Planet 51

I’m on my flight returning from a wonderful festival and the United plane has a wide variety of films available. I see Planet 51 is one of the selections available on the flight entertainment program.

I try to see every animated feature released- even the films made for kids. I believe one can always learn something even from badly made films. Plus, who knows maybe I could discover a lost gem like “Mind Games” from Japan.

I know the airplanes are not the desired screening room for animated films, the picture is small; there are kids screaming and many other annoying distractions like pilot’s announcements and such. But I’m an intrepid cartoon fan.

The film “Planet 51” has a very clever concept of what if we saw an alien invasion from an alien planet point of view and humans were the aliens.

The design is quite good and handsome. They took America in the 50’s as their style format, which is appropriate since in those time there was a preponderance of Martian attack movies and everyone was afraid of invasion from the commies and other aliens.

The problem with the film is the story. The gags just don’t work. They’re very clichéd and tame. They didn't really try anything fresh. One reason might be that it’s a Spanish production and even though it’s made in English I don’t believe the it translated very well.

However, I do recommend the film for its wonderful set design and coloring.

I give it a 6 out of 10 on the Plympton scale.