Madagascar

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Madagascar - 10/10/2005 4:39:52 AM

Empire Admin

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Post #: 1

Amusing and entertaining it surely is - 9/2/2006 8:49:07 PM

Eastern Cowboy

Posts: 47
Joined: 11/10/2005

MADAGASCAR is from the DreamWorks company, the silver-medal winners in the category of; family animation movies. Though everybody knows who the winner is (Pixar yeah), Madagascar shows a fresh and sparkling side of the DreamWorks company that sometimes truly hits the right spots. Madagascar works as mainly a comedy, with dozens of comedic scenes and wacko characters, the movie never tries being specially smart or impressive, simply amusing! Though the biggest dissapointment is, the four main characters - Alex, a egoistic lion, Marty, a dreaming zebra - Melman, a nerdy giraffe - and Gloria, a negro-inspired sea lion - they are all sort of fine, but they never capture the moment. With this being sort of a problem, the movie truly makes a innuendo turn by bringing several fine supporting animals into the show - especially the penguins off course. The directing looks like it's supposed to be very dramatic and steadicam-ish, but this effect doesn't come to it's peak.

Madagascar is very entertaining and all, but it's very limited because that's everything it wants to be too. It wants to be funny and have a freaky kind'a animation, and this has got it's good and bad sides - but in the end; it's a enjoyable zoo-trip-to-real-wildlife-movie.

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Post #: 2

Good Film! - 12/5/2006 9:34:35 AM

Empo

Posts: 139
Joined: 24/4/2006
From: The middle of the earth!

This film was really funny! The best character has to be king Julian of the Lema's. Best character ever! And it was our very own Ali G as well! The only thing that got me was how they got Ben Stiller as the lion! Now I have nothing against him, Big fan an all, but don't you think that the lion should have a strong mainly voice, instead of a camp one???!!!

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Post #: 3

Alright - 2/6/2008 7:48:38 PM

SaphMB

Posts: 5
Joined: 21/10/2007

Madagascar is the latest adventure to some our way from DreamWorks Animation; a studio that has created such works as Shrek and Shark Tale. DreamWorks’ latest outing did not fail to disappoint but didn‘t quite manage to be great. Madagascar tells the tale of Marty the Zebra, Alex the lion, Gloria the hippo and Melman the giraffe, inhabitants of New York's Central Park Zoo. The story is set in motion when Marty decides to go on a trip to Connecticut, what he believes to be the wild. The others go on a quest to find him which results in a media frenzy and the animals of the zoo being shipped far away, to Africa.

After the ship is hijacked by penguins (crazy, I know, but remember, everything‘s possible in animation), our main characters end up stranded on the island of, guess where…Madagascar. This is where the humour really begins. We are introduced to King Julian, voiced by the hilarious Sacha Baron Cohen, and his band of Lemurs. Our first glimpse of the lemurs is one of the most memorable moments in the film; the entire jungle comes to life for an ensemble performance of “I like to move it” lead by King Julian. Sacha Baron Cohen is very impressive in the role of King Julian; he somehow manages to concoct a voice he hasn’t that is in many ways perfect for the big-headed, delusional, King Julian.

Madagascar presents a relatively uncommon argument in relation to what animals want. The last thing the zoo animals (particularly Alex) want, is to be in the wild. Fresh air? Living off the land? Why would they want that? Especially when they have steaks and medical care at the zoo. Madagascar is most certainly an original story; it’s a splash of “the grass is always greener” a dash of “be careful what you wish for” and smidge of anthropomorphism. How original can you get?

The characters that deserve an honourable mention are definitely the penguin. They’re shifty fellows with delusions of

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Post #: 4

WWWAAAYYY better than the Wild - 26/6/2008 11:12:36 PM

JohnPaul1996

Posts: 105
Joined: 11/5/2008

I really enjoyed this film,like some animated movies arent even funny but this was,I loved the American Beaty part

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Post #: 5

Madagascar Review - 2/1/2012 9:57:38 PM

the film man

Posts: 598
Joined: 13/10/2010

Though its story is problematic in spots and its humor is hit-or-miss for the adult crowd, Madagascar boasts impressive visuals and enough spunky charm to keep children entertained.

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Post #: 6

RE: Madagascar Review - 21/10/2012 4:58:16 AM

Phubbs

Posts: 660
Joined: 3/4/2012

Madagascar (2005)

Dreamworks hit back with an animated tale about lovable zoo animals trying to escape to the wild. Always one step behind the mighty Pixar this feature seemed to be an attempt to try and combat the ever increasing list of Pixar classics that just kept on coming.

A curious blend of ideas really, the whole film is made to look quite sensible in terms of how things should look in reality. But there is a kind of Tex Avery/Chuck Jones feel to the main characters that is quite nice but also someone childish compared to the backgrounds and vista's we see. You then have the set up that the animals can all talk to each but not to humans, yet they can perform human acts without question.

The film slides from slightly emotional to sensible to most of the time outright off the wall. The plot is childishly simple naturally but it works OK, it actually gets a little twisted once 'Alex' the lion goes savage when his animal instinct kicks in. Problem is once the animals break out from New York the film becomes very average very quickly. Seeing how the animals live within their city dwelling was pretty good and made for some good clever laughs, nothing hilarious I might add but it worked.

The animals using the subway and at one point getting kicked in the nuts by an old lady does push the boundaries of even this fantasy. Unfortunately even that can't top the dreadful Lemurs they encounter on Madagascar, their leader for some reason given an Indian accent which is hideously unfunny.

The penguins were by far the best of the bunch for me as a small squad of military types led by 'Skipper' who sounds remarkably like 'Zap Brannigan' from 'futurama'. I can see why they got their own spin off. The rest of the animals are voiced well by a good team of big names but they aren't overly interesting really. Rock is plain annoying and that's the end of it, whilst Schwimmer is surprisingly well matched as the hypochondriac giraffe. Stiller does what he does in pretty much everything he's in, its fine.

Overall a very bright start but it just fades into a bland generic mess that includes a god awful hip hop sequence. The animation is fair, some smart visual gags here and there and the penguins are a great success but apart from that its all very meh. The impression I got was no one was sure which way they wanted to go with this film, so many alternative ideas colliding, bit of a mess.

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Post #: 7