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On July 9, 2010 a animation film, Despicable Me, starring Steve Carell, Jason Segel, Russell Brand, Will Arnett, Kristen Wiig, Danny McBride, Miranda Cosgrove, Jack McBrayer, Mindy Kaling, Ken Jeong, Jemaine Clement, Julie Andrews, Dana Gaier, Elsie Fisher, Dave Foley, is released in the United States.

Satirical title or not, this cartoon movie is just one more addition to children’s entertainment that includes the usual super heroes, villains and comedy along with lots of silly gadgets that make all this silliness possible. Parents are not going to get an entertainment factor out of this one, but the kids are going to love it. The movie is all about an elder villain trying to keep up with the younger bad guys and a younger villain comes along and really cramps his style. The little cartoon creatures the animators came up with is sort of cute, and of course totally absurd; they look like erasers on the end of a pencil.

Steve Carell is the voice of Gru, the elder bad guy, with Jason Segel as the younger bad guy. The problem with the comic relief in this cartoon is that most of the funny stuff is over in about say, fifteen minutes. The rest of the cartoon builds up the bad guy characters into stereotypical bad villains that are KGB oriented that have to keep having one larger caper to top the last one in order to stay the best bad guy in the world.

In the world of super villains, not everyone is a scene grabber or headliner. Though many of their capers keep them in the race, they just do not excel at being super bad guys. They just don’t have the meanness in them that it takes to be a really good bad guy. Universal has put their spin on this theme in the new 3D cartoon, Despicable Me.

Gru is created as the vintage villain that adults have come to expect to accompany a James Bond thriller. Gru has a very thick accent, huge plans and intricate schemes, along with the requisite cutting edge technology headquarters and little toy gadgets that can do everything except save the world. The plot thickens as a new bad guy comes to town. This younger bad guy is named Vector, a cool name as villains names go, I guess, and he has been making all the headlines in the bad guy section of the news. Everybody is learning his name, and older bad guys may soon become a thing of the past or just retired because they aren’t as young as they used to be. Gru decides that he is going to pull off the caper of all capers and grab the famous spotlight back from this new upstart criminal that isn’t even dry behind the ears yet. Gru decides to steal nothing less than the moon. He needs a bankroll though and so he tries to get a loan at the bank. The bank turns him down because he is too old to be a profitable bad guy any longer and the new guy in town is the one who is really worth the money now.

Gru can’t take it; he has to find a way to get the competition out of the way or under control. He decides that a device in Vector’s warren is going to give him the intelligence he needs. The safety features of Vector’s place are so tight, Gru can’t get in! He finds that kids, little girls who are orphaned can bypass the security at Vector’s place. He decides to adopt  these little unwitting accomplices and finds that these cute little children have plenty of defenses of their own and are able to start melting this tough bad guy’s heart, just a little at time. No need to go get all sentimental at once now, is there?

Predictably, the road to deliverance is never easy and the mad scientist friend, Dr. Nefario (voiced by Russell Brand) is resolved to put a proper perspective on the table for Gru in spite of his disinclined glide into fatherhood.

Steve Carell dons what sounds like a Russian inflection, and honestly he alters his voice so much that I didn’t distinguish it as his at all. That’s not denigration – he provided a great delivery all the way through the film considering what a despicable personality he played. The directors Pierre Coffin and Chris Renaudstill were able to make the viewers desire to like him. Segel was comical as Vector (his little dance and all, but offspring like that stuff – what can you say?)

The cartoon is definitely a repeat theme throughout the cartoon industry: bad guy prepares for a caper that will make them notorious, runs into kids that melt the heart and it turns out the bad guy isn’t so bad after all. The song remains the same, just the names have changed. The kids will love it because it will win their little hearts over as the bad guy sees the light and becomes a good guy. Isn’t this how the pretend world is supposed to work?

Not many new ideas here. Why fix it if it isn’t broke? The creators used a familiar theme and of course milked the cartoon for the absolute max amount of emotional exploitation. It works like a charm, and that is exactly what they wanted. The kids never get tired of it, even if the parents do.

Even so, the comedy factor will keep the kids entertained and they get to see the strength of love at work on a bad guy and how well things can turn out if you do the right things for the right reasons. This is a middle of the road, okay summer cartoon movie that the kids will enjoy and not especially remember as a favorite. The 2D covers the animation quite well, so save yourself a few bucks and opt for the 2D rather than the 3D.

This movie is a great babysitter for the kids when you are busy trying to complete the laundry or make dinner. They will be entertained and out from underfoot for awhile. There is enough going on in the plot to keep the kids interested, which is saying a lot about any cartoon movie these days.

The movie Despicable Me is is produced by John Cohen, Janet Healy, Chris Meledandri, and distributed by Universal Studios. Despicable Me is directed by Pierre Coffin, Chris Renaud, Sergio Pablos, written by Ken Daurio, Cinco Paul.

You can watch the official trailer below.

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