The Reef

The quality of animated films lately has dropped significantly, as last year's Open Season and Barnyard will testify. They were the first hints that producers were fast running out of ideas, and now with the release of The Reef, that lack of imagination has come to fruition. It's a poor movie and the producers hope that because the kids liked Finding Nemo and Shark Tale, they'll love this. Well, kids are a lot smarter than they think and will more than likely shun this tepid attempt at animation. After losing his family to the nets of a fishing trawler, Pi (Prinze Jnr.) makes his way to the quiet of the coral reef where his Aunt Pearl (Fran Dreshner) lives. There he falls in love with the beautiful Cordelia (Wood) but a big bully, a shark named Troy (Logue), has designs on her too and challenges Pi to a fight. Ignoring the advice from those around him, Pi asks the wise old turtle Nerissa (Schneider) to train him. The story, even at a very slim 77 minutes, feels padded and stretched, and the writers dot the plot with so many characters to fill it out that it ends up being confusing and unfocussed. The Reef simple doesn't flow; it's as if each scene were written by a different writer who had no clue what the other writers were doing. It's a jaded, third-rate animation with nothing new or fun to offer the viewer.