THE SIMPSONS MOVIE
****
PG-13 (for irreverent humor throughout and very brief nudity)
1 hr. 26 min.
written by: Mike Reiss, George Meyer, James L. Brooks, Ian Maxtone-Graham, John Swartzwelder, David Mirkin, Matt Groening, Al Jean, Mike Scully & John Vitti
produced by: David Mirkin, James L. Brooks, Al Jean, Mike Scully, Richard Sakai & Matt Groening
directed by: David Silverman
By the time The Simpsons cartoon premiered on Fox back in 1989, I was a junior in high school living in California. I was hooked. Regardless of how crude they looked (see below) I was simply enjoying the silliness of it all. By the time "Do the Bartman" was in pop culture geek lexicon, I already had purchased my Bartman T-shirt at some shop on Sunset Blvd. yeah, "Eat my Shorts" was big and teenage DAVID was eating it. Pretty soon there was Simpsons everything. Parents and teachers were frightened at the show's irreverence but the media and fans embraced the show lovingly.
Over the years the show just got better and better. This was due to the combined efforts of creative writers and talented voice actors. Sure, like other fans after a while (maybe in the late 90's) my interest kinda dissipated but still when people asked me what my favorite show was, I'd say The Simpsons. And I'd say it proudly. Then syndication came and fans were able to come home from work and watch 5 and 6 and 10:30 every weeknight. Woo Hoo!
Within the past 17 years the show has aired, talk of a movie had surfaced every so often. Some said it would tarnish the TV show but I didn't care either way. I figured it'd still be new Simpsons, so who cares? So, it took about 5 years int he making for this animated prime-time gem to bless the big screen with it's clever presence. Faced with impossible expectations from a fanbase that's memorized every last breath of the show, this is a movie that proudly marches into theaters with widescreen glory worthy of such iconoclastic history.
The Simpsons Movie keeps the rapid-fire, pop-culture-reference-a-minute pace of the series--maybe even more consistently than some episodes. Yet, the jokes come so fast and furiously for so long at the beginning of the film, that one feels strangely cheated later when 15 or 20 seconds elapse without a laugh out loud moment. That's not really a gripe but more of a testament to the creators abilities to deliver solid Springfield fun. The film follows the standard Simpsons blueprint of Homer screwing up (only this time it's a monumental, life-threatening screw-up for all of Springfield), trying to escape his fate, and then, with the help of family, attempting to put all right again. The plot is really secondary to the characters, though, and that is a tribute to how brilliantly drawn (pun intended) these familiar faces have come to us all over these past several years.
From the clever opening to the winking post-credit ending, this movie has the family psychology and biting social commentary that has made people either love or loathe the TV show. Green Day is performing on a raft in Lake Springfield, where they fail to engage the audience in talking about the environment. They are killed when the pollution in the lake eats away at their barge, causing it to sink. At the funeral, Grampa has a religious vision, in which he predicts impending doom upon the town, but only Marge pays attention. Lisa and Colin, an Irish boy, hold a seminar entitled "An Irritating Truth", where they convince the town to clean up the lake by putting the same polluted water in their glasses. Meanwhile, Homer dares Bart to skateboard nude to Krusty Burger and back, but Bart is caught by Chief Wiggum. Ned Flanders comforts Bart after being humiliated, since Homer lets Bart get blamed for the incident and then adopts a pig. Homer srews up big-time (duh!) when he dumps a silo of pig excrement into Lake Springfield, (polluting it severely and mutating a squirrel) the community is immediately quarantined as an environmental hazard. President Schwarzenegger ("I was elected to lead not read!") orders the town enclosed in a protective glass dome much to the delight of the EPA's Russ Cargill (Albert Brooks). Once all of Springfield finds out that Homer is to blame for their new lid, the immense hatred they have for him forces the whole family to escape to Alaska. 
While the entire nation is after The Simpsons for what oblivious Homer has done, the wrath of the locals try to figure out a solution to the problem at hand. Seeing the dome begin to crack and realizing the people of Springfield will escape, Cargill manipulates the President into ordering the town's destruction. In Alaska, the Simpsons see a television advertisement in which Tom Hanks promotes a new Grand Canyon, and Marge realizes that they are planning to bomb Springfield. Marge and the kids decide to save the town, but Homer refuses to help the people that tried to kill him. His family abandons him and returns to rescue Springfield. After a visit with a mysterious Inuit shaman, Homer has a vision and reaches an epiphany (and founds out what the word means as well): to save himself he must save his family, and Springfield and he returns. Meanwhile, Marge, Lisa, Maggie, and Bart are captured by Cargill and returned to Springfield. Cargill tells the people of Springfield that the town will be destroyed. A helicopter arrives and lowers a bomb. Meanwhile, Homer climbs the outside of the dome and descends knocking the escaping townspeople and bomb off the rope. However, he notices a motorcycle, grabs Bart, and cycles up the side of the dome. Bart throws the bomb through the hole, detonating it outside and shattering the dome. The town praises Homer, who rides off with Marge on the motorbike into the sunset. The film ends with everyone restoring Springfield, including the Simpsons' home, back to the way things were.
When "South Park" and "Beavis and Butt-Head" made the leap from the small screen to multiplex stardom, the productions wisely elected to take the most fantastical direction possible, be it a road trip across America or a full-on, say-hey Broadway musical. "The Simpsons Movie" doesn't play by those same expectations, because, well...they've done it all over the last two decades. There's little material left for this franchise to toy with, so the producers have wisely decided to keep the ingredients familiar to best please fan and non-fan alike. Of course, there's a mild, creeping disappointment that that movie doesn't reach for the comedy heavens at first. Perhaps expectation is the wet blanket draped over this film: when it comes down to the finer details, "Movie" is a thoroughly entertaining, frequently hilarious, fanboy wink convention that pleases endlessly by sticking close to the formula that made the show an immortal animated classic.
The plot is undemanding, straight-up Homer monkey business, but the screenwriters find much to bat around during the 85-minute running time. A majority of the laughs originate from the sparkly new big-screen treatment, with "Movie" taking shots at filmgoing culture and embracing its new PG-13 freedom. Let's just say if you've even wanted to hear Marge curse lightly, Otto partake in his favorite pastime, or witness big screen Bart nudity, this one was made for you.
The rest of the picture settles into an extended episode of the show, throwing in some guest stars, shovelfuls of "Simpsons" community throwaway gags (is Ralph officially gay now?), and maintaining a sharp satiric aim toward politics and religion. If the argument is tiresome familiarity, I counter with the observation that the film kicks back and embraces what 17 years have accomplished. To me, that's a quite a bit of comedic ammo to entertain with, and "The Simpsons Movie"pulls off pure yellow magic.
Even if you are not a Simpsons aficionado, the characters reveal themselves so wonderfully in one or two sharply written lines or sight gags that you are provided all the information you need for a boffo punchline. Creator Matt Groening and company have expectedly opened up the proceedings beyond Springfield, and they have added several nice moments of CGI (scattered sensibly throughout the more traditionally drawn bulk of the feature), but the core of this movie is its heartfelt emotion, residing just beneath the surface of its manic energy and joke-a-second timing. For those of us raised on the relatively barren Hanna Barbera cartoons (or even the wonderfully wacky but emotionless Jay Ward creations), The Simpsons is a superb melding of Ward's (or Tex Avery's) off-the-wall looniness with an almost Frank Capraesque homage to family and home. It is something of a miracle that the film succeeds so admirably, as its television progenitor has for years, in making us feel as we laugh.