patten (Michelle Monaghan-The Bourne Supremacy, Mission: Impossible III, Mission: Impossible: Ghost Protocol) to use their game playing knowledge, high tech weaponry, and of course, “Ghosts” to save the world from 8 bit warfare, Contra style with extra Doom and a Donkey Kong.

            Overall, Pixels continues Adam Sandler's streak of misfires but it doesn't stab the coffin of his once talented career as hard as some of his other films, like I said the idea of the movie is awesome, classic video games come down and destroy the real world, I’m surprised we never had a movie like that, although we did have a Futurama episode with that sort of premise and Peter Dinklage is awesome, enough said, he’s the actor who makes the movie, personally I probably would have liked it more if it was just Dinklage and Q*Bert (Who apparently learns how to speak English, probably from hanging out with Wreck-It Ralph and Fix-It Felix Jr. a lot) battling the video games, because he’s the character who’s thoroughly funny from beginning to end, he’s like an adorable Billy Mitchell.

            And of course, the chaotic video game scenes are a ton of fun to watch and laugh at the absurdity, very much like the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man in Ghostbusters and probably some moments from Men in Black. The movie is worth watching for Dinklage and the video game scenes, everything else you can just fast-forward.

            What does bring the film down is the Happy Madison humor, Adam Sandler and Kevin James are just doing their ususal shticks but they’re not as annoying in this as they are in some of their other recent films, Josh Gad is obnoxious and the complete opposite of his Olaf character from Frozen. There are a lot of weird and lazy jokes in the movie that aren’t very funny, to be fair there were a few moments where I laughed, some of the video game scenes are imaginative and at times humorous, Dinklage, enough said, and probably the scene where Pac-Man creator, Toru Iwatani gets his hand eaten by Pac-Man. 

            But if you do have kids who are ten years old and love video games, they’ll probably get a kick out of it, the effects are pixelated fun and they might get a few laughs out of it. Otherwise just watch Wreck-It Ralph again or even that crappy 1989 feature-length Nintendo commercial, The Wizard, at least that movie attempted to be funny and enjoyable.