The Best Films of the Decade: #40. The LEGO Movie (2014)
In just 29 days, the decade will come to a close and so for movie lovers like me it is an opportunity to look over the decade of movies that are left behind. Over the next few weeks I am going to count down the best films of the past 10 years from #40 to #1. My choices are personal choices swayed by nothing but the love I have for this medium. These are all great movies. These films all achieved something great. All reached for something special. They are the best of the decade . . .
Two-thousand Nineteen marks the 30th anniversary
of the beginning of The Disney Renaissance, a revolutionary turn for animated
features that pulled the form out of the sub-marginal doldrums that existed in
the 70s and 80s and brought them to a state of high art. The renaissance wouldn’t last long, nor would
it entirely inspire the kind of output that we might have hoped, but the spirit
of what it wrought was both a commercial and artistic enthusiasm. Very often the run-off from the Disney
Renaissance yields forgettable herpisetic weekend box office torpor that is all
color and no brain – I’m thinking of the likes of Angry Birds, Home
and Space Chimps. But sometimes,
a studio gets one absolutely right.
The LEGO Movie makes my list of the decade’s best largely because it
shouldn’t have worked as well as it did.
Think about it. It’s a movie
about LEGOs. That idea alone sounds like
a recipe for disaster. But something wonderful
happened here. So much imagination went
into this movie that you need multiple viewings to take it all in. These are construction blocks that can be
formed and reformed into literally billons of combinations and the filmmakers
play with that. It’s the best kind of
animated movie – one that reaches the limits of what an animated movie can be.
Even more than that The LEGO Movies is a happy, exhilarating ball of
fun. It is a bright, colorful, quick-witted adventure that stretches the
animated form as far as it can possibly go, spinning its characters into other
dimensions and other realms. In short, it does exactly what animation is
supposed to do. It plays around in a magical world but doesn’t simply
ground itself in one simple-minded idea. This is one of those rare
homeruns that comes along every once in a great while. It follows
ground-breakers like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Who Framed
Roger Rabbit and Toy Story in that the animators open the visual
canvas to create something really special and distinct.
Directors
Phil Lord and Christopher Miller don’t simply pay lip service to the LEGO toy,
they have engineered a universe which is constantly evolving as the bricks are
broken down and rebuilt into something else. They create a beautiful,
colorful world of imagination and reformation that is a tribute to the
endangered spirit of make-believe.
About the Author: Jerry Roberts
Jerry Roberts is a film critic and operator of two websites, Armchair Cinema and Armchair Oscars. 
