Many of those Nickelodeon cartoons can strike fear into the hearts of parents. With no sense of the Disney-level aesthetics we grew up with, and enough inane potty humor to make Pokemon seem highbrow, many are hard enough to tune out when your kids watch a mere 30 minutes. Having to pay attention for 90 minutes to something like The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie seems like an ordeal that almost makes it worth not reproducing. At least, that's how I felt until I laughed out loud more than I will for any other movie this year.
Typically, when you have a cartoon set under the sea, you get a fish, a crab and maybe a shark. The hero here is a walking, talking sponge, his sidekick is a starfish, and the villain is a piece of plankton who owns a failing burger joint. Plankton's only competitor, and SpongeBob's employer, Mr. Krabs, has just opened a second restaurant, and when Plankton learns of this, he frames Krabs for the theft of King Neptune's crown, prompting SpongeBob and Patrick Star, the starfish, to embark on a quest to exonerate the poor crustacean. This adventure takes them across a variety of animated underwater landscapes before dropping them on the perilous shores of live-action.
SpongeBob doesn't have any subtle, social commentary under its wavy surface. Its requisite heartwarming message about not growing up too fast is watered down to the point of being more waterlogged than our hero. And it's not afraid to drop its rectangular pants for a cheap laugh. It's a movie written with Mad Libs, barreling along at 80 knots from one delirious non sequitur to another. And from the moment Patrick, with SpongeBob held firmly between his butt cheeks, hang glides into an underwater tent (which promptly bursts into flames) to the climactic battle sequence that takes place on David Hasselhoff's hairy calves, I couldn't stop laughing.
The animation is rough but perfectly suited to the wildly unpredictable antics. And SpongeBob winds up being as endearing as he is absorbent. Children of all ages will be mesmerized by SpongeBob's nonstop lunacy, and any adults who are willing to let go of their initial prejudices may find themselves leaving the theater singing, "Who lives in a pineapple under the sea ..."