Sega’s most famous character gets the cinematic treatment in
a highly-anticipated film that was held back for several months due to an
overwhelmingly negative response to the character’s original design. It’s also
the feature debut of its director Jeff Fowler. Those two things don’t raise doubts
about the film at all, do they?...
The film starts with Sonic (Benjamin L Valic) as a child,
happily embracing his superspeed powers, but he’s warned by his guardian to
keep them a secret. Of course, he just shrugs and the two of them are
immediately attacked by echidnas. In the panic, he’s given a bag of golden
rings that are one of his franchise’s staples and ends up in the fictional town
of Green Hills Montana.
Ten years go by and Sonic (now played with the right amount
of personality by Ben Schwartz) is enjoying a carefree life in a cave. He keeps
an eye on the locals and makes nicknames up for them, but longs for a friend in
his life. By a lucky accident he causes a power surge that attracts the
interest of the US Military and they send the brilliant but narcissistic
scientist Dr Robotnik (Jim Carrey), who stands out here by using his very
familiar over-the-top acting style to bring this iconic video game character to
life.
Sonic goes on the run intending to live on a ‘mushroom
planet’, but in the process of running he ends up getting tranquilized by an
aspiring street cop (James Marsden), who along with Sonic goes on a road trip
to evade Robotnik and keep themselves safe.
If what I just described sounds basic that’s because it is.
There’s a big lack of originality here and we’ve seen this kind of film before,
only this one has the characters of a much-loved franchise that It can use as a
selling point to get people to see it. But to its credit, it’s very well paced
and doesn’t drag; there are comedy and action in equal measure. The human
characters feel very bland, especially Marsden’s, but he saves himself somewhat
due to the believable chemistry he has with Schwartz. Robotnik is rather clichéd
as well, but Carrey’s performance saves it.
Moving on to the visual effects, I can honestly say the
redesign of Sonic was a success. He looks more like he does in the games, yet
is surprisingly expressive and less like an off-putting human/hedgehog hybrid.
More instances of where the film manages to remain faithful to the games can be
seen in the look of a forest that Sonic runs around in at the start. And for
another example, watch Carrey right at the end.
Even if it does feel like nothing more than the set-up for a
sequel, we even get a post-credits scene where a certain fox with two tails shows
up in Green Hills. He too looks very much like his video game self.
I didn’t enjoy the film much myself, but as far as films
based on video games go this could serve as proof that they can be good if done
right. I guess we will just have to wait and see.
C+