Fridae

Strange things are happening in the realm of animation and film production in general this year. Some might even say these are the effects of the financial crisis on Hollywood and filmmaking in general. For the very first time, Pixar is set to make sequel after sequel (Toy Story 3, Cars 2, Monsters Inc. 2) while its competitors dream up new stories. For the very first time, Pixar did not make the most inventive or creative animated film of the year. Credit for that goes either to How to train your dragon, Despicable Me, or Megamind. We live in interesting times indeed.

Like Despicable Me, Megamind takes a spin on the superhero story and subverts the genre with its own anti-hero (played here by a restrained but still wacky Will Ferrell). The blue skinned super-villain’s career and life satisfaction takes an ironic nose-dive after he finally defeats his arch-nemesis Metro Man (Brad Pitt playing a parody of Superman) and is free to terrorise Metro City. After all, what is there left to do when you’ve achieved your life’s ambition? Of course, Megamind’s answer is to create a hero to rise up against him, to make his life meaningful again! As the history of movie villain bad ideas go, this takes the cake and part of the fun in this film is its very long set up (with Marlon Brando jokes included) for the plan to fizzle in spectacular fashion.

Despicable Me might be more forthrightly subversive and adult-friendly, insinuating that being a villain is just a job and villains should just have a work-life balance. Yet Megamind has a subtle charm of its own, portraying the eternal fight between good and evil as a scripted pro wrestling cage match. But its real subversiveness is in slyly teaching Manichaean dualism to tots and tweens under the guise of kid-friendly entertainment without any smug winking at adults in the audience.

Megamind is a film you’d take your younger charges to for the school holidays, which you’ll grow liking more and more as the story is told.