Surf's Up
Now I know this doesn't seem like my typical movie outting, but there was very little left out there to see, I had heard very good things (dispite the fact that it was yet another movie about penguins), and it made for the perfect outting with my animation friend before she skips town. So how did it all turn out? Quite well I'd say.
The story is nothing new: young hotshot shooting for the top of his sport (Cars), bad-ass jerk of a champion/competitor to beat (Cars), dopey stoner friend/sidekick (Cars), young hotshot trained by a reluctant old-time champ (Cars), love interest who is closely connected to the old champ (Cars), young hotshot learns valuable lesson as he fails to win the big event but manages to win the hearts of everyone (Cars), and cameos by animal versions of real life athletes in the sport (Cars).
So basically it was Cars, but with surfing penguins. And normally such a blatant "remake" doesn't work out, but this one stands above Cars in enough ways to distance itself and work. The voice acting was better (John Heder, Jeff Bridges, Zooey Deschanel, James Woods, Diedrich Bader, and Brian Posehn as opposed to Owen Wilson, Paul Newman, Bonny Hunt and Larry the Cable Guy), the minor tweeks of the story seemed to work better, and I could connect better with penguins over cars (as odd as that might sound). This wasn't a Madagascar vs. The Wild thing. Partially because both of those films sucked, and both would have sucked even if the other didn't exist, but mainly because Surf's Up still shined through depsite the fact that Cars came first. Also, the documentary/reality show angle of the movie gave it that extra umph.
RATING: Worth at least a matinee (perhaps more if you enjoy animated films), Worth a Netflix