With The Emoji Movie Sony Pictures have cleverly shown through the use of Emoji how much we have become to rely on Smartphones – and how hard it is to navigate the social world – especially for teenagers. Critics have said that the film is like it’s main character – Meh – but I think that maybe they are not as down with the kids as they’d like to think.
The Emoji Movie Plot
The Emoji Movie is about what goes on inside a teenage boy’s Smartphone via the Emoticons. They live in Textopolis a digital city and when called upon they get scanned from The Cube and uploaded onto Alex’s device. Gene, a Meh Emoji really wants to join The Cube and work like everybody else. Despite his dad’s fears that Gene isn’t ready, Mel and Mary Meh do agree to let their son join the Emoji workforce. But Gene just can’t help showing all of his emotions – and messes up on his first day! This not only messes up the message to the girl who Alex has a crush on, but also destroys the text center in the processes. The Smiler Emoji says that Gene is a malfunctioning Emoji and needs to be deleted. Escaping from the bots sent to destroy him and in a bid to try to keep his emotions under control, Gene sets off on a journey to find the Hacker known as Jailbreak – but things aren’t always as they seem.
Thoughts on The Emoji Movie
I was invited to the FDA Multiscreening of The Emoji Movie and must admit I did not have high hopes for the film after reading so many negative reviews and Tweets. However, I thought it was alright! I actually wonder if the negativity is due to an inability to see how addicted we are to smartphones and actually laugh about it. I honestly can say I enjoyed this movie. Not my favourite film by no means least but I certainly do not feel it deserves the harsh reviews it has been receiving.
With a great Cast the voices of T.J. Miller, Patrick Stewart, James Corden, Maya Rudolph, Anna Faris and Sofía Vergara – and talking of names there was a lot of App name dropping with Facebook, Candy Crush, WeChat, Just Dance, Instagram, Spotify, YouTube and Dropbox. My husband pointed out that there was no Snapchat and wonders whether this is due to advertising constraints or just that there users weren’t the audience that the film was hoping to pull in. There were plenty of laughs (many of which may go over the head of children) but also enough boyish humour for the children (like with the appearance of the Poo Emojis). I did like (*spoiler*) that the hacker was a female and that she pushed the point that not all females are destined to be Princesses/Brides waiting for a man to come along! Disappointed that in the end the message to be your unique self wasn’t applied to her though (as she seemed to just revert to her former self and not the one she obviously wanted to be!).
I received 4 tickets for myself and family to see The Emoji Movie. Thoughts are honest and my own.