Flicks, Sarah Ward
Building a pile of multi-coloured CGI bricks into one of the great all-ages comedies of recent years, The Lego Movie was the toy-to-film adaptation that could. While other product-based premises floundered with offering anything more than an overblown advertisement (see the pre-Bumblebee Transformers franchise, for example), The Lego Movie could turn its plastic construction playthings into a charming feature with its own flavour. As mainstream animation began to suffer from stylistic homogeneity, it could stand out visually. Embracing the rectangular objects at its centre in more than just a superficial, merchandise-slinging way, it could also smartly and savvily engage with Lego’s very purpose. Indeed, where all of the above points are concerned, it could and it did.
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