Cinema Reviews

Pixels Review

4th Aug 2015

After aliens get the wrong end of the stick about the contents of a time capsule sent into space and they challenge the earth to a mighty showdown: Their version of real life giant 80’s arcade game characters verses the Earth’s mightiest players.

And of course these heroes happen to be the President of the United States (Kevin James, in probably one of his most unlikely castings to date) and the President’s best mate/repair guy/every-day-Joe type guy played of course by Adam Sandler.

So down to Earth is this guy that upon just meeting rich women in their own homes he invites himself into their lives (and their walk-in-closets) to share relationship advice about their impending divorce before cracking onto them.

Sandler has reduced himself to this sort of behaviour on film – and this is just his opening scenes. But if it’s objectivity and insensitivity you are looking for in the treatment of women then you need look no further than the appalling outcome for Josh Gad’s character and his “trophy” in the movie. The film makers may defend this as “broad” comedy (no pun on the word broad!), and that it is meant for entertainment and laughs, but surely this is one of the most dangerous places to be flippant about such matters.

That aside – Pixels is one unholy mess of a movie. The effects may look decent for the most part, but the story and logistics (not to mention rules) of the action is so mishandled that it seems like an afterthought to the actors mugging on camera.

Throw in a very confused looking Brian Cox, and embarrassed looking Sean bean and you have a full on recipe for a film that has stumbled, fallen and mashed it’s face into the concrete long before it has had the chance to ever get going.

Somewhere at its core is and old Joe Dante movie dying to leap out (Or a modern day Edgar Wright movie for that matter). But sadly Chris Columbus can’t reign in his unfunny actors, or give any deeper thought to the plot or action on screen. A real dud.