Planet 51 Reviews

To be honest, I wasn’t expecting much from the damned thing but since it was available on Videoland, I thought I might as well check it out. Well, for a CGI animated produced by a rather small studio, I have to admit that I have seen much worse but, still, it doesn’t mean that’s the damned thing was any good though. At least, the animation was not bad and the whole thing was visually decent enough but, unfortunately, the whole concept (an astronaut lands on an Alien planet and its inhabitants think he is a bloodthirsty monster) was not as clever as the makers were hoping for. In fact, the whole story was seriously derivative and predictable with various hints towards some vastly superior movies. Furthermore, the choice of these Aliens having a lifestyle similar to the US in the 50’s was rather dubious. I mean, I get the idea, if some extraterrestrial being had landed in the US in the 50’s, you could have expected the population to have some similar reaction but, eventually, the whole idea was hardly entertaining. On top of that, all the characters were not much original either. The worst example was probably Rover who was pretty much just a weaker copy of Wall-E which displayed the lack of inspiration involved in this project. Anyway, to conclude, even if the damned thing was rather harmless, it was also pretty weak and I don’t think it is really worth a look.

Oh, just great! Perfect! John Glenn goes around the world, he's a senator for life. I went across the fricking universe! I should be governor, minimum! But, no, I'm marooned here on this stupid rock!

Another Pixar product; this film focuses on the possibility of humans landing on an alien planet and being thought of as the aliens. Astronaut Chuck Baker (voiced by Johnson) is given the surprise of his life when his spacecraft lands right smack in the middle of an alien backyard; specifically, the backyard of teenager Lem (voiced by Long). Lem has just gotten the job of his dreams working in the local astronomy museum, with the strong hopes of being the curator someday. He has also worked up the courage to ask the girl of his dreams, Neera (voiced by Biel) out on a date. However, his life is turned upside down when Baker arrives and asks for his help. The horrorstruck nation is thrown into an alien frenzy, aided by the so-called alien expert, Professor Kipple (voiced by Cleese) and the tough-as-nails General Grawl (voiced by Oldman). This alien race believes that aliens (quite, confusing, eh?) are beings who love taking over their brains, controlling them, and eventually having these for supper. Now, it is up to Lem and his unlikely group of friends, Skiff (voiced by William Scott), Eckle (voiced by Benedict), and Baker's robot dog, Rover, to bring Baker back to his spaceship before it manually leaves for Earth.
The film is a refreshing take on the whole humans-aliens angle, and the twist at the beginning made me stop and go "Whoa". I found it hard to visualize The Rock as the voice behind Baker, but it worked nevertheless. Not as good as previous Pixar films, but still well worth a try. ;) The storyline is easy to follow, and although you might be confounded by the 50's style present in the alien world, I think that's what makes the film more endearing and easy to watch; it's as if you're watching a CGI version of "Grease" with the Scorpion King thrown in the mix.

Planet 51 is the animated tale of man's arrival on an alien planet, which showed no signs of intelligent life, but they were wrong, very wrong. The world is not only inhabited, the entire culture is that of 1950s America - if only everything hovered back then. After planting the flag in someone's backyard U.S. astronaut Captain Charles T. Baker discovers he's not alone and promptly goes into hiding, pursued by the planets military forces and a mad scientist.

The entire movie is played strictly for laughs, but the humour is quite forced. To keep the nerds happy there are hundreds of other movie references to spot. I knew what to expect but was still disappointed, if you liked 'Monsters Vs Aliens', then you will equally enjoy this movie.