Super-hero-fragalist-incredi-able-docious?

Okay, so I'm a little slow off the mark here, seeing as I prefer to be one of the first reviewers of a movie, but sometimes I just can't resist - and there's something just so irresistible about this movie that I had to write this review. I also think I can bring something new to this review that I believe others might have overlooked. So, here goes.

The first thing people will notice about this movie is the stunning graphics. Pixar has yet again brought us a computer generated animated film that will WOW us. Using its total spectrum of the abilities they've developed until now, we are given characters that look as human as possible - while not being totally human. In this - as opposed to Polar Express - I don't think there was a real attempt to make the characters look completely realistic - but rather to make them more fun and interesting, and I truly appreciated this. Still, they are very well rounded (pun intended) characters. So, why not use humans, then? Simply because with animation we get the flexibility of that lets characters do the humanly impossible bits without calling in the fancy stunt doubles and later touch ups by the special department. And anyway, its fun to see how the animators made caricatures out of parts - sometimes heavily basing their features on the stars whose voices later dubbed those parts.

Then there's the acting. Of course, in this case, it's the voices we depend upon to get our characters straight. Just to let you know, I happen to hate Holly Hunter's voice, and she reads the main female role of Helen Parr/Elastigirl. And yet, for some reason, her voice didn't put my teeth on edge this time! You won't recognize many of the other voices here except perhaps Samuel L. Jackson reading Lucius Best/Frozone. Some might recognize Craig T. Nelson's voice doing Bob Parr/Mr. Incredible, but that's about it. I actually recognized Elizabeth Pena's voice doing the character Mirage, but I may be the only one. What's really important isn't whether you can figure out who's behind the voices, but rather if they sound the part and do a convincing job of it. Personally, I think they all had a fantastic time working on this film, and it shows in their voices - everyone seems to be perform at the top of their ability, and there were no weak links in the bunch.

Personally - and this is where I think I have something unique to say about this film - I think they also stuck in some James Bond! Yes, that's exactly what I saw in this film that I think others have overlooked. Good old double-oh seven appears in several bits of this movie. For instance, there's a tropical island where the bad guy has set up his high-tech laboratory for his plan to... em... do whatever evil he's planning to do (Dr. No, to name just one). Or how about the underwater entrance to the villain's lair (Die Another Day)? And certainly those dasterdly gadgets in this film would be the envy of any Q from MI5.

Speaking of drawbacks, yes, I do have to say that I found one. The was in the costume department. Unfortunately, I have to be honest and tell you that the new super-suits that were developed for The Incredible family just weren't as pretty as Mr. Incredible's original suit. Sure, red is sexy and hot, but the blue in the old uniform - that was really pretty. Also, Elastigirl's original outfit had a really cool sparkly mask, which far outstripped the plain black one she gets later in the film (I'm not giving anything away here - those costumes are on all the posters for this movie). Yes, its sad, but true - nothing is ever perfect. But I'm hardly going to reduce my rating for this little foible - perhaps in the sequel they'll hear my plea and get some new costume designer to help them out. Who knows?

The official website of this movie can be found at: http://disney.go.com/disneypictures/incredibles/index.html