Rio

It's almost sad to be cavalier about computer-animated 3D comic movies such as Rio. It proves that a movie-goer can feel that he's had too much of a good thing. Blue Sky's production, from the director of two Ice Age adventures (Carlos Saldanha), is an accomplished U$$90 million investment with an instant global box-office gross of four times as much (and counting), and 20th Century Fox will be a happy distribution company.

Saldanha's "original" story featured a penguin but, that species of cartoon fun being over-exposed in the past decade, his comic hero became an endangered macaw, Blu (voiced in typical US cartoon character with bashful adolescent charm by Jesse Eisenberg). A fully domesticated pet/pal, he's in Minnesota, looked after with TLC for 15 years by eco-friendly Linda.

A Brazilian researcher requests the services of Blu, as the world's only known male Spix's macaw, in Rio to work with the world's only known female Spix's, Jewel (Anne Hathaway, also in stereotypical mode as a bold, bright and brassy US-style teenager). This narrative contrivance may explain why the whole movie was initially rated PG (parental guidance) and only given an unrestricted G (general) rating on appeal (only the third time such a bizarre MPAA situation arose, after the Babe sequel and an Air Bud movie, thus indicating that many of the US movie industry's censorship panels inhabit an unknown religious cloud-cuckoo-land).

By now, our audience/readership knows what will appear next. A gang of lovably bumbling smugglers. An evil animal with a psychological case history (Nigel, a former TV-star cockatoo, voiced with furious glee by New Zealander Jemaine Clement, from Flight of the Conchords). On-off-on-again spats and romance tween the cartoon leads and their human handlers. Swooping scenic 3D panoramas in Rio skies, the lurid Carnival, lush jungle. There's a needy black boy who turns good for no reason, and supposedly comic freaks of nature who perform magic with saliva, flight training and marmoset mayhem.

What's next, pussycat? Yep, it's Puss In Boots. The season's good news is the failure of Mars Needs Mums: there clearly are limits to the CGI audience's tolerance level and movie-going budget. There may also be a limit to audience toleration of so-called 3D cinemas' viewing glasses, which need greatly-increased user-friendliness. Currently, they diminish the brightness level of movies significantly, and that's not acceptable to eyes now accustomed to the vivacity of HD TV transmissions. I'll watch the DVD of Rio with interest, because I expect its exuberant brightness and consequent appeal to be much more enjoyable in 2D.