A Rio lot of fun despite messy plot

A Rio lot of fun despite messy plot

RIO 2 (G)

Musical comedy/102 minutes/Opens today

Rating: 3.5/5

The story:

After meeting and falling in love in Rio (2011), blue macaws Blu (Jesse Eisenberg) and Jewel (Anne Hathaway), apparently the last of their species, are now raising a brood of chicks (Rachel Crow, Amandla Stenberg and Pierce Gagnon) in the comfortable domesticity of the Marvellous City.

When Blu's former owner, Linda (Leslie Mann), and her ornithologist husband, Tulio (Rodrigto Santoro), discover more of the birds' kind in the Amazon, Jewel decides her family must uproot and return to the wild.

Blu's feathered friends and organisers of the fowl version of Carnival - Nico (Jamie Foxx), Pedro (will.i.am) and Rafael (George Lopez) - tag along to scout for performers, winged or otherwise. Meanwhile, an old enemy, Nigel (Jemaine Clement) the cockatoo, resurfaces with a hunger for payback.

 

WHAT is home?

Is it where you were born? The place you grew up in? Where you live now?

This is the conundrum faced by Blu (Jesse Eisenberg), the avian protagonist of Blue Sky Studio's ninth feature film.

Kidnapped by poachers and raised by a human in Minnesota, he was a stranger in a strange land in the first movie, whose themes of identity and cultural displacement I strongly relate to.

The fish-out-of-water premise is rehashed in this follow-up, only this time the stakes are higher.

In Blu's preceding adventure, he had to overcome his mental barrier to flying and win the heart of his fiery mate, Jewel (Anne Hathaway), whereas in this outing, he has a lot more on his plate.

For one thing, he has to contend with an authoritarian father-in-law - Jewel's long-lost dad, Eduardo (Andy Garcia). The latter is the leader of a lost flock of fellow blue macaws, who are hiding from loggers in the Amazon.

While the patriarch is elated to be reunited with his daughter, he is less enthusiastic about his son-in-law's attachment to humans and their inventions.

Then there's Jewel's childhood playmate, Roberto (Bruno Mars), a Don Juan with the voice and plumage of an angel. They even have cute nicknames for each other! Boy, does that turn Blu green with envy.

It gets worse. Not only does he have a rival for his sweetheart's affections, but there's also an old nemesis out for blood.

In a role reversal of the first film, Nigel (Jemaine Clement) - a deranged cockatoo with an affinity for alliteration and Shakespearean verse - is now flightless, after an accident indirectly caused by Blu in the earlier instalment. He is aided on his mission of vengeance by Gabi (Kristin Chenoweth), a poison dart frog who carries a torch for him, and Charlie, a mute, tap-dancing anteater.

There's also a hostile clan of scarlet macaws who are eyeing Eduardo's turf. Oh, and did I mention there were loggers?

Therein lies Rio 2's biggest flaw: too many subplots. Rio's story was beautiful in its simplicity: A shy bird conquers his flight impediment through the power of love. The sequel, on the other hand, is bogged down by its narrative tangents and bloated cast.

Returning characters, such as Luiz the bulldog (Tracy Morgan), spend the movie warming the bench. Meanwhile, newcomers serve as plot contrivances - for example, the scarlet macaws exist only as an excuse to stage an aerial football match, perhaps in tribute to this year's World Cup.

Lack of thematic focus aside, this rumble in the jungle is a visual and auditory delight. Director Carlos Saldanha also helmed the first film, a heartfelt love letter to his hometown, and he brings that same joie de vivre to the sequel.

The beauty of Rio 2's rendition of the Amazon and its beaked inhabitants - twirling with the grace of synchronised swimmers in a liquid sky - is a testament to the talent of the animators and artists.

I was also surprised by the film's dark humour - in one of many morbid scenes, a group of capybaras are stripped to the bone by piranhas.

The soundtrack, produced by John Powell and Sergio Mendes, captures the diversity of Brazil's music. The twangs of jaw harps infuse body-percussion group Barbatuques' rapturous chorus, Beautiful Creatures, while a pop-up book-style montage of Blu and his family's cross-country journey is narrated by Bahia musician Carlinhos Brown's O Vida.

The standout numbers, though, are Poisonous Love, with all the theatricality of a stage opera, and a freestyle rap parody of Gloria Gaynor's I Will Survive. Both are sung by the scene-stealing villains of Broadway veteran Chenoweth and Flight of the Conchords' Clement.

Like its rainforest setting, Rio 2's tale can be a challenge to traverse. But its charismatic characters, gorgeous setpieces and infectious rhythms will have fans of the first movie, like yours truly, feeling right at home.

 


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