Storks

Storks is undoubtedly funny and keeps up with the audience attention just enough in spite of an at par performance in pretty much all departments. The movie doesn't have any wow factor, except for the "baby cuteness", but I didn't find it bad either.

Story (7/10): I've heard about this concept for the first time, but apparently, storks, in some mythologies, are associated with baby delivery and that's what the story is about. In the modern times, though, they have moved away from baby delivery to cell phones. However, in a dramatic turn of events, one of the soon-to-be-boss storks, Junior, is unable to prevent the restart of a baby-making machine by Tulip - the only human at the facility, which creates a baby. Along with Tulip, he has to not just hide it from the rest of the storks at the facility, but also deliver the baby. And in that process, he has to prevent the babies from external enemies as well. I didn't find the story so exciting but what I liked about it was the screenplay that had good punches - although inexplicable on some occasions. What I also loved the most was some of the innovative stuff with wolves and penguins, which was innovative and great to watch. The characterization of Tulip and establishing her chemistry with Junior was a little tricky but the writer managed to do it pretty much smoothly without making it looked forced. Overall, a pretty neat job by Nicholas Stoller.

Animation (8/10): The animation is really good, especially the ones on creating various baby faces and expressions. It was pretty much like they poured in all of their energy into that. Also, the work around landscaping and making the entire visual very colorful is great.

Direction (7/10): The combination of Nicholas Stoller and Doug Sweetland has pulled out quite well. While the former hasn't had a great run with the movies yet, Doug's experience with the animation movies seems to have come handy, even though it was a first time for him. The idea of getting wolves creating amazing shapes - totally fitting into the context of the story - and the silent fight with the penguins was great. However, the direction could have improved in the beginning of the movie, which was a little slow and low on momentum.

Overall (7/10): A well-made movie with good animation and super score on cuteness factor!

In 2016, Nicholas Stoller (Get Him to the Greek & Neighbors) and Doug Sweetland (Presto) presented Storks, an animated film from Warner Bros. Animation Group (The Lego Movie). While it had a mixed critical reception, it's definitely a movie that typical movie-goers and families may find adorable and funny?

The main plot centers on a stork company that delivers packages and babies. When the top delivery stork, Junior, becomes boss of the workers, he is told to fire the only human working there, Orphan Tulip. Instead of firing her, he sends her to the defunct mail room. Meanwhile, the son of two workaholic parents, Nate Gardner, sends a letter to the company asking for a baby sibling to play with. When the letter arrives, it creates a baby, so now Junior and Tulip have to deliver the baby to it's guardians while going through many obstacles like avoiding getting noticed by the company's CEO Hunter, a pack of hysterical wolves, and trying to care for the baby itself.

In concept, the film has all the right ideas to make a charming comedy for the whole family, and it mostly succeeds in it's execution. Even though the journey Junior and Tulip go on feels similar to almost every Pixar film (e.g. Inside Out and Finding Nemo), the film gives the characters enough time to develop off each other, where they came from, and what each other's goals are, even if their quirky eccentric personalities don't always contrast that well. The subplot featuring Nate and his family, however, does come off as rather straightforward and it's easy to guess what will happen since all his goal is to have a baby sibling. It doesn't help that the movie itself does come with some tired film clichés, not just the duo who overcome each other on their obstacles, but also the workaholic parents who try to make their son happy, the big promotion from one job to another, the side villain finding out where the heroes are, and even how the main villain tries to get rid of the protagonists.

As for the rest of the characters, the CEO of the company Hunter at first comes off as a trustworthy boss, but there's quite a nerve he has with babies which presents him as threatening and cunning. The pigeon Toady can either be amusing or annoying with his exaggerated "bro" voice, but he's also a decent deuteragonist as he only follows his orders to make the most of his job. As stated before, the Gardner family have the same trope of the little kid who wants his busy parents to spend more time with him, so they decide to bond with him more to make him happy. And then there are the wolves led by the alpha and beta, who deliver the absolute funniest parts of the movie due to their personalities constantly shifting from menacing to energetically adoring the baby, as well as performing the best visual gags in the film.

However, if there are two things this movie really nailed in the execution, it would be the heart and the humor. The filmmakers definitely knew when to have cute sentimental moments with the baby, and they always come off as adorable instead of schmaltzy. Also, when the movie's main characters have their moments of relief and sentimentality, it gives the film a lighthearted tone that never comes out randomly, and portrays the scene with just the right emotion to make the audience feel for them. However, the humor would have to be the highlight of the movie, as there's plenty of one liners, visual gags, surprisingly decent pop culture jokes, slapstick, subversion and line deliveries, and it's very rare when they miss their mark as they have such exquisite timing and charm to them. Also, since Junior and Tulip do spend the journey caring for the baby, they spend time feeding and trying to put the baby to sleep, which also makes the movie relatable to any parents who raised their own offspring.

Since the movie acts more on the cartoony side, it creates the animation to be as cartoony as it can, and it did the job beautifully. The characters look kinda simplistic, but given the silly nature of the film, they contrast well, and their movements can get exaggerated and wacky at just the right moments. Although some of the places they leads go to range from a cave, to the Arctic, to suburbs, the animators still give the backgrounds life and present them in colorful, unique, vibrant, and bright manners. The effects animation is also quite creative such as the factory robots, the water, the machine that creates babies, and even some of the lights and electrical effects. The only criticism there is to give the animation is that many of the storks look like the exact same model (probably by means of cheaping out a bit), but they don't ruin the sporadically wonderful quality that the visuals have to offer.

While Storks may not have flown as high up as other animated films of 2016 such as Kung Fu Panda 3, Zootopia and Kubo & the Two Strings, it did offer enough good laughs, silly concepts, well crafted animation and memorable characters to stand on it's own. If you're in the mood for a cute little family comedy with some relatability to those who have raised babies before, then this will be a delight from beginning to end, especially since it knows who to aim itself towards. If Nicholas Stoller and Doug Sweetland can do this good of a job with cartoony movies, then I can't wait to see what they have in store next for animation….like Captain Underpants, nice job Nick.

This film tells the story of a delivery company run by storks. They stopped delivering babies for many years, until one incompetent employee broke the rules and created a baby for delivery.

There are many reasons to like "Storks". The animation is super cute, and the story is very sweet. Most people would connect with babies, making this film an easy success. The wolves are funny too. However the broken heart has gone just one step too far as it gets too repetitive and non functional like the other formation of the wolves. I also like the literal downfall of the boss. Adults can relate to that too. It is rare to see a film that can be enjoyed by all ages. I liked it.

Watching this movie in the earlier parts, I could not help to feel that the funny scenes were a little bit forced, but as the movie continues, the funny scenes becoming more and more fluid. The funny moments became more natural. And since the baby girl was "produced", the movie became much more alive. I think the star of the movie was really the baby. The animation of this baby was soooo cute and adorable that you would really want to hug and play with the baby.

You would also be enjoying the very colorful scenes and the funny moments during the chase by the wolves. Those were some of the most enjoyable moments. But the moment that I laughed the hardest was during the scene involving penguins (and the fork). It was priceless!

I also loved that the trailer shown many times in the theaters was only showing some brief introduction about Storks and baby making machine. This helped us to be enjoying the movie without knowing there were so many plots inside this one. For parents who want to bring their children to watch this, I believe they would be able to enjoy it. For teenagers & adults, this movie would also be enjoyable to watch. However, please do not expect logic or the making sense of the story of Storks delivering babies. If you can only enjoy movie when logic is very much a great factor, then I do not think this movie is right for you. If you are looking for some fun and good laughter, then you can definitely watch this one!

By the way, this movie was produced by Warner Bros Animation Group (WAG) which also produced The Lego Movie. Hence, it was not a surprise to see there was a short funny animated Lego movie of a Chinese Kung Fu Master and a chicken before the start of the movie. I guess WAG also wanted to follow the success of such pattern used by Disney, Pixar and even Illuminati (remember those cute minions in The Secret Life of Pets ?). It did give us a nice thing to enjoy before the start of the actual movie. So when you already bought the tickets for this film, please make sure you are not late to be able to watch this short fun movie.

please read my full review in michaelnontonmulu.blogspot.co.id

I found STORKS in the way that you're supposed to find underrated/cult classics: by accident. When it was released, I bought into the collective sigh of underwhelm that most critics expressed and that was my mistake. It's easy to understand why the critical community didn't like it: in an era where Pixar, Disney and even Dreamworks keep churning out magnificently multi-layered heart-warmers that set the bar stratospherically high, STORKS doesn't register all that well. We've been spoiled by excellence. As a result, we've lost the ability to enjoy the simple pleasures of pure entertainment.

And that's what STORKS delivers better than babies or packages: entertainment.

You might have noticed people commenting on how forced and thin the storyline is and how uneven it feels, and those complaints are accurate. The plot is extremely thin (virtually an extended sitcom-sized premise stretched into an epic road-trip format), and the story moves so quickly that it goes too far too fast with nary any breathing room to savor the experience or give the characters the tension or time to build any real catharsis or change. But the characters are so authentic to themselves that you know just about everything you need to know about them from their first scenes.

I think the main reason STORKS gets such middling reviews in print and here on IMDb is because it's an old-fashioned type of comedy: a screwball-slapstick hybrid. The emphasis on sight gags, pain-humor, and wackiness has generally been avoided in animated films as passe and vulgar--low comedy. The rapid-fire snark between the main characters of Tulip and Junior hearken back to the old Howard Hawks workplace comedies of the 1930s, which is definitely an acquired taste in the post-narrative style of humor found in kids entertainment today--where non-sequiturs and punchlines exist in a vacuum and visual comedy is derived from abstraction rather than plasticity. But the comedic energy and the variety of jokes from modern "Office"-style cringe (Pigeon Toady) to the machine-gun-speed HIS GIRL FRIDAYy-style verbal sparring (Tulip & Junior), absurdism (the wolves), post-modern meta-humor (the boy and his parents) to classical WB slapstick of yesteryear, and the film is riotously funny because of it. At the end of the day, that's what STORKS wants to be: FUNNY.

STORKS is not a great film. It's not a masterpiece like TOY STORY or UP. It won't win any Oscars and it won't be everyone's cup of tea. But there's an excellent chance that it will live on as a multi-generational favorite for the same reasons as dumb-fun-with-a-heart-of-gold treasures like SPACEBALLS, DUMB & DUMBER, THE NAKED GUN, and NATIONAL LAMPOONS CHRISTMASs VACATION:

Because you can watch it 1,000 times and it will NEVER stop being funny.

So try it out. There's a 50-50 chance you'll be among the ones who can't stop watching it.