'The Mitchells vs the Machines' Makes The Apocalypse Seem Amusing
Starring Abbi Jacobson, Danny McBride, Maya Rudolph, Michael Rianda, Eric André, Olivia Colman, Fred Armisen, Beck Bennett, Chrissy Teigen, John Legend, Charlyne Yi, Blake Griffin, Conan O’Brien and Doug the Pug
Rated PG
Animated, Adventure, Comedy
Run time: 1 hr, 53 min
Directed and written by Michael Rianda
On Netflix April 30, 2021
Before I go into my actual thoughts about the movie, I have to insist you scroll back up and read the cast of this animated film again. Done? Great. It’s as good as you’d expect with that many heavy hitters. And with that being said, this is not your average, everyday cartoon. There’s a unique style to the animation, a fun twist on an overdone plot and that legitimately stellar cast. I remember seeing previews for this in the Before Times and distinctly seeing that ridiculous looking pug that somehow manages to embody the entirety of that breed’s personality in a ridiculous, short clip. The good news is that little guy isn’t overused, and that is actually a great pattern throughout the entire movie.
The Mitchells vs the Machines is a story about the end of times via robots that turn bad. With that sentence on its own, it sounds far from impressive. However, it’s a story about the end times that occurs while a family cross-country road-trips to take the daughter (Katie, voiced by Abbi Jacobson) to college in order to get in some last minute bonding. Meanwhile, a tech conference - led by someone who totally at all isn’t a play on Steve Jobs (Eric André) - gets thrown into chaos as some robots he created take over and go full evil as his old AI assistant (Olivia Colman) feels betrayed and rejected by his upgrade. Suddenly, the Mitchells are the only humans free and available to save the world. See? Not your standard robot uprising kind of film.
This film is incredibly cute. It sounds like a veiled insult, but it’s true. It’s adorable. There are heartwarming moments, laugh out loud moments and some moments where I was fully invested in the animation of the whole thing. With the story centering around Katie, the daughter who is going to art school in order to pursue her dreams of filmmaking, they incorporate her own style into the movie. At various moments, there are illustrative aspects that are akin to what she designed and drew in her own productions. Occasionally, it is a distracting, but I think it really helps center the story around the character they’re really tying to highlight. Because while it is an apocalypse tale, it’s also a coming-of-age narrative.
I think the reason I can’t rate this movie much higher is that I didn’t feel super invested. This movie is a bit ridiculous, which should have been obvious from my summary above, but it’s supposed to be. However, that does make it a little hard to be as emotionally invested as the writers want us to be. Some of the more poignant conversations seem a bit forced or “a special episode of” style, but I don’t think my expectations were much higher than that. And if you ask me, whenever a non-Disney/Pixar animated film sticks to landing, that’s something to be enjoyed and watched by a lot more people than maybe it normally would.