The Smurfs Review: Smurf On Ahead, Nothing To Smurf Here
The Smurfs cartoons were a daily presence in my life growing up. It originally aired from 1981-1989 with 420 episodes and I would watch many of these every day, especially on weekends and summer vacation. Looking back, its no wonder that my parents never watched this with me because of the ubiquitous “La la la lala lalalala,” that I’m sure would drive any adult a little nuts.The Smurfs are magically transported to New York City via a portal on the day of the Blue Moon festival. Clumsy Smurf (Anton Yelchin) accidentally leads Gargamel and his cat Azrael into the hidden Smurf village wherein chaos ensues after the sorcerer begins to start destroying their homes while trying to capture the tiny little blue men. Clumsy, being Clumsy, gets separated from the rest of the Smurfs causing Papa (Jonathan Winters), Smurfette (Katy Perry), Grouchy (George Lopez), Brainy (Fred Armisen) and Gutsy (Alan Cumming) to go after him. In New York, they meet Patrick (Neil Patrick Harris) and Grace Winslow (Jayma Mays), a young couple expecting their first child. Patrick works for a cosmetic company headed by Odile (Sofia Vergara), and recently has a trial promotion as the Vice President of marketing. If he can please Odile then he gets to keep the job. Of course that isn’t easy with the Smurfs involved. They are well meaning little blue creatures but incredibly out of place in this modern world. Still as they try to find their way back home and stop Gargamel from capturing them and stealing their Smurf essence, audiences are imparted with some important lessons.
The 2011 film doesn’t quite pack the same entertainment punch as cartoon did my five-year-old self saw it back in the day, but if you are in that age group now and watched it this opening weekend you probably enjoyed yourself. I’ll admit that the physical comedy of the movie were the parts where I laughed with the five, seven, and ten year olds who were in the theater with me. Hank Azaria, who plays Gargamel the dimwitted sorcerer hunting for Smurfs, took the brunt of the falls, hits, tosses, and crashes. Azaria did a spot on job in his portrayal of Gargamel’s demeanor and movement, but I just couldn’t get over the voice. Of course there was no way it could be the same, but it just kept reminding me that it was Azaria playing Gargamel, not really Gargamel come to life. That being said, I’m biased and I’m sure the kids enjoyed it.Harris and Mays gave decent performances, but to be honest I kept feeling like I was watching an episode of Glee and soon the two actors would burst into spontaneous singing. Mays plays Emma Pillsbury on the hit show and Harris guested as Bryan Ryan (he won an Emmy for outstanding guest actor in a comedy series for this role).
The voice acting caught me by surprise, as I had no idea that Lopez was playing Grouchy, which was quite fitting. My favorite had to be Cumming as Gutsy because for one I couldn’t recognize his voice and secondly, he had the best lines.
Still my favorite character in the entire film has to be Azrael the cat. It was the best comic relief and had the funniest expressions. Kudos to the voice actor, CGI team, and the animal trainer!
Bottom line – parents, your kids will enjoy it and children of the eighties I say stick to the cartoons.
