Wreck-it-Ralph - 8/10
The film introduces us to Ralph, the villain of the game Fix-it Felix, whose role is to smash up a building, which Felix then proceeds to repair. Ralph is very good at what he does, but he's tired of never being recognized for his work, of being subjected to racial profiling, of being ostracized by the good guys. In short, Ralph doesn't want to be a bad guy anymore.
It's this brilliant premise that had me looking forward to the film for several months, with the accompanying fear of disappointment. Fortunately, the film lives up to my expectations!
For me, Wreck it Ralph has succeeded in doing what Scott Pilgrim failed to do: finding the right balance between homage and references. Ralph's quest justifies all the cameos and winks. The visual effects that were annoying in Scott Pilgrim (the “ BANG ” and other life gauges in the air) are much more discreet and better integrated here.
Throughout the exhibition phase, we discover the world of the arcade, and especially the “ central station ”, the multi-socket on which the games are plugged in, and which allows the characters from all the arcade terminals to meet up. It's all well thought-out and coherent, and it's easy to imagine Bowser and Zangief going for a pint at Tapper's while Mario and Fix It Felix go for a run at Sugar Rush.
On this occasion, we meet cult characters such as Zangief, Qbert and Sonic's villain. Some will regret that they don't have a more prominent role in the film, but I thought the cameos were pretty well done. The famous “ Bad anon ” scene that everyone has seen over and over again in the trailer (which is a real shame, by the way :/) is excellent.
The first 20 minutes of the film are fabulous. Graphically, it's perfect. Representing a 2D video game (a la Donkey Kong) in a 3D film could have resulted in a flat (!) result, but here it's perfectly handled, and the shot where we switch from one view to another in the game Fix it Felix is magnificent. The characters are animated according to their 2D movements, and the transition from one world to another is superb (the Pacman passage). I was really blown away by the animation.
The Toy Story-style operation is well thought-out, and it's quite funny to see the characters hurrying around because there's a “coin alert”.
Ralph's character is endearing, lacking a little something to make him a mythical Disney character, but his duet with Vannelope works very well.
The story that unfolds is fairly simple, but it's effective, and I was surprised 2 or 3 times by the twists and turns. If I had to criticize the film, I'd have liked us to spend a little less time in the world of Sugar Rush, a little too dripping with sugar and colorful cuteness for my taste, but after a few long stretches, the finale makes up for it all, in a huge reference to “ internet culture ”, which you can see coming at 30m, but which is cleverly handled.
Unlike The 5 Legends, which I found a little too childish around the edges, Wreck-it Ralph is really designed to appeal to adults as well as children, and apart from an unfortunate session of fart gags (I promise you, it lasts 30 seconds), it's very funny.
You can tell it's a sincere tribute to video games, and you can feel the love for arcades and retro games (“ it means we're old but cool ”). In fact, I think there were some big Street Fighter fans on the team, given the ratio of references to this particular franchise.
