Movies For Juniors – The Boss Baby
Cinema: The Boss Baby (2017)
7 year old Tim (Miles Bakshi) spends his days using his overactive imagination pretending to be an explorer, rocket ship pilot or whatever takes his fancy. His life is perfect as he shares adventures with his mom and dad (Lisa Kudrow & Jimmy Kimmel) who devote all their time to making his fantasies comes to life. One day they bring home a business suit wearing, briefcase carrying baby, who turns out to be his brother and who in turn, threatens to disturb his happy existence.
Not only does Tim find his world turned upside down with the introduction of his baby brother, he uncovers that The Boss Baby (Alec Baldwin) is on a secret mission to infiltrate Puppy Co. It turns out that the world is starting to find puppies more adorable than babies, so The Boss Baby has been sent by Baby Corp to prevent the unveiling of the worlds most adorable puppy.
Ok, the plot to The Boss Baby sounds incredibly stupid and convoluted, and it certainly isn’t going to feature in my favourite animated movies of all time but, I was entertained from start to finish. I laughed a number of times and was particularly impressed with the animation, which emphasised how Tim uses his imagination to view the world around him.
As you can imagine there were lots of references for the parents to spot including Raiders of the Lost Ark, Lord of the Rings and of course Glengarry Glen Ross. The makers of The Boss Baby would need to take a good long look at themselves if they didn’t include a joke about one of Alec Baldwins most well known performances.
I think the reason why I liked The Boss Baby so much is because it made me think of my own family. I don’t have any brothers or sisters, so I have never known what it is like to have all the focus and attention taken away from me and shared with anyone else. I now have two girls, a 5 year old and 9 month old (my own boss baby!), and can see how much it changed the dynamics of our household. The Boss Baby also made me think about how much children use their imagination and reminded me how imaginative I used to be when I was a kid.
It’s fair to say that The Boss Baby received a fairly good kicking from critics upon its release so my expectations weren’t particularly high for our latest family trip to the cinema. However, I’ve got to be honest and say that my daughter and I enjoyed ourselves, and I can imagine that we will watch The Boss Baby again in the comfort of our own home.
Laughs: 4/5
Peril: 1/5
Fidgets: 2/5
Overall: 4/5
Review by Chris (co-host of 60 Minutes With and The Same Coin).
