"The Secret Life of Pets" Review

The Secret Life of Pets is an animated adventure comedy film directed by Chris Renaud and Yarrow Cheney that stars the voices of Louis C.K., Eric Stonestreet, Jenny Slate, Kevin Hart, Lake Bell, Hannibal Buress, Bobby Moynihan, Albert Brooks, Steve Coogan, Dana Carvey, and Ellie Kemper. It follows the various pets of residents of a New York City apartment building, specifically Max (C.K.), a terrier, who feels his territory immediately intruded upon when his owner brings home a second dog, a giant sloppy hairy dog named Duke (Stonestreet). While attempting to get rid of Duke, Max and Duke accidentally find themselves involved with a group of rogue ex-pets who, after suffering abuse by humans, have taken to the sewers to plot their revenge on mankind, led by a vicious bunny played by Kevin Hart. Led by a tiny wide-eyed puppy named Gidget (Slate), the rest of the pets of Max's building band together to go out into the streets of New York to find Max and Duke and bring them back home before day's end, and your requisite goofy animated hijinx occur as a result and it's all good fun.

Pets is produced by Universal/Illumination Entertainment, the same folks behind the Despicable Me/Minions series, so if anything, you can expect plenty of well-constructed cuteness and infectiously likable characters, although I have a sneaking suspicion that thankfully none of the characters in this film will reach quite the heights of day-ruining ubiquity of those little screaming yellow tumors (by the way, get to the theater late if you're like me and hate Minions, because before the film begins you're treated to a five-minute short film of shrieking, babbling nothingness that is largely bereft of laughs). No, Pets gets by on a bit more than just expelling "aww"s from the audience; it also has a fair amount of charm and genuine wit, especially when working to draw comedy from the universal truths about the animals that we love.

The Secret Life of Pets is by no means a trailblazing achievement of animated filmmaking, even though most of the visuals (which, by the way, were produced on a relatively measly budget of $75 million) are pleasant and bright, and the cartoony action is animated with noticeable fluidity and with beguiling character put into every movement. The film aims to be undemanding, funny, and pleasant family entertainment, and it delivers in spades. You'll never exactly be emotionally invested, but it'll certainly provide small children with enough bright colors, silly characters, and fun slapstick to keep them entertained, as well as enough Looney Tunes-esque charm and smarts to keep parents mostly satisfied.

Along with the cutesy moments, fun slapstick, and mostly funny jokes (there's the seemingly requisite poop/butthole jokes that sometimes get into eye-rolly territory, but there's also stuff like Kevin Hart's character making a surprisingly smart quip about hipster culture), the film's saving grace by far is its fun cast of characters, bolstered by the brilliant work of its voice cast. None of the characters have any significant depth, but they're all individually and identifiably silly enough to each have at least one moment in the comedic spotlight, and to the point that I actually remember most of their names, which is an achievement for a comedy movie.

The standouts, to me, are Louis C.K. as Max, Jenny Slate as Gidget, and Kevin Hart as the bunny. I kind of hate Kevin Hart, and fans of his loud broad humor will immediately get a kick out of his absolutely bananas character. And I have to say, I'm kind of over the animated kids' movie trope of making bunnies evil/threatening, but I'd be lying if I said Hart doesn't bring unbridled energy to the character. Louis C.K., one of my favorite human beings on the planet, elevates his cookie-cutter protagonist character to being a perfectly sarcastic but still cheery and likable dog, with some wonderfully dry humor that I can only imagine was written specifically for him or was ad-libbed by Louie himself (such as him describing Duke as "scary and frightening and the death of all good things"). And Jenny Slate, as well as having the most likable and most frequently funny character, has a voice perfect for animation work, and her character Gidget is palpably lovable.

All these things make up for the film's undeniable weak point, the story, which aims to be nothing special and ends up being just that. You can probably understand the general direction of the story just by my synopsis of it, even if you don't get all the details right. Unfortunately, the least interesting relationship of the film is between our two main characters, Max and Duke, who stay completely undeveloped until the last third of the movie. The film is too busy moving the audience from one brightly-colored comedic action setpiece to the next, and honestly this is perfectly acceptable. The movie breezes by and is a delightful diversion.

Overall, The Secret Life of Pets is not a groundbreaking film by any means, and its plot is fairly recycled and lacks any sort of depth, but it's bright, cheery, funny, silly, cute, fast, and undemanding, and honestly, after the last couple weeks, that's all I needed. What's the hurt in a movie asking nothing of its audience other than laughing at its silly adorable characters for 90 minutes and delivering pretty consistently on that? If you need a fun and easy-breezy time at the movies for the summer, The Secret Life of Pets has plenty of vocal talent, pretty animation, and fun slapstick to give you what you're looking for.

Grade: B