One major advantage to having the movie be animated is that the fight scenes are leagues better than the originals. Now, they actually fight like ninjas, bouncing off of walls and flying through the air.

Nostalgia is a hell-of-a thing. It manages to blind us with ignorance while giving us a taste of what the world was once like.

TMNT, the newest film revolving around the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, won me over mostly due to nostalgia, but it didnt manage to completely blind me.

Looking back on the original Ninja Turtle movies is a rather painful experience. On one hand, I remember how much I enjoyed the first two when I was a kid. Like most children of the mid-80s, I was completely transfixed by these walking, talking reptiles.

However, I am also now aware of the awful writing, terrible fight choreography, and the inclusion of Vanilla Ice that plagued the two movies (we wont get into the third one “ the only movie that I remember hating as a child).

This latest edition to the franchise comes to us without the bulky costumes and white rappers. Instead, director Kevin Munroe (whose only other credit includes a video-game where you race cartoon characters in airplanes) presents us with a computer-generated affair that picks up after the original movies.

Leonardo is off in South America undergoing leadership training (their words, not mine). Michelangelo and Donatello have retired from crime-fighting, opting instead for day jobs. Raphael sleeps during the day and dresses up as a super hero at night.

At the hands of a catalyst that I absolutely cannot remember, the four are reunited and team up once again to fight all sorts of bad guys.

The story is a fairly contrived affair containing a billionaire tycoon, magic statues, ancient monsters and the always hot-headed Raphael getting into all sorts of trouble. The twists in the plot can be seen from miles away, as well as the obvious set up for a sequel featuring an old enemy.

One major advantage to having the movie animated is that the fight scenes are leagues better than the originals. Now, they actually fight like ninjas, bouncing off of walls and flying through the air. This is quite the departure from the Steven Segal robot style of fighting featured in the originals.

The movie is elevated by some surprisingly good voice acting. Patrick Stewart, Laurence Fishburne and the late Mako provide a little class to a script that is almost always by-the-books.

Fans of the original movies will enjoy TMNT as a way of escaping into a time in their lives when film reviews didnt matter. The only important thing was being entertained. However, those who never had a tryst with the heroes in a half-shell should probably steer clear of this one.

> Comments