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Post by the Scribe on Jul 12, 2022 6:31:44 GMT
‘Minions: The Rise of Gru’ review: ‘You’re No Good’? That’s a good thing in this silly origin story June 29, 2022 at 6:00 am Updated June 29, 2022 at 6:34 am www.seattletimes.com/entertainment/movies/minions-the-rise-of-gru-review-youre-no-good-thats-a-good-thing-in-this-silly-origin-story/
Minions Kevin and Otto, Gru (Steve Carell) and Minions Stuart and Bob in “Minions: The Rise of Gru.” (Illumination Entertainment & Universal Pictures) Minions Kevin, Stuart and Bob in “Minions: The Rise of Gru.” (Illumination Entertainment & Universal Pictures)
1 of 6 | Minions Kevin and Otto, Gru (Steve Carell) and Minions Stuart and Bob in “Minions: The Rise of Gru.” (Illumination Entertainment & Universal Pictures) Skip Ad
By Soren Andersen Special to The Seattle Times Movie review Ready for a nostalgia bath?
You are? Well then, you’re ready for “Minions: The Rise of Gru.” Plop right in and prepare yourself for a full-immersion experience.
There are two levels at play here. Level One harks back to “Despicable Me,” the 2010 animated epic that launched a multibillion-dollar franchise that’s spread like the Borg to encompass sequels, prequels, TV shows, video games and even a theme park ride.
“The Rise of Gru” reworks scenes from “Despicable” — remember the Freeze Ray? Meet the Cheese Ray, a gooey people-coating antecedent — as the picture charts the youthful mischiefs of aspiring supervillain Gru. Steve Carell is back to provide his villainous voice, though at a higher pitch to reflect the fact Gru here is 11¾ years old.
The precursor of his vast underground lab in “Despicable” is the basement of his suburban home where he cooks up his naughty instruments of disruption with the assistance of his delightful henchbeings the Minions. Yes, young Gru is already surrounded by his jabbering yellow crew of Kevin, Stuart, Bob and the pint-size rest, whose jabbers are all supplied by Pierre Coffin as they have been in the franchise’s various big-screen outings. How they coexist with Gru’s shrewish, denigrating mom, again voiced by Julie Andrews (sadly underutilized this time), is unexplained.
But wait. Deeper goes the immersion in Level Two, all the way back to 1976 when the picture is set.
On view: bell-bottoms, long sideburns. On the soundtrack: disco, the Ramones, Linda Ronstadt, the Rolling Stones and more, artfully woven into the narrative to comment on the story. (Ronstadt’s “You’re No Good” is a prominent commentary. And the Stones’ “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” is a hilariously showstopping closer, at once reverent and risible.)
The plot pits boy Gru and his loyal Minions against a cadre of supervillains called the Vicious Six, voiced by a murderer’s row of celebrity bad guys: Danny Trejo, Dolph Lundgren, Jean-Claude Van Damme. Taraji P. Henson voices the group’s Afro-coiffed leader, Belle Bottom (groan). Curiously, the filmmakers gave these folks dialogue that consists mostly of aaarghs, yawps, screeches and snarls. Anyone could have done those voices.
Boy Gru venerates these villains and wants to join them. They rudely dismiss the kid until he steals a magic medallion, and then they spend the rest of the picture chasing him and the Minions from coast to coast.
Gru is mentored in the arts of cartoony malevolence by a baddie named Wild Knuckles (irascibly voiced by Alan Arkin) who’s been booted from the Vicious Six and seeks revenge. Also in a mentoring mode is a kung fu sensei voiced by the lately ubiquitous Michelle Yeoh. A very funny character.
Gru in turn mentors the Minions who worship him. He instructs them in the making of his bad-guy devices. An early example is a stink bomb that clears a sold-out showing of “Jaws” and allows our heroes to watch it, with gas masks in place.
The tone throughout is frantic, with screamy chases overused. Franticness at its best is a scene in which the Minions take, well, you can’t call it control really, with all the button-pushing craziness in the cockpit, of a jetliner and give panicked passengers the ride of their lives.
Kids will love all the silliness, but oddly the greatest resonance of the Wayback Machine plot will be felt by the kids’ grandparents (if any find themselves in attendance) who were around in those bygone days.
Hey, yeah. I remember that. And that. And that other thing too.
Go Gru.
“Minions: The Rise of Gru” ★★★ (out of four) Featuring the voices of Steve Carell, Alan Arkin, Taraji P. Henson, Michelle Yeoh, Pierre Coffin, Julie Andrews, Russell Brand, RZA, Lucy Lawless, Danny Trejo, Dolph Lundgren and Jean-Claude Van Damme. Directed by Kyle Balda, Brad Ableson and Jonathan del Val. 90 minutes. Rated PG for action, some violence and rude humor. Opens July 1 in multiple theaters.
You're No Good by Linda Ronstadt www.slashfilm.com/913386/every-song-we-heard-in-minions-the-rise-of-gru/
Kyle Balda's "Minions: The Rise of Gru" is set largely in San Francisco in 1976, when the titular Gru was a mere 11 ¾ years old. Several scenes of the film's action take place inside of — or in a mysterious chamber below — a music store called Criminal Records. Gru, to remind readers, aspires to be one of the world's most notorious supervillains, and the titular Minions aspire only to aid him in his endeavors.
In the film, the young Gru (played by Steve Carell with his voice artificially pitched up) receives an invitation to fill in an empty spot on The Vicious Six, a famed supervillain team that was recently reduced to five. In order to enter the evil team's enclave, Gru must give a password to a record store clerk and be shown into an empty listening booth where he is meant to play Linda Ronstadt's "You're No Good" from her 1974 record "Heart Like a Wheel." The record, when run backwards, opens a trap door in the floor.
"You're No Good" was written Clint Ballard, Jr. in 1963, was originally performed by Dee Dee Warrick, and was covered — to great chart success — by Betty Everett that same year, and by The Swinging Blue Jeans the following year. Ronstadt's version was the most popular version, hitting #1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
"Minions" only cares to play with the song's title; Gru and his villainous compatriots only aim to be "no good," and the lyrics to the song (it's a breakup song about leaving behind a no-good lover) are ignored in favor of its title. Fitting, as the entirety of the song is not used. companion thread conservatism.freeforums.net/thread/9559/minions-rise-gru
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Post by the Scribe on Jul 12, 2022 6:32:19 GMT
Associated Press
‘Minions’ set box office on fire with $108.5 million debut www.yahoo.com/entertainment/minions-set-box-office-fire-154245219.html
LINDSEY BAHR Sun, July 3, 2022 at 11:42 AM
Families went bananas for Minions this weekend at the movie theater. “ Minions: The Rise of Gru ” brought in an estimated $108.5 million in ticket sales from 4,391 screens in North America, Universal Pictures said Sunday. By the end of the Monday’s July Fourth holiday, it will likely have earned over $127.9 million.
The film is on track to become one of the biggest openings ever for a July Fourth holiday weekend, a record previously held by “Transformers: Dark of the Moon” which made $115.9 million in its first four days in 2011. Including international showings, where “Minions: The Rise of Gru" is playing in 61 markets, its worldwide gross is sitting at $202.2 million through Sunday.
“It's a tremendous debut,” said Jim Orr, Universal's president of domestic distribution. “It’s playing very broadly across North America. Every single market doing extraordinarily well.”
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Post by the Scribe on Jul 13, 2022 12:27:25 GMT
Breaking Down Every Major Song We Heard In Minions: The Rise Of Gru www.slashfilm.com/913386/every-song-we-heard-in-minions-the-rise-of-gru/ Universal Pictures BY WITNEY SEIBOLD/JULY 1, 2022 10:00 AM EDT
Mix tapes are a delicate science. Nick Hornby declared as much in his 1995 novel "High Fidelity," wherein he pontificated on the proper placement of songs, the flow of one song into another, and his intense concerns as to what kind of messages a properly thought-out playlist would communicate to the intended recipient. To quote: bookshop.org/books/high-fidelity/9781573225519
"To me, making a tape is like writing a letter. There's a lot of erasing and rethinking and starting again. A good compilation tape, like breaking up, is hard to do."
As Sarah Vowell once said on "This American Life," a homemade tape is a work of friendship. And she is right. There can be an intimacy to a mix. A declaration of time, of mood, of intent. That notion is certainly true of a good soundtrack record, which can speak more to a film's tone than the use of and kind of carefully assayed visual language. An audience will be able to shake hands with a film based on its music alone. www.thisamericanlife.org/45/media-fringe/act-three-2
With that in mind, some assessment is in order: What kind of message is the soundtrack for "Minions: The Rise of Gru" sending to its audience with its collection of now-standard 1970s hit songs? www.slashfilm.com/894379/minions-the-rise-of-gru-review-just-what-youd-expect-from-a-blaxploitation-movie-starring-minions-annecy/
'You're No Good' by Linda Ronstadt
Universal Pictures
Kyle Balda's "Minions: The Rise of Gru" is set largely in San Francisco in 1976, when the titular Gru was a mere 11 ¾ years old. Several scenes of the film's action take place inside of — or in a mysterious chamber below — a music store called Criminal Records. Gru, to remind readers, aspires to be one of the world's most notorious supervillains, and the titular Minions aspire only to aid him in his endeavors. www.slashfilm.com/911038/what-the-minionese-in-the-minions-movies-means/
In the film, the young Gru (played by Steve Carell with his voice artificially pitched up) receives an invitation to fill in an empty spot on The Vicious Six, a famed supervillain team that was recently reduced to five. In order to enter the evil team's enclave, Gru must give a password to a record store clerk and be shown into an empty listening booth where he is meant to play Linda Ronstadt's "You're No Good" from her 1974 record "Heart Like a Wheel." The record, when run backwards, opens a trap door in the floor.
"You're No Good" was written Clint Ballard, Jr. in 1963, was originally performed by Dee Dee Warrick, and was covered — to great chart success — by Betty Everett that same year, and by The Swinging Blue Jeans the following year. Ronstadt's version was the most popular version, hitting #1 on the Billboard Hot 100.
"Minions" only cares to play with the song's title; Gru and his villainous compatriots only aim to be "no good," and the lyrics to the song (it's a breakup song about leaving behind a no-good lover) are ignored in favor of its title. Fitting, as the entirety of the song is not used.
'Cecilia' by Simon & Garfunkel
Universal Pictures
In most of the "Despicable Me" movies, the Minions, typically depicted as feckless, bickersome children, have a scene wherein their solidarity is expressed through whole-group renditions of notable pop songs, presented in their own particular gibberish language. In the past they have performed "Another Irish Drinking Song" by Da Vinci's Notebook, "The Major General Song" from "Pirates of Penzance," and "Y.M.C.A." by The Village People. In "The Rise of Gru," the Minions perform "Cecilia" by Simon & Garfunkel, using the clattering vehicles and machinery in Gru's lab as percussion. www.slashfilm.com/551817/despicable-me-honest-trailer/
"Cecilia debuted on Simon & Garfunkel's hit album "Bridge Over Troubled Water" in 1970, and was used again on "Greatest Hits" in 1972. It peaked at #4 on the Billboard Hot 100, although it was likely not charting nearly as high by '76 when "Minions" takes place. It seems that the Minions, while largely clueless to some of the larger machinations of the world, do have a line on popular culture — at least enough to learn these songs and pass them around among themselves. The story goes that Simon & Garfunkel composed the song at a party, using a piano bench as a percussion instrument, giving the song a loose, raucous origin. If any group of kid-friendly critters can relate to late-night party raucousness, it's the Minions.
'Blitzkrieg Bop' by The Ramones
Universal Pictures
Hard rock and fast music are often used in movies as an unfortunate shorthand to denote that a character is evil. I say unfortunate, as perfectly decent people are perfectly capable of enjoying The Ramones. The story of "The Rise of Gru" centers on a magical coin, emblazoned with gems, that is highly sought by the Vicious Six. During the film's mayhem, the coin briefly comes into the hands of a bratty suburban kid after it's given to him by the Minion Otto in exchange for a Pet Rock. When the Minions return to the boy's home to retrieve the MacGuffin, he is heard listening to The Ramones. www.mentalfloss.com/article/595180/pet-rock-history
The Ramones are one of punk's seminal acts, and their fast-and-loose sound — essentially surf music played quickly and loudly to cover the band's lack of musical virtuosity — is often used to pump a scene full of energy while also communicating rebellion and gleeful destruction. "Blitzkrieg Bop" is a pat, easy track that seems almost incidental to its scene. A kid is listening to the Ramones in the mid 1970s. All one might be able to ponder is how hip that kid is.
'You Can't Always Get What You Want' by The Rolling Stones
Universal Pictures
Several Minions movies have ended with a glorious Minionese rendition of a popular song, often presented at a large event, notably a wedding. One film ended with All-4-One's "I Swear." The previous Minions-only adventure had a post-credits rendition of The Beatles' "Revolution." The climactic song at the conclusion of "The Rise of Gru" is The Rolling Stones' 1969 hit "You Can't Always Get What You Want." No spoilers, but the scene in which the song appears is a melancholy occasion. The song is used to show Gru and his Minions emotionally in tune for the first time.
www.slashfilm.com/650453/the-best-music-documentaries-of-all-time/
"You Can't Always Get What You Want" is a sad song that, to some ears, may be about failed revolution. It describes miniature scenarios wherein the narrator has lost something: a woman at a reception, the positive opinion of a dying man, their own ability to be heard. But if you try sometimes, you just might find ... you get what you need. The glorious choral crescendos will elevate any movie.
However, thanks to Martin Scorsese's prolific use of the Rolling Stones, perhaps a moratorium ought to be held on their music for a few years. Older viewers have heard Stones songs plenty in many, many movies. Of course, there is an argument against this point, elucidated below.
Soundtrack overview
Universal Pictures
The timeframes of these movies ("Minions" is set in the late '60s, the new film in '76) are dictated by Gru's age in the original "Despicable Me." Their soundtracks, though, are not from Gru's own personality, as they lazily and bluntly use their selections to denote little beyond the era. There are no deep cuts, no clever use of lyrics, no obscure bands that a passionate music supervisor ached to share with the world. They seem like automatically generated playlists derived from feeding a series of years into an algorithm, and all it could muster was nostalgic hits of the day. To those old enough, the "Minions" soundtracks are going to be pat and predictable. www.slashfilm.com/577893/minions-holiday-special-first-look/
Note above, however, the phrase "older viewers." The Minions films are made with a younger audience in mind, and while the parents — and grandparents — in the audience may be intimately familiar with the songs in question, the "Minions" movies seem to be making an effort to put them in kids' ears. There was a time when the pop hits of the '60s and '70s denoted anger, rebellion, sex, and danger. They were a defiant and dangerous art to fight the adult systems binding youth listeners. Talkin' 'bout my generation. Over the decades, however, those same songs become powerless, eventually used as nostalgia and comfort food for youths who have now aged into adults. The songs no longer speak for the upcoming generation.
The "Minions" movies, in presenting the songs in a colorful adventure movie context, may be giving kids their first taste of certain rock classics — classics that still have power for those kids to tap into.
Read More: www.slashfilm.com/913386/every-song-we-heard-in-minions-the-rise-of-gru/?utm_campaign=clip
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