j* movie reviews 2020

Sonic The Hedgehog (2020)

Jim Carrey is back in funny form and the blue thing is blue.

I have no history with Sonic the Hedgehog. Not as 8 bit, not as 16 bit, not as Playstation 12 or anything. Probably the most I know about Sonic is that some researchers once named a specific secreted protein after him. And that he's blue.

My partner who does have history with the game reckons this does a lot of great referencing of in-jokes from the game. And as a casual observer these kind of presented as gags that were maybe a bit funny but with too much emphasis. So if you're a fan, it seems this film has nailed it.

I thought it was cute enough, in a kidsy adventure film kind of way. Sonic didn't quite land with me as a character, neither through personality or CGI. He didn't really have any sense of gravity or weight, and I never really managed to sympathise with him much. And his Doughnut Lord sidekick is okay. But they're just not quite over the top fun enough.

But Jim Carrey, oh lordy, he is perfection. If you've been sitting around wishing Jim Carrey would come back and do some cracking hilarious roles again, well this is it. He is super dastardly with neo-Matrix trappings and a moustache to boot. He pulls in all his wild face acting and physical theatrics. He does absolute whack things so out of the box for no discernible reason and it is great. He is maybe a robot and he commands a lot of drones and other high tech nasties with sort of mimey glove dances. Without a doubt Jim is the best thing in this film.

There are also some nice moments of slo-mo-exploration here, ala Quicksilver. Because Sonic is super-fast so to see what he gets up to we basically freeze time. Then we drift all around under and over frozen action, tweaking things for unfreeze hilarity. And those things are always pretty cool. I love slo-mo, I dig it. But these parts are somewhat undermined by the frenetic bits where they just put Sonic everywhere seemingly all at once. I found some of these scenes a bit confusing to watch - too many Sonics doing too many things for no real plot-point.

I've been told I should mention that chilli dogs happen. I don't know that means contextually. Seems if you're a fan of Sonic they do a good job. If you're a fan of Jim Carrey it's also pretty good.

J* gives it 3 stars.