The Simpsons Movie Review

Last night I took the kids to see The Simpsons Movie at a large theater complex in Irvine. Whenever a hot new movie comes out this theater is usually packed with long lines for each showing. To my surprise, we arrived at 6:40 and bought tickets for the 7:30 show, and although there was a line designated for that show, there wasn't anybody in it. They still made us wait there, and when the theater toady came to get us there were only about 10 people in line.

We were in one of the largest theaters in the complex, and though people kept coming in until showtime, the room was probably only 60% full when the previews started. The boxoffice numbers have been pretty big, but they weren't busting down the doors in Irvine.

The movie started out very promising. The first 15 minutes or so were pretty funny - typical Simpsons stuff jabbing at everyone's sacred cows. However, after that it markedly slowed down and frankly by the end, was a little boring. The Simpsons as a concept works pretty well in a 22 minute TV show, but ran out of ideas in a 2 hour movie. The reviews have been remarkably high for this movie (as I pointed out here), but if I were to rate it on the same 100 point scale, I probably would have been down in the 60's somewhere.

It was okay - a pleasant diversion for awhile, but whereas I don't mind seeing episodes of TV version over and over again, I don't have any desire to see this movie again.