Home


Director: Tim Johnson
Year: 2015

I came into the screening of Home cheering for this film to work. The trailers we saw back in the fall of 2014 had my two kids (a three and a five year old) howling. Steve Martin and Jim Parsons were involved, which had my wife and I howling. During the first 15 minutes, however, I felt myself slowly sinking from enthusiasm into a wave of criticism.

Establishing the rules of reality is key with any film and with a sci-fi element added in, Home had a lot to answer for. One of the biggest problems I had with the setup was the inability of the humans to mount any sort of response against the Boovs simple and incredibly effective relocation plan (putting all the humans on Australia…I think). So the Boovs are just that powerful, though they’ve been established as cowering bumblers led by a fool named Captain Smek (Martin). Conveniently (that word sums up much of my criticism of the film), Tip (Rihanna) is not sucked up and relocated because her cat was on her head so she wasn’t identified. If that’s all it takes to not get relocated there are going to be a lot of people who don’t get taken – not because there are that many cats on people’s heads but because this is an example of the Boovs inefficiency. Which leads me back to the humans, as a species, inefficiency in their ability to mount a defense. Home, at times, feels like a semi-typical Hollywood mess where there are too many disparate thoughts being thrown at the idea and it ends up being frayed all over.  
 
As the movie finally got going in its relationship between Tip and Oh (Parsons), I looked over at my kids. They were enthralled, laughing and delighting in the many sweet and funny moments. This helped reset my meter for the film and forgive its many flaws. Home works. It’s no animated thing of beauty like Finding Nemo, Toy Story or even Kung Fu Panda (there has to be at least one non-Pixar representative), but what it lacks in structure and story it more than makes up for in its heart during the last 45 minutes.

The familiar elements and themes of friendship, fish-out of water, longing for home, family and ultimate sacrifice are played strongly. That’s no criticism, as the familiarity of those elements is a good thing. Parson’s performance is funny, smart and very layered. The only problem there is Rihanna, at times, is left comparatively flat.  

The bottom line is if you see this film through children’s eyes, you’ll find the childlike, kind and entertaining universal themes Home dishes up in great supply.    

Resonance Rating: 2.5 out of 5

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