#52 - The Spongebob Squarepants Movie

I'll come clean here. I haven't watched very many episodes of Spongebob Squarepants. It's not that I don't like the cartoon, I just never really went out of my way to watch it. Because of this I wondered if I should go forward with watching the movie, kind of thinking along the lines of my not watching sequels first rule. Well, I obviously watched it, otherwise I wouldn't be writing a review here. (Think about it, dummy) You see, I am of the opinion that movie versions of television shows should stand on their own. For example, South Park and Beavis and Butthead both stood on their own as good movies. I also expect that the overall scope of the movie be WAY amplified from that of the TV show. It is the big screen, time to go big, or go home.

Does this movie stand on its own? Does it go way beyond the scope of the TV show? Well, sort of. If by adding live action elements to a cartoon and placing the animated characters in a live, non-cartoon world you are expanding the scope, then yes, it did do that. But I'm not convinced it was enough to satisfy me. The reason is because other than the live action moments, they didn't really go too far outside of the already established world of the TV series. Sure Patrick and Spongebob go on a long journey, but the shots of them were always the close up shots you have already seen. I want a big sweeping shot from far away that zooms in as it revolves 360 degress around the main character. You're on the big screen, make things BIG.

...you see, they are on a plane, and there are SNAKES ON IT TOO!!!...

Having said all of that garbage about the scope of the movie, I did enjoy it. The animators for Spongebob are very good at making a character look lighthearted and loveable one moment, and then hideously grotesque another. The contrast is very effective, very well done, and very funny. If you liked Ren and Stimpy, you should also enjoy this because it is in the same vein. Oh, and I had no idea that the voice of Patrick was done by Dauber from Coach.(M-O-O-N. That spells moon.) I think Patrick is my favorite character because of how over the top and insane he really is. "I LOVE BEING PURPLE!!!" Almost completely random, and very, very funny. And even though its a cartoon, I want to take this moment to tell you what you may already know: Scarlett Johansson is very, very hot. At times, mind numbingly hot. But I digress.

And the topper of it all. What was quite possibly the best and most entertaining performance of the entire movie was that of acting legend David Hasselhoff. That's right. I said it!! The shit eating grin that he puts on as he plays a caricature of himself is priceless. There's a difference between just knowing you are satirizing yourself and actually playing the part to its full effectiveness. He does the later, and it is a hoot. I guess to summarize the whole thing, it wasn't as much of a breakout from the cartoon as I would have liked to have seen, but it was entertaining and had the same type of humor and animation that you see on the TV show. Which is a good thing.