G-Force is certainly a strange film, but it is oddly entertaining family entertainment. Zach Galifianakis stars as Ben, who’s dedicated his life to teaching Guinea Pigs to become secret agents and sneak into places where human can’t go in order to engage in espionage (don’t ask me why, he just has, okay). However, the FBI, in the form of Will Arnett, aren’t that impressed with his talking rodents and want to shut Ben’s operation down.
As a result, the rodents go on the run rather than becoming lab animals, initially ending up in a pet shop, where they meet the laid-back guinea pig Hurley, who’s about as far from being a secret agent as you can imagine. Soon the animals are on the run again and on the trail of industrialist Leonard Saber (Bill Nighy), who they believe has some sort of weird world domination plan – and it’s only the guinea pigs who can stop him.
G-Force is essentially an 88-minute chase scene that occasionally pauses to pretend to do a character arc (something about that age-old universal theme of realising that it doesn’t really matter if you’re a genetically modified super-guinea pig or not, as long as you’re true to yourself). However despite the films flaws and sillines, it doesn’t really matter too much because the guinea pigs are cute, the special effects are good (and pretty much non-stop), and the frantic pace mean it never lulls. Kids should certainly enjoy it.
You just look at the rather daft looking animals, which guinea pigs most certainly are, and it makes a dumb family-action farce much easier to swallow, especially when they have the voices of Steve Buscemi, Sam Rockwell, Jon Favreau and Penelope Cruz.
While in the cinemas the big selling point was that the film was in 3D, or course you’d don’t get that on the Blu-ray. To be honest, initially I thought this was going to be a major down point, because half the fun on the big screen was the cleverly done 3D effects, which seemed to cover up the fact that it was pretty much just a 90 minute chase scene, but actually the film is just as fun without having to put special glasses on. This is especially true in HD, as while 3D tends to make films a little fuzzy, Blu-ray of course does the opposite and brings everything into super-sharp focus. It ensures that even sure that look like they only exist to show off the 3D technology, actually give a great sense of space in hi-def.
It’s a very good showcase for the extensive and very well executed, slightly cartoony CG effects, which look excellent in HD. The detail on the computer-generated guinea pigs looks wonderful, while the live action portions are sharp, grain free and very colourful. As quite a lot of the film involves the rodents sneaking around at night doing their special agent work, the disc thankfully features richly detailed blacks, to the point where dark scenes actually look more impressive than their daylight counterparts.
Likewise the audio is sharp and gives your speakers a pretty good workout, with lots of detail and some nifty surround effects.
On the features front, there are a few featurettes, most of which seem to be about how great producer Jerry Bruckheimer is, and which provide some fairly interesting behind-the-scenes info, even if they’re fairly short. There’s also some deleted scenes and bloopers, as well as three music videos and a digital copy of the film. To be honest while it’s not the most amazing selection, this little lot alone wouldn’t make for a bad disc (and certainly better than a lot of family films), but the Blu-ray then really outdoes itself with the Cine-Explore feature.
Using the full extent of Blu-ray technology, Cine-Explore is an extremely well put together mix of audio commentary, video files, pictures, storyboards and animatics, which play alongside the film to illustrate what director Hoyt Yeatman is talking about. You can also choose whether to include relevant behind-the-scenes featurettes that pop up every now and then and take you deep into the making of the movie. Finally, to make it more interesting for kids, guinea pigs Darwin and Blaster also makes an appearance. It’s a truly excellent feature and goes surprisingly deep into how you make one of these live action/CG films (I particularly love the reference footage they took using tatty looking soft toys). In fact, if I’m being honest, I enjoyed the cine-explore feature more than the movie – it’s that good.
Overall Verdict: G-Force may not be a movie masterpiece, but it’s a cute family action flick that should more than satisfy the kids. The film looks great in HD and the features are excellent, particularly the Cine-Explore mode.
Special Features:
Cine-Explore With Darwin, Blaster & Their Creator
‘Blaster’s Boot Camp’ Featurette
‘G-Force Mastermind’ Featurette
‘Bruckheimer Animated’ Featurette
‘Access Granted Inside The Animation Lab’ Featurette
G-Farce Bloopers
Deleted Scenes
Music Videos
Digital Copy Of Film
Reviewer: Tim Isaac
