John’s Movie Musings

I wasn’t all that impressed with the first Madagascar.  The animated talking animal genre was getting a little stale, and Madagascar only made people start looking for mold.

The movie wasn’t a total loss, however.  There were some penguins that provided some good laughs and Sasha Baron Cohen’s lemur carried the rest of the cast (admittedly, not exactly a tough challenge).  Oh and there was that dance song.  Most of you probably hated that, but I have the sense of humor of a twelve year old and LOL’d.

In Madagascar 2, guess what three elements all come together in the opening scene?  You got it.  Penguins and Lemurs all dancing to “You got to move it, move it.”  That, my friends, is what you call a bad entrance.  Remember my point above about things going stale?  Imagine Madagascar 1 is a loaf of mostly stale bread.  If you break off the bad parts of the loaf and present what’s left a couple years later, that too will be stale.

Thankfully, Dreamworks picked things up quickly.  Not only did the story get better (better than the original, by far), but they managed to avoid pop-culture jokes.  Mostly.  They actually tried to inject real humor into a pretty decent story.  Every story should get props for that.

And speaking of humor.  There’s a scene about a volcano god and the sacrifices it requires that left me rolling.  Er, ROFL-ing.

In summation, Madagascar 2 starts weak, but quickly grows into a much better film that the original.  Not too many sequels you can say that about.

Grade: B