南極にある皇帝ペンギンの国“エンペラー帝国”。彼らにとって何より大事なことは、自分だけの“心の歌”を見つけること。ところがマンブルは筋金入りの音痴で、小学校では幼なじみのグローリアが美声を披露するのとは対照的に調子外れな音程で大非難を浴びる始末。その代わり生まれつきタップダンスが得意なマンブルは、アデリー・ペンギンの５人組“アミーゴス”に踊りを絶賛され意気投合。しかし、そのダンスが帝国に災いをもたらすと判断した長老の命令でマンブルは追放の身に。さらに、ペンギンの食糧となる魚を乱獲する人間たちを説得しに向かった彼は、挙句に捕らえられてしまう。
製作費: $100,000,000 (150億円)
興行収入: $384,335,608 (577億円)
推定収支: $284,335,608 (427億円)
※製作費・興行収入はTMDBのデータを参照しています。収支は(興行収入 - 製作費)で算出したFindKey独自の推定値であり、広告宣伝費や諸経費は含まれません (1ドル=150円換算)。
監督: ジョージ・ミラー
脚本: John Collee / Judy Morris / Warren Coleman
音楽: John Powell
制作: ダグ・ミッチェル / Graham Burke / デイナ・ゴールドバーグ
撮影監督: David Peers / Steve Newman
制作会社: Kennedy Miller Productions / Animal Logic / Village Roadshow Pictures / Warner Bros. Pictures
It was at least a different kind of a movie. They do look cute. They looked pretty funny dancing.
When a young penguin is born to a colony that communicates largely via song, I felt it’s pain. Not only because of the endless set piece numbers “Mumble” has to endure, but because he’s completely tone deaf. Indeed, as Cynthia Erivo might have said, “…he couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket”. He can, however, dance. Boy can he dance. That’s no use though as his love interest “Gloria” has the voice of an angel and the curmudgeonly (and Scottish) elder “Noah” blames their sudden paucity of fish on this youngster’s inability to croon. Now shunned by his own tribe, and thanks to an encounter with a lithe and fearsome leopard seal, he is befriended by some more Hispanic guins and off they set to seek the sagely advice of “Lovelace”. He claims that he was the victim of an alien abduction and that they gave him a very special necklace made of plastic. "Mumble" reckons the aliens might be the source of the food problem, so they travel the breadth of the snowy continent, facing peckish orca and huge great elephant seals as they go, before discovering just who these extra-terrestrials actually are. It’s at this point that the environmental message of the film kicks in, and though that’s all perfectly laudable and clear, the plot loses it’s way and becomes something of a mess. Sure, it’s encouraging us not to be judgmental of those different to ourselves, or the masses; and it’s also showcasing the enormous damage caused to the seas and oceans by trawling and litter contamination, but the story doesn’t really emphasise any of these connections using “Mumble”, especially at a conclusion which is really quite rushed. At times this is quite a lively affair, but the threads are too bare and the characterisations too lacklustre to sustain this as a feature length animation. Condensing it into half an hour with a couple of catchy tunes might have done better; focused more on it’s messages, and allowed for his Fred Astaire impersonations to have more impact. It’s original and fine, but sadly forgettable.
