Space Chimps

When this film was released it brought wildly mixed reviews. Many hated it, some respected critics found it delightful. I suspect that was because many of us have become jaded by thanks to the overcomplicated, pyrotechnical movie fare we have been fed recently and this is a simple story reasonably well told that will keep kids occupied for 90 minutes and is not too ghastly that the adult who sits and watches it with them will consider it 90 minutes totally wasted. That said, I cannot imagine sitting willingly through it a second time.

The plot sees three chimponauts sent into space to recover a space probe that has gone missing in a wormhole. Naturally the chimps turn out to be far more intelligent than their human counterparts and, if you can stand the irritation of sitting through Ham’s (Andy Samberg) antics initially, the story is quite engaging, particularly when the extraordinary Kilowatt (Kristin Chenoweth) makes an appearance, a balloon-shaped creature that lights up when emotionally challenged and has some decent, operatic voice work. There are more than a few nods to famous sci-fi films such as Star Wars and 2001: A Space Odyssey and there are the bare bones of a good plot but this never really gets fleshed out.

I’m afraid when you are used to animation of the standard of Pixar this is a very poor substitute and I cannot say that the film is worth the money spent on it, although the budget is not huge, judging by the crude animation.

The film caters unashamedly to family entertainment, although considering how demanding today's kids are, they will doubtless be highly discriminating where this is concerned. Only for those who are extremely undemanding when it comes to entertainment.