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"ALVIN AND THE CHIPMUNKS: THE SQUEAKQUEL"
(2009) (Zachary Levi, David Cross) (PG)

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QUICK TAKE:
Family comedy: The three pop-star chipmunks from the first film are back and enrolled in high school, where they vie with three female singing chipmunks discovered by their evil former agent.
PLOT:
Alvin, Simon and Theodore (featuring the modified voices of JUSTIN LONG, MATTHEW GRAY GUBLER and JESSE McCARTNEY, respectively) have their lives thrown for a loop when their manager and legal guardian, Dave (JASON LEE), is injured during a concert in Paris. The three rodent brothers then fly back to Los Angeles where they are to be cared for by Dave's ne'er-do-well cousin, Toby (ZACHARY LEVI).

Acting on Dave's wishes to have the three chipmunk pop-stars live as normal a life as possible, Toby enrolls them at the local high school where they quickly draw the attention of the principal (a closet Chipmunks fan played by WENDIE MALICK) and the school bully (KEVIN G. SCHMIDT).

At the same time, their disgraced and still-unscrupulous former manager, Ian (DAVID CROSS), looks to get revenge on the chipmunks by discovering and then promoting a female version of the band, dubbed the Chipettes (voiced by CHRISTINA APPLEGATE, ANNA FARIS and AMY POEHLER). When Alvin becomes the school's newest sports star, Simon and Theodore are left to fend for themselves, leaving the band's future in jeopardy.

OUR TAKE: 3 out of 10
I only had to endure the sounds and voices of Alvin, Simon and Theodore for about 90 minutes in the theater. Pity the poor sound engineers and dialogue editors who had to work on this footage for weeks and months, listening to those voices, hearing those songs over and over and over again. These are brave, hearty souls, ladies and gentlemen, who more than earned their pay on this one. They also might be on the verge of snapping. Here's hoping their next gig is a sequel to "My Dinner With Andre" or something along those lines.

Well, to anyone over the age of 4, "Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel" is pretty much torture sitting up in the dark for an hour and a half. This is the Abu Ghraib of singing, talking animal movies. Did the producers mean to make a movie THIS excruciating for grown-ups to sit through? In addition to the three shrill critters from the first flick, we now get three MORE chirpy rodents absolutely murdering today's (and yesterday's) pop tunes … only this time, they're female chipmunks.

The plot? Alvin and the Chipmunks have risen to the top of the Billboard charts and are performing a concert in Paris to the brainwashed French. Alvin decides to showboat on stage and ends up loosening a massive concert display that pancakes their manager and caregiver, Dave (Jason Lee, returning for about five minutes of contractually obligated screen time). With Dave in traction and forced to remain in Europe, the chipmunks are cared for back in Los Angeles by Dave's unemployed, ne'er-do-well cousin, Toby (Zachary Levi of NBC's "Chuck")

Following Dave's wishes, Toby enrolls Alvin, Simon and Theodore in high school, which sets up all sorts of conflicts already explored in "Glee" and the "High School Musical" franchise. Oh yeah. There's a sing-off with the aforementioned female chipmunks who are also students there (and under the control of the Chipmunks' evil former manager, Ian, played by David Cross). Meanwhile, Alvin wants to get in with the cool crowd, led by the resident jock-bully Ryan (Kevin G. Schmidt). In turn, Theodore and Simon are harassed by Ryan's friends and football teammates.

I would say the Powers That Be went the cheap-o route on this one by downsizing Lee and setting the whole film in a high school. But then they went out and got three fairly big names to voice Brittany, Jeanette and Eleanor of the Chipettes. Cast in the parts are Christina Applegate, Anna Faris and Amy Poehler, respectively. Why?! Their voices are electronically altered. You could cast Christina, Anna and Amy from the local high school, and they wouldn't sound any different. We should all be so lucky to cash one check like that in our lives!

The climax is just ridiculous, with a Big Game factoring in along with a Big Concert and also a Big Race to Get to the Show on Time. It's way too much. The film should have been a lot more streamlined. With seven or eight subplots going (including Toby struggling to tell a teacher at the chipmunks' school he likes her), you know that each has to be resolved before the thing will actually end.

Director Betty Thomas used to be a skilled, interesting filmmaker. Behind the camera, the former "Hill Street Blues" actress helmed such heady fare as HBO's "The Late Shift," then got credible performances from Howard Stern and his radio crew in "Private Parts" before signing her name to such dogs as the "I Spy" big-screen remake and the putrid "John Tucker Must Die."

On the positive side, the film is fairly innocuous for the littlest ones in the audience. The violence is almost all of the slapstick variety. There is no cursing beyond one character saying, "Darn it to heck!" and just one gag involving flatulence. And, of course, most Gen Xers and Baby Boomers have shared memories of the Chipmunks from their own childhoods, so there is a familiarity there that can be shared with the kiddies. As such, the film manages to eke out a rating of 3 out of 10. (T. Durgin)




Reviewed December 23, 2009 / Posted December 23, 2009


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