Igor

I’m a sucker for a cartoon, so I picked Igor next on the in-flight list. I’d heard a little about it and it seemed a nice premise. The voice cast has some superb actors listed including Steve Buscemi, Eddie Izzard and John Cleese (all too briefly).

Plot in a nutshell: in a mountainous country the king has saved the economy – destroyed by continuous storm clouds – by promoting evil geniuses. Their job is to built devilish world-ending devices. Each year, these devices compete and the winner’s is used to blackmail the rest of the planet for enough money to keep the country ticking over for another 12 months.

Every mad professor has an “Igor”. They’re all called Igor and they all look much the same – small and hunchbacked, speak with a list. Or film follows one Igor with ideas above his station. Of course, he has a couple of comic sidekicks (a brain in a bucket and a squirrel that can’t die, no matter how much he tries) and there’s a bed guy in the plot.

The story is a little predictable, but it is a kid’s film. The action sequences are amusing, the animation superb and – as is often the case – one of the sidekicks has all the best lines. Donkey’s dialogue always outdoes Shrek‘s, for instance.

There’s comedy, romance, action and big monsters. It’s also slightly gross, so it’s bound to appeal to the younger set. Not a classic, but a good way to tide the last 90 minutes or so between Heathrow and Abu Dhabi.