Movie Review: Free Birds

There's a good reason why we don't do Thanksgiving movies

Free Birds is a mediocre animated movie about two turkeys going back in time to prevent turkeys from being served at Thanksgiving. The movie was made by Reel FX Creative as their first original movie, beforehand the studio has only produced short films and visuals for theme park rides such as The Simpsons Ride at two separate Universal Studios theme parks. The most surprising part about this movie is the fact that despite the very low scores, it managed to make twice it's budget back, grossing over 100 million dollars! 

The movie begins with our main turkey Reggie (Voiced by Owen Wilson), talking different holidays before cutting to a part in which a family sits down to carve their roasted turkey. Through the window Reggie looks on in horror as he finds out what happens to turkeys on Thanksgiving. He tries to tell the other turkeys on the farm about the truth, but they ignore him, and toss him aside as an outcast. A week, or so before Thanksgiving the President arrives for the "Pardoning of the Turkey Ceremony", his daughter makes him choose Reggie. At first Reggie thinks he is going to be killed until realizing that he is pardoned, thus safe. Reggie is taken to the President's home, which isn't the White House for some reason. Here Reggie starts his life of luxury, eating pizza, and watching Spanish soap operas all day. His peace is disturbed though when Jake (Voiced by Woody Harrelson) kidnaps Reggie. He tells Reggie that he must help him take turkeys off the menu by traveling back in time to the first Thanksgiving, and doing whatever is necessary in order to achieve their goal. Reggie of course doesn't believe Jake as it sounds like nonsense. Though Jake insists it is true, as The Great Turkey told him so. After some hijinks though they find themselves in a top-secret military base where the time machine is being kept. The time machine also happens to be controlled by a sassy AI named S.T.E.V.E (Space Time Exploration Vehicle Envoy).

Once they make it into the time machine, they set off towards the past, 1621, Plymouth, just three days before the first Thanksgiving. Immediately Jake, and Reggie are chased by hunters, led by the real world colonist, Myles Standish. Before they can be captured though, our two feathery heroes are rescued by a group of wild turkeys, one of which, Jenny (Voiced by Amy Poehler), becomes the obligatory romantic interest for Reggie. The wild turkeys lead Jake, and Reggie back to their secret hideout where they are introduced to the chief of the wild turkeys, Broadbeak. Jake also gets in a fight with Ranger, a tough turkey that is just as stubborn as Jake. It is here that Jake explains to the turkeys that they are in danger, and they need to fight back. The chief explains that they can't as that would be very dangerous. Jenny then takes the two to the turkey nursery where we see a bunch of puff-ball baby turkeys doing cute things before cutting to the next day.

The next morning, the turkeys are given different assignments by the chief; Ranger, and Jake go scout out the fort, while Reggie, and Jenny spring the hunter's traps. While scouting Ranger, and Jake are able to find where the humans store their weapons, Jake takes this into consideration for a plan later on. Meanwhile Jenny, and Reggie bond a little after Reggie disarms all the traps in a accidental slapstick manner. Though they are chased by the hunters, luckily with the time machine nearby Reggie is able to use it to get Jenny, and him to safety. He asks if she would want to go to the future with him, but she declines as she can't leave her family. Once down at the ground, Jake steals Reggie away for his plan. At nighttime, Jake takes Reggie to the fort where he tries to explain his plan. Reggie though gets mad at Jake because of his nonsensical story. This is when Jake tells Reggie his backstory of how he escaped from a factory farm, and met The Great Turkey shortly after. Upon hearing this, Reggie decides to listen to his plan. Jake then explains that they are going to destroy the human's weapon supply. Though hesitant at first, Reggie realizes that if the humans have no weapons then the flock won't be in danger, and perhaps Jenny would take him up on his offer. Thus the two head out to destroy the weapons supply.

The birds are able to successfully blow up the weapon shed, and return in triumph, Jake even showing off the powder horn he stole as proof. The birds cheer, and celebrate thinking that they are all safe. What they didn't know though was that Jake had spilled the gunpowder all the way from the fort to the hideaway, accidentally leaving the humans a trail. The humans burn their hideaway as well as capture more then enough turkeys for their feast tomorrow. The chief also dies saving Jenny, and Reggie. Jenny is made the new chief, and plans a attack on the humans as they don't have weapons anymore so that gives them an advantage. Meanwhile Reggie returns to his own time feeling like it was his fault for getting Jenny's father killed. Though three other Reggies from alternate timelines show up, and explain to Reggie that not all is lost, and he can still go back, and save everyone. He also learns that he is The Great Turkey. First Reggie makes sure to go back in time to give young Jake his destiny before returning to 1621 to help the others. We first see Jenny leading the flock into battle with the humans, and two Native Americans show up to only say, "Those are some Angry Birds", haha get it, dated pop-culture reference. 

Before the cannon balls can hit the birds, the balls are stopped in their place because I guess the time machine could do that? Myles Standish also gets sucked into a time vortex as well (geez sounds like a fate worse then death). Out of the time machine steps Reggie with a box of cheese pizza to offer the humans, the humans happily accept it as a confused pizza man also steps out with even more pizzas to give. Thus because the humans had something to eat, they freed the turkeys they captured, and begin their feast. The feast is named Thanksgiving because the leader of the human gave his thanks to Reggie (I'm not kidding, that's literally what they go with). Human, and Turkey peace is established thanks especially to Chuck.E.Cheese's Pizza... i'm not joking, the rat's face is literally on the box, weirdest product placement ever. We fast forward to the future where Jake, Jenny, and Reggie look on happily as the humans continue to eat their thanksgiving pizza to this day. Upon returning to the past, Jake leaves with the time machine saying that he must go where his help may be needed. The turkeys celebrate as Thanksgiving is now a vegan holiday I guess. Though in the mid-credits scene Jake returns with a chicken, and a duck tucked under his wings. In a panicked voice he asks, "Have you heard of Turducken!?", then the movie actually ends. Just in case you didn't know, Turducken is a chicken, stuffed into a duck, stuffed into a turkey, a true abomination to nature.

Overall, this movie is very meh, It isn't very good, but it's not horrible. There were actually a couple parts that made me chuckle, at first only in the first quarter of the film however, then everything became more bland then that one time my mother cooked a turkey roast (And that was pretty bland). The visuals though are pretty poor for a movie that was released in 2013, in comparison Epic from Blue Sky Studios came out earlier that year. Sure, the movie didn't have the best plot, but the visuals were really quite stunning. Frozen also released a couple weeks after Free Birds, but comparing the two is useless when Frozen was animated by such a animation powerhouse like Disney. Anyway back to my main point, visuals are blah, the jokes fail to land, relying too much on slapstick humor, and the story, pretty sure the writer just stole his 10-year old's writing assessment. Surprisingly enough, the movie did have some potential in being good. If the jokes had been more funny, then maybe it would be more enjoyable to watch. All in all this Thanksgiving comedy get a 1 out of 5 paws up.