The Simpsons Movie

I won't start this with the almost obligatory 'DOH!', I won't sink to that level...DOH! (damn.)

The Simpsons are massive, one of the longest running series on telly, Homer's probably of at least equal fame to Jesus or even Michael Jackson!

A big screen outing for them has been a long time coming ,talked about, rumored, now done. At 87 minutes they keep it at a sensible length...if only it felt like it.

I don't recall any film where I've nearly nodded off in the cinema, not even 102 Dalmations, The Simpsons Movie is just plain boring.

If you've seen the trailers, you've seen nearly all the funny bits, there are a couple more but really only a couple, some of the jokes are, as expected as it happens with all TV-to-movie formats, are directly lifted from the TV show.

The plot is suitably Simpsons-esque, no real deviation from their usual formulas, just making it longer, Homer's mis-judgement results in Springfield being practically destroyed and he needs to rectify it whilst restoring his family's faith in him, you've seen this sort of thing before, but not on this scale.

The animation seems much more Futurama like, lots more use of computers to help with the parallax and faux 3D, but that's just the natural progression of things, however on the subject of Futurama, I got about 3/4 of the way through the film and started wondering how much better a Futurama movie would be, at least they could go full on space epic with it.

The Simpsons has always been one to satirise, that's the point in the programme, and boy to the do it in this, taking, not-so-subtle swipes at the US government every few sentences and a bit of a jab here and there at Al Gore and the environmentalists (band name anyone). And there seems also to be a rather homo-phobic side to the movie, the racism in there is played off, Apu everyone accepts, Lenny makes a comment, Carl retorts and the racism is satirised, however any gay references are just inserted as is and that feels distinctly out of place.

The language in the film also goes up a bit at times, not to South Park levels, but enough for me to reel slightly.

So, I guess then to summarise, The Simpsons Movie was boring and unsettling. Yay. :/

The Simpsons Movie - 4/10