The Boss Baby (2017)

The Boss Baby (2017)

IMDB rating : 6.3/10 (as on 08.04.2017)

PG | 1h 37min | Animation, Comedy, Family

A suit-wearing briefcase-carrying baby pairs up with his seven-year old brother to stop the dastardly plot of the CEO of Puppy Co.

Director: Tom McGrath

Writers: Michael McCullers, Marla Frazee (based on the book by)

Stars: Alec Baldwin, Steve Buscemi, Jimmy Kimmel

IMDB link Here

‘The Boss Baby’ Puts Alec Baldwin in Diapers, Sort Of

The animated feature “The Boss Baby” has some hilarious moments. If, that is, you’re a grown-up.

It’s a movie whose story is aimed at the siblings of newborns — the 8-and-under crowd, more or less. They’ll follow the plot for most of the way; they just might be puzzled by their accompanying parent’s reactions. “What’s so funny, Dad?”

That’s because the title character is voiced by Alec Baldwin, and all of his various past personas, especially the one from “30 Rock,” somehow make hearing his distinctive voice coming from a cartoon infant all that much funnier.

The story, based on a picture book by Marla Frazee, is told from the viewpoint of Tim (Miles Bakshi or, when he’s in narrator mode, Tobey Maguire

The contrast between the helpless-infant stage of life and corporate-speak is funny but fairly high-concept for a kiddie movie, and the plot grows denser as it goes along and the baby and Tim reluctantly join forces to stop a conspiracy by which puppies would corner all the love in the world. The film, directed by Tom McGrath (“Megamind,” the “Madagascar” movies), is also full of homages and such that no young child is going to get. Psst: Hey grown-ups, no need to tell the kids that; just let them squirm while you enjoy the adult flourishes.

Read full review at New York times

Movie Rating ★★☆☆☆   

A one-joke, grubby-fingered grab for the heartstrings

 Faced with the choice between a stony female cyborg and a malevolent infant in a business suit, America threw its lot in with The Boss Baby. Of course I’m talking about the US box office last weekend, where the new film from DreamWorks Animation outgrossed the Scarlett Johansson science-fiction thriller Ghost in the Shell by $30 million – a figure buoyed up, wouldn’t you know, by unexpected audience support in the heartlands.

Under happier circumstances, you might make sport of the result. (Squint a little and there’s the vaguest of real-world parallels.) But when it comes to The Boss Baby, there’s precious little to laugh about.

Based on a 40-page children’s book about a taxing tot who treats his parents like zero-hour flunkeys, Tom McGrath’s film is charming for exactly as long as it can keep that premise spinning without embellishment, which is around 15 minutes.

Propelling us through this, at least in theory, is Baldwin’s boardroom ball-buster shtick, which owes far less to his Donald Trump impersonation than his furious sales whizz in Glengarry Glen Ross. (Cookies, rather than coffees, are for closers here.) But shtick is all there’s space for. Whether Boss Baby is riffing on corporate retreats or double espressos, the punchline – a baby in a suit is behaving like an adult – never changes.

There’s more to be said for – and by – the animation itself. The original book’s gently sketched visual style – the work of writer-illustrator Marla Frazee – has been switched out for an ebullient, retro-expressionist colour-whirl that’s hugely indebted to both the pioneering Disney artist Mary Blair and Bill Watterson’s Spaceman Spiff Calvin and Hobbes strips.

It’s a look that chimes with the film’s setting – a nonspecific olden-days American suburbia of transistor radios, train sets and meals in tinfoil trays. If only it carried over to the characters themselves, who are a fantastically uncharming bunch all sculpted from the now-usual textureless DreamWorks digi-flab.

By all means shrug and say well, it’s for kids, so the pre-owned jokes, threadbare subtext and convoluted plot make no odds. It’ll pass the time. Well, so will the autoplay function on YouTube.

From an oddly similar premise, sky-bound baby factory and all, last year’s Storks got madcap right, while pulling off an improbable third-act emotional pivot. By the time The Boss Baby makes its late-breaking, grubby-fingered grab for your heartstrings, you want to hand it back and reach for the wet wipes.

 Read full review at The Telegraph

Movie Rating ★★★☆☆ 

Alec Baldwin sweetens the deal in amusing animation  

Glengarry Glen Ross, 30 Rock, SNL’s President Trump … Alec Baldwin gives a quickfire recapitulation of those classic earlier turns in this amusing if convoluted animation, which, like the recent baby comedy Storks, ties itself in knots developing the initial premise. There’s some good-natured entertainment along the way, and Baldwin’s husky basso profundo is always enjoyable. He is the voice of Boss Baby, a suit-wearing, briefcase-carrying newborn who is resented by his seven-year-old brother Tim (voiced by Miles Christopher Bakshi) for tyrannically imposing his corporate-style rule on the household. The Trumpian tininess of his hands is periodically shown up when he attempts a handshake or a fistbump.

There is an elaborate backstory showing babies chugging along in a celestial prebirth production line, destined for “family” or “management” roles according to whether they are ticklish. It doesn’t exactly make sense: what do America’s families think of all these other thousands of management babies? Whatever, Boss Baby and Tim wind up making common cause against a sinister conspiracy to promote eternally young puppies over babies. It’s disposable fun.

 Read full review at The Guardian

Movie Rating ★★☆☆☆  

A good premise stretched to the breaking point  

The prospect of a sibling can shake any child’s world. So, idea, or even name, wise, The Boss Baby seems completely appropriate. However, this DreamWorks animation isn’t content to leave it at that, stretching and stretching till a good enough premise is spread so thin that the stitches begin to show.

Alec Baldwin, the stand-up of the moment, is the Boss Baby, throwing around lines like fired, hired, promoted, and upper-rung and middle-rung management. He is one of the employees of Baby Corp, whose goal is to ensure that babies remain central to the universe. Employees such as him are fed on a formula that forever keeps them a baby, and all they aspire for is a corner office and private parties. He is brought home by the unsuspecting parents of Tim (voiced by Miles Bakshi) who, like parents of all newborn, put up with all he does, including wearing a suit and tie and carrying around a briefcase.

Tim is suspicious, but his doubts are brushed away as sibling rivalry.

McGrath swings between trying to keep the humour very, very basic — including bare butts and baby farts — and trying to elevate it to something more. He gets a few laughs here and there, particularly when Tim and the Boss Baby are left to themselves, but towards the middle, there are just two many things being juggled around. That includes the hunt for a mysterious new puppy, since Baby Corp feels threatened that humans are replacing their love for babies with that for the four-legged creatures.

There is another idea aired for a long time here — “whether there is enough love around for everyone”. There is plenty of cause for doubt, but in a world as boisterous, lustrous and colourful as this, there can be only one answer to that.

Read full review at Indian express

The Boss Baby Missed the Memo

In his 1927 book Understanding Human Nature, the psychotherapist Alfred Adler argued that children’s birth order—their status in their families as a first child, or middle, or youngest—influences, in ways both varied and predictable, the personalities they go on to develop later in life. It’s a notion that, today, is controversial. The controversy has done very little, however, to prevent birth-order theory’s endurance as a mainstay of pop psychology and pop culture. As Parents.com recently put it, “Birth order plays a role in how we do things, which career we choose, and how our relationships play out.”

Did the world need an animated feature film dedicated to the psychological effects of an idea that is nearly a century old? No, very probably it did not. But here, nonetheless, is DreamWorks’ The Boss Baby, which is dedicated both to the existential challenges that confront an older sibling when a new one comes along, and also to the many delights that come from spending time in the company of a suit-wearing, corporate-speaking infant. (Both. Really.)

The Boss Baby, whose voice Baldwin imbues with a delightfully Donaghyan air of six-sigma swagger, takes the compromises of new parenthood to their delightfully logical conclusion: The Templetons’ new infant wears a slick black suit that features ample room, in its otherwise slim cut, for a diaper. He wears a fancy watch. And sock garters. He carries a briefcase. And he is above all extremely aware of being the Boss. We know this because when Tim asks him, “Who are you?,” the Boss Baby replies, “Let’s just say I’m the boss.” And also because, later on in the film, the Boss Baby declares, “Tim, I may look like a baby, but trust me, I’m all grown up.” And because, later, the Boss Baby further clarifies, “The truth is, I’m no ordinary baby.”

The Boss Baby is based on the illustrated board book from Marla Frazee (a work that, Kirkus wrote, “will appeal to parents, of course, but also to siblings who see a new baby demand so much of mom and dad’s time and energy”). It’s a rich premise, offering a similar kid-movie balance: There’s a little here for the kiddos, definitely, and a little, as well, for the adults.

The problem is that the movie isn’t content with that one malleable notion of siblinghood and its discontents. Instead The Boss Baby layers on the jokes, and the ideas, and the feels. It indulges in chaos. Baldwin’s “no ordinary baby” is desperate to prevent the Forever Puppy from being put on the market, because that’s the only way for him to get promoted to the highest echelons of Baby Corp. This leads a Puppy Co. henchman to chase the Boss Baby and his brother around to try to prevent them from reaching the puppies, which in turn leads the Boss Baby and his brother to Las Vegas (cue the jokes about the unaffordability of flying First Class, and also the jokes about Elvis), where Puppy Co. is announcing the development of the Forever Puppy at a corporate convention. This in turn leads the duo—zig!—to find their parents in Vegas, and in turn infuriates the head of Puppy Co., who turns out to have an unforeseen connection to Baby Corp., and things culminate in everyone doing battle over ... a rocket ship loaded full of puppies. Zag?

Read full review at The Atlantic

Movie Rating ★★★☆  

In 'The Boss Baby,' it's clear who wears the diapers

Some of the best animated films have been inspired by fairy tales, ancient Greek fables or mythology. Now comes one clearly inspired by, of all people, David Mamet.

The creators of "The Boss Baby " have obviously been mining the playwright's gritty, foul-mouthed "Glengarry Glen Ross" to build the title character, a ruthless, capitalist-minded newborn with pupils the size of saucers who insists that "Cookies are for closers."

To make the connection even firmer, they've hired Alec Baldwin to voice the baby, reprising in cartoon version his motivational speaker from hell from the 1992 film version of "Glengarry Glen Ross." The baby is also drawn in Baldwin's black suit and tie with a gold watch and slicked-back hair.

The casting and homage to Mamet's snarling, soulless character is funny indeed but seems somewhat outsized in this sweet film, overpowering its understated humor and terrific animation. Altogether, it sometimes seems like "The Boss Baby" was a really good 20-minute short film that became stretched out like a piece of gum until the taste grew stale.

An army of animators - no, really, the endless end credits are staggering to sit through - have been employed to make a 12-course banquet out of a whimsical board book by Marla Frazee, which introduced the suit-wearing toddler. Onscreen, alternate realities mix with several exciting chase sequences, Elvis impersonators, montages and moments of tenderness.

Screenwriter Michael McCullers, an alumnus of "Saturday Night Live" who went on to write some of the "Austin Powers" movies, has built an insane plot to accommodate Frazee's briefcase-wielding, spicy tuna roll-loving parody of 1980s avarice.

Directed by Tom McGrath, the director of the "Madagascar" franchise, "The Boss Baby" is best when it riffs off other action films, such as "The Matrix," ''Mary Poppins," ''Honeymoon in Vegas" and "Raiders Of The Lost Ark," to name a few. The animation and sound effects are so superbly rendered - the fantasy sequences have an entirely different and nifty flavor - that a drop of drool or a puff of baby powder seems to have real texture and feeling.

The laughs aren't machine-gun fast; they're rather gentle, surprisingly not completely scatological, and only a few are meant for adults only. (One takes place on a plane, in which the pilot welcomes customers with the line: "Ladies and gentlemen - and those in coach.")

But make no mistake: A lot of money has gone into this story about the joy of brotherhood. The soundtrack includes tunes by Paul McCartney, Irving Berlin, Elvis, Carole King and Burt Bacharach. The voice cast also includes Steve Buscemi, Jimmy Kimmel and Lisa Kudrow.

Baldwin - no surprise - turns out to be simply great at playing a big, scary baby. His unmistakable presence here also adds a strange twist to a movie that its creators couldn't have anticipated. Baldwin, after all, has become notorious on "Saturday Night Live" for playing another suit-wearing character who's also egomaniacal, compassionless and a self-described business genius. This spring, Baldwin plays them both.

Read full review at Daily mail

Movie Rating ★★☆☆☆   

Alec Baldwin starring as a grown-up baby is weird, and confusing   

Jake Wilson

It is hard to say which is the weirdest thing about The Boss Baby. Is it that Alec Baldwin was cast in the title role long before he rose to a new level of fame by playing Saturday Night Live's edition of Donald Trump?

Or is it that following Nicholas Stoller's Storks, this is the second animated children's film of the past year that whimsically poses the question "where do babies come from?"

The answer in this instance is they come from BabyCorp, a mystical conglomerate staffed by thousands of talking infants in business suits (there's a touch of authentic surrealism to this image – picture a live-action version and you have a scene straight from a wacky art movie such as Leos Carax's Holy Motors).

These babies subsist on a special brand of formula that stops them ageing, and don't deign to mix with adults. An exception is the Boss Baby himself, who allows himself to be born into an ordinary suburban family – one throwaway joke associates him with Jesus – as part of a spy mission against a dastardly plan to have puppies take over from babies as primary recipients of human love.

None of this makes a lick of sense – a fact that director Tom McGrath and writer Michael McCullers seem almost apologetic about, hinting that the story is unfolding in the mind of seven-year-old hero Tim, who resents the way his baby brother has turned their parents (Jimmy Kimmel and Lisa Kudrow) into his slaves.

But it's never entirely clear where reality begins and fantasy leaves off, and the confusion is only compounded by the voice-over narration from the adult Tim (Tobey Maguire) looking back on his 1970s childhood in the manner of The Wonder Years.

What is clear is that The Boss Baby is a concept that doesn't work, whether it's taken to be aimed at actual children or at the subgroup of adults who might get fleeting amusement from an allusion to Baldwin's role in Glengarry Glen Ross.

Perhaps the problem is precisely the strain of trying to appeal to both audiences, which is more apparent than in most animated comedies of this ilk.

Read full review at Sydney morning Herald

Movie Rating ★★★☆☆   

Kate Muir

Boss Baby is a petulant, selfish, demanding, short-fingered vulgarian in a dark suit, carrying a briefcase. We must assume that this children’s animation was made before President Trump rose to power, but the blond swept-over hair on this chubby toddler just adds to parental unease — and entertainment.

For the children, this is that eternal story of an older sibling displaced by a demanding new arrival, but the “baby factory” has sent a tiny executive who secretly can talk (he’s voiced by Alec Baldwin) and is spying on the parents, who are in the puppy business.

Understandably, people increasingly prefer cute dogs to babies, and it’s corporate war — conducted on chiming Fisher-Price wheelie phones. The joke starts well, but the formula gets repetitive.

Read full review at The Times

Movie Rating ★★✬☆☆   

Fun for parents, maybe not so much for kids

The Boss Baby" derives its premise from the notion that when new babies show up in the household, they render parents into slavishly devoted employees with their demands and fits. Babies are like bosses, but more satirically, bosses are like babies, right?

That metaphor is explored in Marla Frazee's children's book, with a boss baby outfitted in a suit, complete with buttoned bottom flap, and now that's been transported to the screen with Alec Baldwin voicing the titular boss.

In theory, the idea seems about as interesting as "Baby Geniuses," but in execution, the film is surprisingly fun and clever. Written by Michael McCullers, it's almost too clever for its own good — only adults are going to the appreciate nuances of the jokes and wordplay about corporate middle-management culture, with all of its memos and water coolers.

That content is offset with a wild and creative visual design. The film is directed by Tom McGrath, who directed the "Madagascar" and "Megamind" films, and got his start in animation on "The Ren & Stimpy Show." There's a fluidness to the action sequences, especially the imaginative fantasy sequences of young Tim Templeton (Miles Bakshi), the boy whose home the Boss Baby invades. It's a visual treat from start to finish, expansive in scope and multitudinous in its design influences.

Most of the movie's laughs are from the cognitive dissonance of Baldwin's voice coming from a large-eyed, adorable blonde baby, and there are some great visual gags — his mouth twists into a pout that is veritably Trumpian — and references that the film incorporates. "Cookies are for closers!" he barks, harkening to Baldwin's memorable speech from "Glengarry Glen Ross." "The Boss Baby" is great fun for parents, but it remains to be seen if kids will get it at all.

  Read full review at Chicago Tribune