Planet 51 (2009)

Directors:

Jorge Blanco
Javier Abad (co-director)

Writer:

Joe Stillman (writer)

Release Date:

20 November 2009 (USA)

Genre:

Animation | Adventure | Comedy | Family | Fantasy

Tagline:

Something strange is coming to their planet...Us!

Plot:

American astronaut Captain Charles "Chuck" Baker lands on Planet 51 thinking he's the first person to step foot on it. To his surprise, he finds that this planet is inhabited by little green people who are happily living in a white picket fence world, and whose only fear is that it will be overrun by alien invaders...like Chuck!

Plot Keywords:

Digit In Title | Number In Title

US Showtimes:

The Bridge: Cinema de lux

12:15pm | 12:45 | 2:35 | 3:05 | 4:55 | 5:25 | 7:15 | 9:35

(personalize)

Cast

Dwayne Johnson	...	Captain Charles T. Baker (voice)
Jessica Biel	...	Neera (voice)
Justin Long	...	Lem (voice)
Gary Oldman	...	General Grawl (voice)
Seann William Scott	...	Skiff (voice)
John Cleese	...	Professor Kipple (voice)
Freddie Benedict	...	Eckle (voice)
Alan Marriott	...	Glar (voice)
Mathew Horne	...	Soldier Vesklin (voice)
James Corden	...	Soldier Vernkot (voice)
Lewis Macleod	...	Additional Voice (voice)
Rupert Degas	...	Additional Voice (voice)
Rebecca Front	...	Additional Voice (voice)
Vincent Marzello	...	Additional Voice (voice)
Emma Tate	...	Additional Voice (voice)

Also Known As:

Planet One (UK) (working title)

MPAA:

Rated PG for mild sci-fi action and some suggestive humor.

Runtime:

USA:91 min

Country:

Spain | UK | USA

Language:

English | Spanish

Color:

Color

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Certification:

USA:PG (certificate #45479) | Singapore:G | Australia:PG | UK:U | South Africa:PG | Ireland:G

Company:

Ilion Animation

Movie Connections:

Spoofs Alien (1979)

Soundtrack:

Ding Ding a Boom Boom

Good Not Great

I took my 8 year old daughter and her friend to see this opening night. There was a decent size crowd who seemed to enjoy it. For ESPN fans one of their long time personalities, who has his own video short series on the website, was there. But I digress.

It took a while to realize that it definitely was Dwayne Johnson as the astronaut's voice. He's created a great niche for himself in family films and I think he does good job. Justin Long was a good choice for the lead "alien" Lem and John Cleese is always a good choice as he did a small role as the professor. The role of Skiff brought good humor to many scenes. Sean William Scott was very animated in his voice acting for this character. Other than Rover and the hippie-like guy, the rest of the characters are just back drops without adding much.

We laughed quite a bit throughout the movie, which is mostly the point. There was plenty of cute humor with the dog-like robot Rover, who was a little reminiscent of WALL-E, a little. The down-side was that it never drew you in to fully connect, sympathize, like or dislike any of the characters. I didn't see myself rooting for anyone over anyone else. If the message is supposed to be about not judging anyone based on appearance, that message was shallow. If the message was to keep an open-mind toward what is possible and to learn new things, that message was under-developed.

Bottom line, the kids enjoyed it and we had a good entertaining night out. So in that respect it served its' purpose. The animation was suitable and I liked the 50's like theme of the planet. One or two adult humor jokes in there that could have been omitted and not change the movie.

For a family movie 7/10.