Imaginum (2005)

Wonderful character development!

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Typical Mexican movie for children! Tons of slapstick violence which causes laughter without being violence-free, and despite the annoyance of the voices which sound awfully affected, as in anything dubbed into Spanish. Children throughout Mexico are starting to use, in their everyday speech, the fake-sounding syntax and unauthentic phraseology they hear in dubbed animations, their own linguistic identities being threatened.It gets worse: The story is OK but teaches children the "values" of racism, for not a single person of color is found throughout the film, which takes place in Mexico. Ironically, this is typical of Mexican mainstream TV and film. All the characters are fair-skinned and many are blue-eyed and have blond, brown, or even orange hair. As in any soap opera by Televisa or TV Azteca, the Mexican wealthy minority seems to be the target audience.Children ride vehicles without wearing seat belts or helmets; they drive ultrafast wit no regard for the elderly or other pedestrians, this being portrayed as funny but clearly not the best values to teach children in a country where traffic etiquette has a long way to go. There is even a scene in which the Beatles are crossing Abbey road and have to run for their lives as the child's vehicle passes through. I don't find this funny, considering the number of deaths by impact we have in my "peaceful" Mérida.I'm ashamed that Mexico still produces racist films and that movie makers aren't even close to understanding that this is wrong. Due to Mexico's poor educational system, both public and private —which teaches students to comply to, not to question, status quo as they learn the "how-to-do" of things—, most Mexican children and parents would not get my point even if I spelled it in Spanish. Yet, once you watch this film, you might agree in that I am merely stating the obvious.

Animation in Mexico is exploring a new field, and even more in the cinematographic part. A Mexican company named Anima Estudios supported by the FIDECINE (government support for Mexican productions) finally achieved a result and got to produce a second Mexican animated movie of this new animation era we are living in the country and with very good results.Imaginum is a good try, with very funny jokes and Mexican references which had never really happened in a long animated movie. Besides, these same jokes were thought for kids and adults which is well received. Continue making animated movies won't be an easy task, but Imaginum shows that it can be possible to do something and do it right. The movie is fun, has an interesting story, the voice acting is very well done, leading by Eugenio Derbez as Yxxxxx. Of course don't expect a Disney/Pixar/Dreamworks quality, but this is a great step to reach that kind of levels.

There have been just a few animated movies in Mexico, after 20 years or so without developing one, Anima Estudios dared to give one step in the animation field in our country, "Magos y Gigantes" was a first step, and now with "Imaginum" they show that with creativity and dedication this is becoming a growing industry in the country, the characters are well developed and attractive for kids and it doesn't focus in something "just for Mexicans" but enjoyable for children all around the world, a very good 2nd step for Anima Estudios, we can already see the seed they planted is giving the opportunity to more animation companies to born and start developing movies, each one making a stronger movie industry out of the Japanese and American ones.

Watching this movie makes you sad about the state of the film industry in Mexico.The movie barely makes sense, uses the most formulaic story conventions, talks down to kids, uses the most generic character design, the dialog is awful. Again, it just makes you sad, this was a movie made with no vision, except the one to sucker a few parents into bringing their kids to this... "thing". One of the most disparaging aspects was that government money intended for support to Mexican cinema was used to fund this movie.The only good thing about Imaginum would be that some good directors' kids got their brakes. Now that they failed, one hopes they will creep back into the creative void they came from.