Not since The Magic Roundabout has an animation had me so urgently wondering: “What exactly are these people on?” A shameless merchandising and franchising opportunity, DreamWorks’ neo-psychedelic Trolls is based on the once ubiquitous range of repellently cute homunculi with rubbery faces and gravity-defying DayGlo coiffures. But, co-directed by Shrek and SpongeBob franchise hand Mike Mitchell and written by the Kung Fu Panda team of Jonathan Aibel and Glenn Berger, Trolls proves an immensely entertaining, highly savvy piece that always has a sardonic wink to remind us that we’re not in Smurfland any more.
Mocking its own glittery cheer something rotten, Trolls pits the pathologically happy, rainbow-coloured imps against a tribe of hideous ogre malcontents, the Bergens, who seem to owe some of their CGI DNA to Fungus the Bogeyman. Justin Timberlake – who’s also executive music producer on a very retro, disco-fied production – amusingly voices the one troll who’s not only miserable but won’t sing. The visual invention is delirious, the colours lysergically eye-popping. If you like kids’ movies served with a side of po-mo knowingness, as in The Lego Movie and the Jason Segel/Amy Adams Muppets film, you’ll have a great time. You’ll also suspect that your popcorn has been spiked with something a lot stronger than caramel.
