With this film coming out on DVD tomorrow, I figured I'd give anyone who's interested a head's up on it. The film's plot is fairly simple. An evil scientist bent on acquiring the status of el numero uno super-villaino decides to steal the moon. In the process he adopts three little girls so he can steal a shrink ray from his rival (it's a long story and would require spoilers). This film is a lot of fun. So here it is. My review for 'Despicable Me'.

Eye: Fifteen years ago a film called 'Toy Story was released. The film revolutionized the animation industry and gave birth to a new breed of film-making. Fifteen years ago 'Toy Story' looked incredible. Flash-forward to today. Today's technology is giving life to animation that is looking better and better with each year and making 'Toy Story' look like nothing. 'Despicable Me' looks incredible. While the animation is not as good as some of the more recent films, it holds its own. Excellent use of lighting. This being possibly the first film Illumination Entertainment has released (under the distribution of Universal), it's looking very good.

Eye score: 9/10

Ear: The thing about animation is that if you're judging the sound, you have to include the voice acting. This film genuinely stands out in the wise of voice acting. Steve Carell was excellent as the voice of Grue, and is the definite standout in the cast. Jason Segel (Vector) was also excellent and managed to give an extremely humorous performance. The other standout in my opinion was Grue's mother, whom I was shocked to learn was played by Julie Andrews. The other big name in this film was Miranda Cosgrove (Margo), who did fine, but not exceptional.

Now, in the wise of a soundtrack, I'm satisfied. It's rare for me to find a soundtrack I genuinely don't like, but it's also rare for me to find one that stands out. The music fits the film.

Ear score: 8/10

Head: The pseudo-science in this film is simply awesome. I'm not sure what world the characters live on, but I wish I lived there. The bad guys steal everything in sight. The bigger the better. In terms of a story, sure there's one or two things that could have been better, but for the most part, I felt like this film was excellently with all the various plot-points covered. A genuinely original idea and well-executed as well.

Head score: 8/10

Heart: I really like movies like this one. It's one that's obviously targeted at kids, but has a lot of stuff that older audiences will enjoy. In one sense it reminds me of those great cartoons from the nineties; the ones with a lot of humor that kids love, but with plenty of subtle 'inside' jokes that they won't get until they're older. The characters are done well, and it's easy to connect with many of them. There are times, however, that I felt like it was hard to relate to some of the characters, for example, why Grue's relationship with his mom is so good, when she was a complete jerk to him as a child. There were one or two characters that I just didn't get, for example, Dr. Nefario, who I'm convinced was only even in the film so a few jokes could be made. Not that I'm complaining. Emotionally, this film is done well. I can sympathize with what's going on. Admittedly, I'm not entirely convinced that this movie wasn't loosely based around my uncle's life, but whatever.

Heart score: 7/10

Overall score: 8/10