Eep: How did the Tiger fly?
Guy: She jumped on the Sun. Rode it to tomorrow.
‘The Croods’, another spectacle on the big screen in 3D by DreamWorks Animation, a masterpiece in animation is what the movie is. Phil McNally the stereoscopic supervisor of ‘The Croods’ stated that, “This movie has some of the strongest 3D that DreamWorks has produced to date and we wanted to keep this depth even during the action sequences, which can be very challenging.”
Let me tell you this is not a review, this is for gcaffe archives as this is one movie which is surely for keeps. Animation now-a-days has become so very real that it ceases to be a cartoon flick anymore. It is larger than life. There is a child in all of us who lives in an enchanted world of love and happiness. Animation is what brings us closer to that child.
The journey of the Crood family takes us back to per-historic times when the world was crumbling with earthquakes and volcanoes and a single family manages to survive all the predators and other dangers. The father ‘Grug’, the man of the house, makes sure that his whole family of six follows his rules for survival and he keeps them safely together. Then he meets ‘Guy’, the man with the brain who has ideas better than his own.
Together they are forced to embark on a journey which is an adventure in which the cavemen learn to come out of their cave and live in the open world. They discover fire and food and learn how to hunt. The fiery daughter of the house ‘Eep’ who is the dreamer is mesmerized by Guy and the grandmother ‘Gran’ is a survivor with tricks up her sleeve. ‘Thunk’ the middle kid learns how to keep a pet after Guy tells him, “A pet is an animal we do not eat.” Then we have Ugga, Sandy and the cutest is ‘Belt’ the sloth ‘da da daaaaa’….who as Guy describes him is a cook, a conversationalist and a navigation guide who keeps Guy’s pants up as he is tied to the waist. Now how innovative is that!
Director Kirk DeMicco says, “We were trying to keep the creatures and the world grounded but at the same time retain a whimsical side.” The world in ‘The Croods’ is full of extraordinary creatures who can fly and swim at the same time, flying turtles with four colourful wings as big as dinosaurs, a colourful cat who is like a snow tiger and a predator, a dog with the face of a crocodile and orange parakeets with body and behaviour like a piranha called pirahnakeets and so many more.
As the production designer Christophe Lautrette puts it, “For an artist, there’s nothing better than having the opportunity to create a world that doesn’t but could exist.” They truly did create one such world. The voice-overs are by Nicholas Cage – Grug, Emma Stone – Eep, Ryan Reynolds – Guy, Catherine Keener – Ugga, Cloris Leachman – Gran, Clark Duke – Thunk and Chris Sanders – Belt. They did an awesome job. Actually voice-overs are equally important as the visuals. The background score by Alan Silvestri is generic.
‘The Croods’, directed Kirk DeMicco and Chris Sanders, brings such a spectacularly happy world full of dangers for us to see in 3D with some awesome effects. In all a must watch for all those who still have not ventured out to see it already.
