The closest your 6 year old will get to ever dropping acid, wait, is that a good thing?
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“The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water” brings everyone’s favorite squishy square character from the animated TV show to the big screen in an adventure to save the beloved Krabby Patty recipe from falling into the wrong hands. The film attempts to take the simple tone and humor of the original and expand it to bigger worlds and bring fans a full 90 minutes of the SpongeBob goodness they know and love. And as for that, I think the movie succeeds just fine.
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Of course the key word in all that is “fans”, cause this movie seems geared right to them, which I guess makes sense. Not that a non-fan couldn’t find some stuff here to enjoy. For one Antonio Banderas as the pirate in this movie is perfect casting. I always find him a bit too animated and over the top in his other roles, so to throw him into the world of Bikini Bottom is a perfect choice that well befits the randomness and craziness of this show and adds to the solid sense of humor here. I mean the SpongeBob universe is a surreal and strange place, but there really is a well crafted abstractist humor going on here, and I think it really works. The puns and personality of these characters are hard not to at least be a little amused by. So that even as you are cocking your head wondering exactly what kind of medicinal influence these writers were under, you still can’t help but have a smile on your face. I mean don’t expect a lick of this to really make sense, but if you can let go an enjoy the ride you might find yourself having a good time while at the same time shaking your head and questioning your own sanity.
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Now don’t get me wrong, there’s not a great movie here, the story is basically a rickety framework for jokes, and the message of teamwork feels as tagged on as it is underdeveloped. Plus, maybe it’s just me, but I thought the musical parts of this movie were just abysmal, and not in some sort of clever commentary way, but more of a please make it stop and so we can go back to the jokes about flatulence kind of way. Speaking of which, the infantile humor quotient is through the roof on this one, so much so I wondered if maybe they should just consider changing the name of the show to FartBob Poopypants, you know, just cut out the middleman. Anyhow, if that kind of stuff bothers you, you may just want to swim on by this one and avoid the bubbles.
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Overall, The SpongeBob movie Sponge out of Water, is an immature absurdist cartoon that has been craftily formed into an immature absurdist movie. If you love the guy that lives in the pineapple under the sea, I’m guessing you’ll love this movie too. For the rest of us it’s kinda like a eating a krabby patty, if you can get past that there is zero nutritional value, there’s still might be enough fun to be had here to come to the shore with a B-