Plot
Surly, a curmudgeon, independent squirrel is banished from his park and forced to survive in the city. Lucky for him, he stumbles on the one thing that may be able to save his life, and the rest of park community, as they gear up for winter - Maury's Nut Store.
Release Year: 2014
Rating: 5.6/10 (263 voted)
Director:Peter Lepeniotis
Storyline
Surly, a curmudgeon, independent squirrel is banished from his park and forced to survive in the city. Lucky for him, he stumbles on the one thing that may be able to save his life, and the rest of park community, as they gear up for winter - Maury's Nut Store.
Writers: ,
Taglines:
No Nuts No Glory
Country: , ,
Release Date:
Technical Specs
Runtime:
User Review
Author:
Rating: 4/10
Surly, an adjective and a name apparently, embarks on an adventure to
obtain food for the approaching winter. He runs across some wacky
characters and antics ensue. The Good: Art- The time spent on the
animal and human designs was readily apparent throughout the film. I
could pick out individual hairs in the animals' coats. I also liked
that the artists paid attention to the animals' mouths. They were not
just mere flaps of skin covering teeth, but it looked like the mouth
region actually had some depth, that the lips were also 3D along with
the rest of the animal. The humans had a distinct look and style about
them that made me think of 2D cartoons. Big and imposing, shady and
dangerous, cute and cuddly, the artwork certainly helped draw a person
in. Ambition- The Nut Job tried to draw on several genres of film. It
attempts to reshape these stories and form into a family friendly
movie. I could spot a crime drama, a voyage of self discovery, a tale
of redemption and rejoining society, just to name a few. The film also
provided some rudimentary information about the animal species through
dialogue, so it did have some educational moments. Whether or not the
film succeeded in its ambitions will be covered in the not-so-good
section. The Not-So-Good: Pacing- What a colossal mess. The Nut Job is
a short 86 minutes and the film tried to show at least three different
story arcs. The audience is not shown how the characters will respond
to any event because the next event is following hot on the heels of
its predecessor. Because of this, any connection or concern for the
characters is lost in the fray of action and fart jokes...yes, I'll get
there too. Characters- Unfortunately the pacing of the film allows the
survival of only the most basic character types. Might as well forget
about character development too. And learning. And change for the
better. Comedy- I had hoped that the family film genre had grown past
this, I really did. Situational and character-based comedy has made
significant headway into the family films. Granted it may be a little
silly to laugh at Mr. Potato-Head's parts stuck in a flour tortilla,
but I found it to be incredibly funny. Or how about when a mermaid
becomes a human and, as a result of misguiding information told to her
in a previous scene, she puts a fork and a pipe to hilarious use at the
dinner table. Fart jokes. Maybe with the compressed story arcs, the
only form of comic relief could come from this. The Nut Job tried to
meld several different genres and in so doing, did not execute any of
them well. You've seen better representatives of the genres attempted
here and I'd suggest seeing them instead. 4/10
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