Back in 2006, Warner Bros. became part of the “penguin movie craze”, and won an Oscar for Best Animated Feature with “Happy Feet” (a decision by the Academy that still bothers me).
Four years later the studio may be trying to start an “owl movie craze” with “Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole”, but this movie has no chance of taking home any statues come awards season.
“Legend of the Guardians” is based on the popular book series, Guardians of Ga’Hoole. At the beginning of the film we meet Soren, a young owl who lives in a tree with his family. Soren has always dreamed of meeting and then becoming one of the famous Guardians of Ga’Hoole, a group of owls who protect the kingdom. Soren’s brother Kludd doesn’t believe in dreams, or the Guardians.
The two get captured by an evil group of owls who are stealing hundreds of young owls, and forming an army to defeat the Guardians so they can rule the land. Soren escapes and it’s up to him and a few new friends to try to be heroes.
As you can tell, the story is pretty basic, and that’s one of the main problems with “Legend of the Guardians”. Even though the animation is great and there are plenty of action scenes, overall the movie is pretty dull.
Director Zach Snyder made a name for himself with the films “300” and “Watchmen”. He was an interesting choice to do what I thought was supposed to be a children’s film. But as it turns out “Guardians” has to many serious themes and too much violence to really be considered a kids movie. This is a movie about kidnapping, torture, revenge, hatred, war. And even though they’re owls, it still doesn’t make for good family viewing.
And there are also some major holes in the plot, which is often a problem when several books (in this case the first three of the series) are squeezed into one, 90-minute movie.
“Legend of the Guardians” is rated PG, for the action-violence and scary scenes. But parents, you need to know that this is NOT a cute, kids movie about owls. It’s very dark, with very little humor or things that little ones will enjoy. And older kids will likely be bored much of the time, as I was.
On The Official Kid Critic Report Card, “Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole” gets a C. It’s beautiful to look at, the owls faces, including their animated mouths when talking, are amazing. But you won’t give a hoot about the story.