MARS NEEDS MOMS

LET THE KIDS CHOOSE

Review by: Yumi

Being the mother of two small children I see nearly every kids' movie, sometimes more than once.  My kids are easily pleased.  They like horrible crap.  They liked 'The Spy Next Door,' which was an embarrassing Jackie Chan thing about a single Mum moving into a house next to Jackie Chan, who's, like, a spy and stuff?  In the end the single Mom and Jackie Chan kind of hook up which is sick-making because Jackie Chan doesn't do his own stunts any more and in spite of his millions, can't afford decent hair dye.  

Although they could tell it irritated me, my daughters also quite enjoyed the heap of dogballs that was 'Gnomeo and Juliet'.  It used Shakespeare as a departure point to sail directly into the compost.

The other worst kids' movie of 2011 was 'Hop' (out, damn hop!) (which may be further evidence that Russell Brand's star is on the wane).  He voices a c***sucking little rabbit with a personality bypass who hopefully will get myxomatosis in the sequel.  F***er.  Why does he eventually have to face his responsibilties and/or take ownership of his lifelong dream to be a drummer?  F*** off!  If I was in my car and the 'Hop' rabbit was in the middle of the road, I would totally turn the wheel in the hope of flattening that little cute rabbit into road jerky.   The rabbit is a douchebag.  He can take those drumsticks and ram them up his little hairy f***hole.

We can talk about why those movies blow at length some other time but it can actually be quickly summed up with a Top 5.

Top 5 Reasons Why Kids' Movies That Blow, Blow.

1.  There's a female lead character who is a bit of a suck-up, no sense of humour and way too much hair

2.  Mike Myers is somehow involved

3.  No one dies and there are no zombies

4.  There's a male lead character who's essentially a bore, but also misunderstood by his peers, usually his dad, but he'll figure it all out after overcoming some entirely forseeable and avoidable obstacles that will involve some chasing and some poop gags

5.  The merchandising figurines were designed before the script was written

The shittest kids' movie of all time is 'Racing Stripes' which has a preposterous plot that actually makes me suicidal to think about, about - (prepare the noose) a zebra that thinks it is a horse.  'Racing Stripes' is the benchmark by which my daughters and I measure all other shit kid films.  Remember how Paris Hilton went around tracking down and destroying all DVD copies of her sextape 'One Night in Paris'?  Someone should do the same to 'Racing Stripes'.

Okay, so let's go to the film that I took my kids, Thing 1 and Thing 2, to the other day that I didn't hate.  In fact, I quite liked 'Mars Needs Moms', and at no point during the film did I start tweeting from boredom about pubic hair or etiquette in Japanese restaurants.  (Chopsticks are not pointers and 'seventies bush is back.)

In spite of its inauspicious title, it's good.  You can tell from the opening scenes when a lisping and familiar female voice lends itself to an exhausted and - oh my God - unsexy Mom.  The voice belongs to Joan Cusack who gives her role all the daggy-T-shirt softness and lack of grooming that real motherhood contains.  I don't mind if mothers are always shown as sexy, that's cool...just not very true to life.

Top 5 Smokin' Hot Moms in Kid Movies

1.  Renee Russo in Spy Kids.  Hello? WAY sexy!

2.  Mrs Incredible in The Incredibles.  She has J-Lo's ass and kicks some ass.

3.  Susan Sarandon as James Marsden's evil Mom in Enchanted.  She's hot, he's hot.  Pass me some marshmallows.

4.  Kathleen Turner in Serial Mom.  Okay so it's not a kid's movie but she's total sex in those white knickers in the courtroom scene and how awesome is it when she starts killing all those annoying people?

5.  Helena Bonham Carter as Mrs Bucket in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  Poverty wouldn't be so bad if you could snuggle her every night!

'Mars Needs Moms' is a film that really understands the unending sacrifice that most mothers go through; the stoicism of their love.  If you can stand producer Robert Zemeckis' (A Christmas Carol, 2009) grim and zany vision, and the perfect oddness (or the odd perfectness) of stunted actor Seth Green playing a small boy in a motion-captured performance, the pay-off is worth it.  I cried.  My kids loved it.  But they do love some stinky crap.

STARS: 3 stars

SUMMARY: Martians have evolved so far that they've lost touch with their natural maternal instincts, so they need to kidnap great Moms from Earth in order to clone their nurturing Mommy DNA!

WHO SHOULD SEE IT: Families and animation nerds