Were Christina Aguilera or Snoop Dogg ever going to produce a track hotter than the Addams Family Groove? No way! Can’t be done! ‘Haunted Heart’ by Christina Aguilera and ‘My Family’ by Migos, Snoop Dogg and friends are capable songs to accompany this movie, but they were set up to fail. They could never match the lyrical precision of MC Hammer and his Addams Groove (…I’m semi-serious).
When I first heard the new The Addams Family cartoon movie had Oscar Isaac and Charlize Theon to voice Gomez and Morticia I was instantly on board. Throw in Chloe Grace Moretz as Wednesday and the movie was looking down the barrel of perfect casting. Was it too late to work it into a live-action tale? I’m a big fan of the ninety’s life-action The Addams Family movies and they’re always going to a tough comparison in my mind; I’ve also seen the Hanna-Berbera cartoon movie where the Addams family meet Scooby-Doo, but I’ve never seen any of the 1960s television sitcom or the original comic strip. I understand that The Addams Family is often wackier than the ninety’s movies allowed, but I believe I get the gist of what makes the property great. A cartoon Addams Family movie is exciting because the format can lend itself to creating a lot of great sight gags easily, especially for animate-object characters like the polar bear skin rug and Thing.
The Addams Family is directed by Conrad Vernon and Greg Tiernan, and follows a jumble of intersecting plotlines – The Addams come in contact with a new neighbourhood development where the realtor is horrified to learn that the estate will look upon the Addams family asylum; she offers her services to renovate or demolish the property. Wednesday expresses an interest to explore beyond the asylum grounds, and Morticia clashes with her daughter’s experimentation with a new attitude, and fashion accessories, from the outside world. Meanwhile Pugsley and Gomez are training for a sword-dancing tradition, that will announce Pugsley has become a man. Pugsley does not seem to grasp the importance of the tradition but Gomez and Fester insist. The Addams family’s extended relations will soon travel from across the globe to witness the sword-dancing ceremony.
I was enthused by the idea of the Addams interacting with the real world. It wasn’t until the direct-to-video movie with Tim Curry (Addams Family Reunion) that the Addams truly ventured outside their home. The way this movie establishes the housing estate is disappointing though; it’s called ‘Assimilation’ for God’s sake, an on-the-nose indicator as to how the realtor necessitates conformity amongst the townspeople. The realtor (voiced by Allison Janney) influences the townspeople through a neighbourhood-watch style app, and they don’t even question it. I think the majority of this movie’s audience is going to be aware of the pitfalls of social media, or too young to understand the commentary. By the time the school girls sing outside a gazebo it’s clear that we are in an unpleasant heightened reality. The city in the animated movie Sing! felt more lived in than this neighbourhood, and that was populated by animals. I did enjoy one joke set up by the town, when Gomez goes to the café and comes out with a paper of ground coffee as a delicious treat. The movie sets up that Morticia and Gomez are already aware that they are unwanted by the outside world, but for some reason Gomez still wants to venture down to the neighbourhood and introduce himself. The Addams were run out of their home country and moved to New Jersey for seclusion. Morticia makes the point that she believes Wednesday is safer near the asylum and Gomez shows nothing to contradict her. I like when Gomez is friendly and optimistic that he can always make a new friend, I just didn’t think the movie was written that way from the beginning.
The great flexibility of The Addams Family is that I’d imagine it can lend itself in so many different creative directions. Firstly, there are upwards of five main characters, with varying personalities; you can tell individual stories and stories about family values – the nineties movies excelled at that. The Addams Family can evoke themes such as identity and belonging, and the value of accepting people for who they are, and not judging a book by its cover. Of course, humour is included, because not only is the family creepy and cooky, they can satire the common culture by opposing it. With all this rich potential, it’s disappointing that this movie gets jumbled, and doesn’t focus up in one way or another. To the movie’s detriment, it tries to incorporate every family member evenly, where it might have been more productive to have some characters take a backseat to allow others complexity. The gag-to-plot ratio is also about 50/50; there’s some funny jokes in here, but not enough to compliment the sheer volume – even the best episodes of Family Guy know when it’s best to focus up the story and leave a cutaway or two behind. It’s not a bad story, and it’s not a bad movie, but it seems superficial at a level.
I do want more Addams Family in my life, and I enjoyed seeing Morticia and Gomez on their wedding night. I like how Lurch joined the family as an escaped mental patient found on the side of the road; I feel sorry for him though, because apparently he was wearing his traditional coat underneath his straight-jacket the whole time; the man must’ve been toasty! The way the story is written allows the movie to stagger the introduction of key family characters, like Fester, Grandma and Cousin Itt; smart move. I loved the addition of Snoop Dogg as Cousin Itt – who else is more incarnate?! I doubt I’ll think of Cousin Itt as anyone else ever again. Finn Wolfhard and Bette Midler as Pugsley and Grandmama are great decisions as well. It took me while to warm to Nick Kroll as Fester, but I got around to it.
It really bugged me though; I always thought Pugsley was the older sibling to Wednesday, and that Grandmama was Morticia’s mother. I’ve looked it up and it seems that there are conflicting interpretations for both; how funny. I think it works better for Wednesday to be younger and constantly outsmarting Pugsley, personally. I think I would have preferred Gomez and Grandmama without the accent too. I think Oscar Isaac and Bette Midler have great preestablished public personalities that would have carried their voicework alone, and let the animation speak for itself. I understand how the Addams family originates for Europe, so the accents make narrative sense, but this is cartoons, where Beauties and Beasts can speak American-English in the middle of France, so who cares. I wasn’t overly impressed with the animation design either; you expect the Addams family to be exaggerated so I’m not talking about them, but the townspeople with their skinny limbs and flat heads were so distorted I winced.
It’s weird to describe a movie as tired when it is supposed to be a renewed take. At the end of the day, the best way to sum it up is to say there’s no Addams Groove, no Gomez rant to rival Raul Julia, no Wake the Dead, no Camp Chippewa and no Christina Ricci. I’ll stick fat to my 90s and nostalgia if you please, thank-you!
2.5
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