Animated movies fly into the cinemas at a much faster rate these days compared to the previous build-up to big Disney releases of years gone by, but they don’t seem to be getting any less entertaining, as is the case with Wreck It Ralph. Disney’s computer games based adventure was a hit on the big screen and the DVD release packs a lot of heart warming punch too, as well as a little spinning piledriver action thrown in for good measure.
The film is set in the digital world of a computer games arcade, where all of the machines are connected, seeing the characters playing out their parts in their game during the day, but getting up to all sorts of mentalness when the lights are turned off in the arcade. The main character is a big building crushing guy called Wreck It Ralph who spends his game playing time trying to destroy an apartment block in the game.
Suffering from mild depression at his lot in life and jealous of the praise and adoration Fix It Felix, Jr., his good-guy gaming nemesis, gets he sets off to prove that he can be a hero too. However, it doesn’t all go to plan as he manages to bring a dangerous sprite from the brutal alien shoot ’em up, Hero’s Duty, to the candy coated world of Suger Rush racing and has to help the glitchy Vanellope von Schweetz get into racing and save the whole arcade.
One of the funniest elements of the film is the addition of popular computer games characters to the backdrop of the film, including the giant Russian wrestler, Zangief, from the Street Fighter series in a Bad Guys Anonomous support session with Ralph. There are plenty to look out for including Pac-Man and his ghostly pack, Bowser, Sonic and Doctor Eggman, Ryu in Tapper’s bar and Q*bert gameless and destitute.
The title character is played to perfection by John C. Reilly who pulls off the big, destructive single mindedness of the character in his quest, but also the softer side of him as he becomes much more selfless as the film develops. He’s got some great support in comedian Sarah Silverman as the wilful and super-cute Vanellope. She makes the character annoyingly fun, cute and infectious, while pulling off the perfection of imperfection concept that sits behind her really well.
Wreck It Ralph hit the cinema on the 2nd November 2012 before being released on DVD and Blu-ray on the 3rd June 2013. Extras include a making of feature, the Oscar-winning short film Paperman, a deleted and alternative scenes feature and a series of computer games ads from the film including a Fix It Felix, Jr. 8-bit showcase. There’s also a feature that you can turn on to allow comedian Chris Hardwick to chat through some of the computer games references in the film whenever you pause the movie.
Wreck It Ralph is a great story with some very cool gaming cameos and loveable characters. If you’re a kid, you’ve got kids, you like animated movies or you’re a computer games fan then this is a must see DVD. It’s also the kind of film you might be inclined to watch a few times, so it gets our shout for collection addition as well as rental.
Wreck It Ralph DVD review: 4.5/5
