Film Reviews

Rio

• Rating:
• Director: Carlos Saldanha
• Starring: Anne Hathaway
• Details: US / 96mins (G).

Following on from Happy Feet, which was about a penguin that can't sing, Carlos Saldanha directs this kiddies adventure romp about a bird that can't fly. Saldanha is a dab hand at this talking animal thing with the Ice Age trilogy on his CV, and although Rio is spectacular to look at, the story fails to live up to the visuals.
Before he can learn to fly, little Blu (Eisenberg) is taken from the jungle and shipped to Minnesota where he's nursed by a little girl who grows up to be Linda (Mann). As Blu is the last male Blue Macaw on earth, Linda is persuaded by scientist Julio (Rodrigo Santoro) to take Blu back to Brazil to mate with Jewel (Hathaway). However, before that can happen, Blu and Jewel are stolen by smugglers and their nasty cockatoo Nigel (Jemaine Clement). Manacled together, Blu and Jewel escape their captors and attempt to make the journey home, which proves difficult with the domesticated Blu unable/unwilling to fly...
Throwing every colour he can at the screen, watching Rio is like taking a bath in a tub of Smarties. Sometimes it can veer close to sensory overload (read headache inducing) but it's gorgeous to watch for the most part. There's plenty of scenes where animals get clobbered and fall over or fly into walls and whatnot, which should keep the kids entertained, while Clement's Nigel is a terrific villain and Tracy Morgan's cameo as a slobbering dog is a right laugh. All that's good.
Now the bad. Rio's derivative story never gets out of its comfort zone. Eisenberg and Hathaway work hard with what they have but Don Rhymer's script doesn't give them many funny lines to play with; a quick glance at Rhymer's credits may hint at why: bar the hugely entertaining Surf's Up, movies like the Big Momma's House trilogy, Deck The Halls and Agent Cody Banks 2 doesn't fill one with excitement.
How the Brazilians will take to their country depicted in not the best of lights - the children on show are homeless orphans, men are petty thieves - is another matter. The Simpsons got in trouble for the same.

Review by Gavin Burke