I adored this film. Katie Mitchell is due to leave the family home to join film school and find 'her people' and she can't wait. Things between her and father Rick have been tense so he decides to drive Katie to film school along with wife Linda and Katie's younger brother Aaron. During the road trip virtual assistant PAL turns rogue and uses robots to gather up humanity, planning to launch them into space.
I'm a sucker for an apocalypse movie anyway but I've rarely seen a family friendly one. This is literally a story about robots attempting to wipe out humanity yet they manage to do it without much violence. PAL is a play on the likes of Siri and Alexa (the PAL logo even has the Amazon-esque line under it) and one sequence set in a shopping mall plays with the idea of pointless items having internet connections too. There's a gentle satire on technology that runs throughout the film which never goes too deep.
The description I read of the film described the Mitchells as the world's weirdest family, a description I disagreed with. If anything the Mitchells are the world's most normal family, full of eccentricity and personality in a way movie families rarely are. It's brilliantly well-observed and makes these characters feel like they are based on reality to some degree.
The emotional stuff is fantastic here as the family become more connected thanks to the events of the film. I think many teenagers feel like Katie, not understood or even respected by their parents, when in reality the parent's are more similar to them than they realise and only want the best for them. It never felt especially shoved in your face either yet was still an integral part of the film.
The other highlight is the fact that the film is really funny. It's packed with joke after joke and the vast majority land. There's a brilliant comic double act who were hilarious every second they were on screen and many jokes at the expense of the families' dog Monchi. There's jokes on every level to from one the whole family can enjoy to more adult ones like references to Dawn of the Dead.
The animation style is great, using the style the studio created for Into the Spider-Verse but being able to play around with it more due to not aiming to look like a comic book. It often looks a bit like claymation, which I love, and they also add in lots of 2D animation over the top for titles and symbolic ideas which works really well.
All in all, this is just superb. It has a terrible title and the premise doesn't sound especially promising but this is the best new animation for some time. I hope Sony Pictures Animation can continue with the great run they seem to be having at the moment.
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