Migration (2023)

Score: 2 / 5

It has become popular to hate Disney movies -- we've discussed this ad nauseam -- but it's when movies like this pop up that I get back on my high horse to defend the studio's creative output. Migration is one of the only non-Disney animated films I've been eager to see in cinemas in years, and frankly it repelled me. Apart from its stellar voice cast, some pretty animation, and a delightful premise, the film fumbles itself until it founders in terms of plot, dialogue, and theming. If this is the asinine, low-brow kind of material we encourage our children to absorb, our future generations are doomed.

This comes from Illumination Studios, those who created Despicable Me and the prevailing ubiquity of "Minion" characters, which I've thankfully never seen. There is a "Minion" short that unfortunately opens for Migration, and it was a disgusting display of banality I'm ashamed to have witnessed. Hopefully the studio has other, better, material, but if that's its bread and butter, I'd rather starve. By the time this main feature began, I was eager for a palate cleanser. And the first several scenes of Migration were both delightful and charming.

The Mallards are a family of ducks residing in an insular, picturesque New England pond. Patriarch Mack (Kumail Nanjiani) is a nervous worrywart while mother Pam (Elizabeth Banks) has an itch for adventure and spontaneity; their kids Dax and Gwen are largely interchangeable, though the much younger Gwen has a bizarre pseudo-semi-British accent that feels less authentic and more like a shy kid's attempt at overcoming a speech impediment by mimicking cartoons like Peppa Pig. When another family of ducks rests briefly in their pond, Pam and the kids eagerly want to join them on their migration south for the winter. Mack's fears of the dangers in the wide world stop him from joining -- or is it his pride? -- until he is reminded of his inevitable fate by Uncle Dan (Danny DeVito) were he to stay stuck in one place forever. It's all heavy-handed and offers no real stakes, but whimsy is a valid basis for an adventure-comedy, so I was willing to roll with it.

And the plot begins promisingly. One of their first stops en route to Jamaica -- much like the Madagascar frenzy a decade ago, this film is annoyingly eager to capitalize on the iconography of an exotic, tropical island -- is a nearby swamp under the cloud of a dismal storm. There they meet Erin the heron (an endlessly hilarious Carol Kane), who steals the entire film. Erin is homicidal and crazed, much like a Gollum-type, who is always on the verge of eating the young ducklings. I won't spoil the sequence for you here, but it's a truly magnificent bit of swampland haunted house storytelling that I can hardly wait to watch again.

Too bad it's all couched in a movie that, shortly thereafter, reveals just how much hooey it is. The Mallards head the wrong way and end up lost in New York City. Running afoul (sorry, but I'm avoiding bird puns as the lowest of low-hanging fruit) of a flock of pigeons, they meet Chump (Awkwafina playing herself, as usual), a veritable gang leader who gets them connected with a captured parrot named Delroy (an obnoxious Keegan-Michael Key) who knows the way to Jamaica. A lengthy sequence sees the ducks going full Ratatouille in the kitchen of a villainous (and bizarrely animated) chef who keeps Delroy locked up to free the parrot. Things only get weirder from here, including the chef's apparent wealth in chartering a helicopter to hunt the ducks and parrot and being absent from his restaurant for an indeterminate amount of time. There's even a resort for ducks where the Mallards pause to recuperate that is revealed to be a fattening farm for ducks to be sold to this insane and bloodthirsty chef.

Devoid of interest for all but the youngest of children, Migration doesn't even manage to end with any reasonable morals, lessons, or revelations. Not that it should or has to do so, but it's also devoid of developing its own characters or ideas in any meaningful ways. Writer Mike White (of the brilliant The White Lotus, among other, lesser titles) clearly had some clever ideas going into this project, but what churned out could by no standard be described as intelligent or even intelligible. By the finale, I was so checked out of the whole thing I can't even remember how the film ends, apart from the family deciding to be nomads and continue adventuring elsewhere, which makes even the title of this film a point of contention. Sure, the relentless slapstick humor and bright colors will distract kids for its mercifully brief running time, but if I had kids I would not have this on for them, even in the background.