Bookshelf Battle

Hey parents!  Remember all those video games you loved as a kid?

Well, they’re so old that they’ve become quaint!

Bookshelf Q. Battler here with a review of Adam Sandler’s action movie for kids, Pixels.

Even Pac-Man couldn’t gobble up the oncoming SPOILERS fast enough.

Movie Trailer – Pixels – Sony

Sometimes it’s hard to be Adam Sandler.

He wowed people in the 90’s with hits like Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison.  Those are two films that are still quotable today.

(You’ve never told someone something they just said made no sense and everyone is now dumber for having heard it?)

But then he made a slew of lesser films that fell flat and now he’s the point where everyone expects his movies will suck.

To his credit, this one didn’t.

If you’re looking for highbrow entertainment, then you’ll probably think it does.

If you’re a parent looking for a movie to bring your kids to that won’t bore you to tears, then you’ll enjoy it.

As kids, Sandler (Brenner), Kevin James (Cooper), Josh Gad (Ludlow), and Peter Dinklage (Eddie) once competed in a 1980’s video game tournament.

Back in those days, the lads thought the world would one day be their oyster.  Alas, they find life pretty disappointing as adults.

Brenner, who once dreamed of becoming a tech genius works at a Best Buy-esque home TV installation company.  Ludlow has become a wacky conspiracy theorist who still lives with his grandma and Eddie?  I won’t spoil it for you.

The only one who had life go his way was Cooper, but I won’t spoil that for you either.

Needless to say, the buddies who once believed their video game skills were useless in the real world become the world’s only hope when aliens attack using video game warfare.

Turns out, aliens aren’t that bright.  (Don’t tell Alien Jones).

Footage of the video game tournament was sent to outer space as an example of Earth culture in the hopes that friendly aliens would discover it.  Alas, the aliens take it as a challenge and develop real life versions of 1980’s video games to attack Earth.

Completely silly I know, but you’ll enjoy the special effects as Brenner and friends take on Centipede, Pac-Man, Donkey Kong and so on.

There’s plenty of celebrity appearances.  Brian Cox plays a cranky American general and Sean Bean plays his British counterpart.  Michelle Monaghan plays Brenner’s love interest/Army inventor of anti-alien video game technology.

Josh Gad steals the show with his antics until Dinklage steals it from him with his obnoxious, egotistical character.

Q-Bert becomes the Jar Jar Binks of the film but that’s besides the point.

Will you, as once said to Happy Madison, be dumber for watching this movie?  Maybe.  But if you suspend disbelief and silence your inner critic, you’ll be entertained.

But if you can remember a time when arcades were fun and popular, then you might want to skip it because you’ll be left feeling old…unless you’re feeling nostalgic.

STATUS:  Shelf-worthy.