The Lego Movie
Part of a series on LEGO. [View Related Entries]
[View Related Sub-entries]
About
The Lego Movie is a 2014 computer animated comedy film that follows the heroic adventures of the protagonist Emmet Brickowski and his friends in the fictional LEGO universe. Upon its release in 2014, the film was met by universal acclaims from the critics and commercial success in the box office.
History
The LEGO Movie was conceived in 2008 by American film producer Dan Lin, who brought the idea to his fellow co-producer Roy Lee.[1] In November 2011, The film was given a greenlight by Warner Bros.[2], with Phil Lord and Christopher Miller joining onboard as the writer and the director of the project, respectively. By late 2012, an ensemble cast of voice actors and actresses were announced, with Chris Pratt as "Emmet", Will Ferrell as "Lord Business", Liam Neeson as "Good Cop/Bad Cop", Elizabeth Banks as "Wyldstyle", and Morgan Freeman as "Vitruvius". The film premiered on February 1st, 2014 and was released in theaters February 7th, 2014.
Animation
According to the CG supervisor Aidan Sarsfield, the entire CG animation process was aimed at replicating the aesthetics of fan-made Brickfilms; the scenery was projected through the LEGO company's internal Lego Digital Designer and the official LEGO Brick Library, while the characters' movements were designed to reflect the same mechanical restrains of actual Lego figurines.
Plot
From iMDB:[4]
The wizard Vitruvius attempts to protect the "Kragle", a superweapon, from the evil Lord Business. He fails to do so, but warns Lord Business of a prophecy where a person called the "Special" will find the Piece of Resistance capable of stopping the Kragle.
Eight and a half years later, Emmet Joe Brickowski, an ordinary construction worker with no special qualities, comes across a woman, Wyldstyle, who is searching for something after hours at Emmet's construction site. When he investigates, Emmet falls into a hole and finds the Piece of Resistance. Compelled to touch it, Emmet experiences vivid visions and passes out. He awakens elsewhere, with the Piece of Resistance attached to his back, in the custody of Bad Cop, Lord Business' lieutenant (whose head sometimes turns around to reveal his other side, Good Cop). There, Emmet learns Business' plans to destroy the world with the Kragle. Wyldstyle rescues Emmet and takes him to Vitruvius, who explains that he and Wyldstyle are "Master Builders" capable of building anything they need, both with great speed and without instruction manuals. Years ago, Lord Business rose to power, his disapproval of such anarchic creativity resulting in him capturing many of them. As the "Special", Emmet is destined to defeat him, yet Wyldstyle and Vitruvius are disappointed to find Emmet displays no creativity.
Lord Business plans to use the Kragle (a tube of Krazy Glue with some of the logo's letters rubbed out) to freeze the universe perfectly in place. Bad Cop tracks down Emmet and Wyldstyle, who are rescued by her boyfriend, Batman. He takes them to a meeting of the remaining Master Builders. Unimpressed with Emmet, they refuse to fight Lord Business. Bad Cop and his forces attack and capture all the Master Builders except for Emmet and a few others. Emmet believes the Master Builders' weakness is that their individual creativity prevents them from working together. He devises a team plan to infiltrate Lord Business' headquarters. As Emmet and his allies are captured and imprisoned, Vitruvius attempts to fight back but is killed; with his dying words he admits the prophecy was made up. Business throws the Piece of Resistance off the edge of the universe, sets his headquarters to self-destruct, and leaves with the Kragle while leaving Bad Cop behind. Vitruvius' ghost tells Emmet that even if the prophecy isn't real, Emmet can still save the world. Emmet, tied to the self-destruct mechanism's battery, sacrifices himself for his friends, flinging himself off the edge of the universe.
Inspired, the Master Builders escape and rally with the help of Bad Cop. Soon, Lego people across the universe are building their own creative weapons. The Master Builders lead the charge against Business.
Emmet finds himself in the real world, where the events of the story are being played out within the imagination of a boy, Finn. His father "The Man Upstairs" chastises his son for ruining his father's Lego set by mixing characters with the wrong playsets, and originating hodgepodge creations. Finn argues that Lego are for children, but his father prefers to Krazy Glue his perceived perfect creations together permanently, as this is how adults play with Lego. In the Lego world, Lord Business' forces gain the upper hand. Realizing the father will glue all the Lego in place, Emmet wills himself to move and falls off the table, gaining Finn's attention. Finn returns Emmet to the Lego set, where Emmet builds a massive robot to assist his friends before confronting Lord Business. In the real world, Finn's father looks at his son's creations again and finds himself impressed. Realizing his son based the evil Lord Business on him, the father has a change of heart and allows his son to play with his Lego however he sees fit. In the Lego world, Emmet convinces Lord Business that Business, too, is special, as is everyone. Moved by Emmet's speech, Business destroys the Kragle and unfreezes his victims.
With the world saved, Emmet celebrates with his friends, and Wyldstyle, whose real name is Lucy, becomes his girlfriend. However, alien Duplo beings beam down, announcing their intentions to invade, due to the father allowing Finn's little sister to play with his Lego set as well. Then at the end they get captured by the Duplo toys.
Reception
On Rotten Tomatoes,[3] the film received a 96% fresh rating, as well as a critic rating of 8.1/10, and an average user rating of 4.3/5. On IMDb,[4] the film received an average user rating of 7.8/10, as well as a Metacritic score of 83. During the opening weekend, the film grossed $69 millions and ranked #1 in the US box office for three straight weeks, becoming the fifth highest grossing film of 2014.[5] The movie grossed a total of $469.2 million, establishing itself as the 17th highest grossing film worldwide.[6] In addition, the popularity of the film, especially among the youths, led to a shortage[9] of LEGO toys during the holiday shopping season of 2014.
Spin-offs
Due to the success of this film, there are works of spin-off movies that will star Lego Batman in The Lego Batman Movie which is reportedly set to be released on February 10th, 2017[26] and the Lego Ninjago cast in The Lego Ninjago Movie which was supposed to be released on September 23rd, 2016,[24] but was was postponed until October 13th, 2017.[25]
The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part
Following the successful reception at the box office, a sequel was announced to be released in May 2017,[7] but was unfortunately push until February 8th, 2019, due to hiring Raphael Bob-Waksberg, the creator of BoJack Horseman, to rewrite the script for the film.[27]
Plot
From iMDB:[28]
Just moments after Emmet Brickowski (voice of Chris Pratt) and his friends saved their city of Bricksburg, they are visited by aliens from the planet Duplo. This comes just after their real-world builder Finn (voice of Jadon Sand) is told by his father (voice of Will Ferrell) that his little sister is now allowed to play with Legos. After the Duplos threatens to destroy the Lego people, Emmet approaches them with a heart that he builds as a peace offering, only for the Duplo leader to eat it. Lucy, AKA Wyldstyle (voice of Elizabeth Banks) tries to attack, but this just makes the alien scream powerfully enough to shatter windows. The Duplos start to rampage across Bricksburg, causing structures to collapse. Emmet and Lucy get help from Batman (voice of Will Arnett), Unikitty (voice of Alison Brie), Metalbeard (voice of Nick Offerman), and Benny (Charlie Day), but they are outmatched and defeated. Meanwhile, President Business (also Will Ferrell) ditches them to go golfing.
Five years later, Bricksburg has become Apocalypseburg, with everyone adjusting to their new city by being dark, brooding, and edgy. Lucy says that the Justice League – Superman (voice of Channing Tatum), Wonder Woman (voice of Cobie Smulders), Aquaman (voice of Jason Momoa), Green Lantern (voice of Jonah Hill), and Cyborg – went off to fight the Duplos, but they never returned. Batman stayed behind to do a standalone adventure and is now living in a large fortress with Alfred (voice of Ralph Fiennes). Emmet is the only one who retains his cheerful disposition. He joins Lucy with some coffee, but she is too busy brooding. Emmet then mentions having a crazy dream in which he saw a dolphin clock with a time of 5:15, and a black hole opening that swallows all of his friends in an event called "Ourmamageddon". He then shows Lucy that he built them a house just outside of the city, and he brings her over to check it out. While she thinks it's nice, she worries it will attract unwanted attention, and she also thinks Emmet is too childish. Her fears are confirmed when a ship descends toward the city and spots Emmet, Lucy, and Unikitty (who is now huge and goes by Ultrakitty). The pilot fires a heart bomb at the trio, who run away after building an escape buggy. However, they are followed because Emmet puts his blinker on.
They make it to Batman's fortress where they hide from the invader, and Batman attempts to fire at them, but it doesn't work. The invader makes her way in and introduces herself as General Sweet Mayhem (Stephanie Beatriz). She seeks out the leader of the group, and Lucy points Emmet out as "The Special". Mayhem disagrees and doesn't see anything special about Emmet. She proceeds to kidnap Lucy, Batman, Unikitty, Benny, and Metalbeard and take them with her. Emmet tries to get the other citizens to help him save his friends, but they don't want to join him due to him being immature. Emmet sets off on his own to rescue his friends by converting his house into a ship.
Mayhem brings the Master Builders to the Systar System where she lives. She takes them to a planet ruled by the shape-shifting Queen Watevra Wa'Nabi (voice of Tiffany Haddish). Watevra appears like an evil tyrant, but she does her best to persuade the heroes that she is the complete opposite of a villain by singing a song about it. She manages to persuade the others by appealing to their interests (spaceships for Benny, cute stuff for Unikitty, pirate stuff for Metalbeard, and just appealing to Batman's ego). Everyone but Lucy is convinced that she can be trusted. Watevra wants to marry Batman and unite their worlds, which startles him.
Emmet is making his way through space, only to come across a glassteroid storm. Just before he collides with one, he is saved by the super cool Rex Dangervest (also Chris Pratt), flying in a ship shaped like a fist. He brings Emmet on-board and introduces himself as a galaxy-defending cowboy/raptor trainer (in other words, Chris Pratt's most famous roles). Rex tells Emmet his backstory of how he was left trapped under the dryer in Finn's home and was forgotten by his friends, but he managed to pull himself out and become who he is now. He has a whole control center with raptors that he trained. Rex then decides to join Emmet in his quest to save his friends.
The Master Builders are brought to Planet Sparkles in preparations for the wedding. Lucy is given a wash, revealing that the black in her hair is painted, and her real hair is blue. Watevra's assistants – Ice Cream Cone (voice of Richard Ayoade), Banarnar (voice of Ben Schwartz), and Balthazar (voice of Noel Fielding) – try to get Lucy as pumped up as they are by forcing her to listen to the upbeat "Catchy Song". She escapes and finds herself crawling through a vent next to Bruce Willis (voicing himself as a Lego).
At the same time, Emmet and Rex appear on the same planet with other Lego Mini-Figures people. Emmet finds everybody to be overly happy and friendly. The Justice League are there, and Superman is now best buds with Green Lantern (whom he couldn't stand before) and even Lex Luthor (voice of Ike Barinholtz). They also go along and sing "Catchy Song", which Rex finds painful.
Batman and Watevra have a private dinner together. Mayhem scans Batman and detects that he is hiding his insecurities under his ego, which Watevra implies is not unlike her. He admits that he is not looking to get hitched, but Watevra responds that she only said she wanted to marry him to make her real crush jealous. This starts to make Batman walk back on his words, just as Watevra starts to sing a song about why she's not into Gotham City guys. Batman relents and makes an official proposal to her.
Numerous citizens gather on top of a giant wedding cake for Batman and Watevra's wedding. Lucy meets up with Emmet and Rex as they both plan to stop the ceremony by smashing the wedding cake. Rex is suspicious of Lucy and thinks she is brainwashed, but Emmet trusts her. As they proceed with their plan, Lucy runs into Mayhem, and in the confrontation, Mayhem is knocked off a ledge. Her helmet falls off, and her deepened tough voice is gone, and she appears genuinely frightened as she holds on for dear life. She slips but Lucy manages to catch her. Mayhem explains that she and Watevra really aren't bad, and that they just wanted to unite their worlds. This leads Lucy to realize that Rex is the true villain, as he is trying to keep everyone apart. Outside, Lucy watches the ceremony and sees Watevra take her true form – the heart that Emmet built all those years earlier for the Duplos. Before Lucy can stop Emmet, he harnesses his "grown-up" power and smashes the cake, which causes everything to fall into ruin and tear open a hole.
Everything that happens is a result of the real world where Finn's sister Bianca (voice of Brooklynn Prince) has brought Finn's Legos into her room so that they can play together, but Finn is a jerk and he breaks Bianca's creations. Their mother (voice of Maya Rudolph) comes in and scolds them for fighting, and because the Legos hurt her bare feet, she orders the kids to put the pieces away in a storage bin (the black hole). This makes Emmet's nightmare of Ourmamageddon come true, as the kids pick up all the Legos and leave them trapped in the darkness of the storage bin.
After Emmet realizes what has happened, Rex tells him the truth – he is Emmet from the future! On his trip to save his friends, Emmet ended up under the dryer and was left alone, just watching Finn play without him. He became bitter and forced himself out of the dryer where he made a new tougher, mature image for himself and shunned all the cute and childish things he once valued. He made himself a time machine using bits from the DeLorean, Bill and Ted's phone booth, the Tardis, an H.G. Wells contraption, and a hot tub, and he used it to go back in time to find Emmet before he got lost. Since Emmet doesn't agree with his plans, Rex tosses him out of the ship and back under the dryer.
Lucy, Mayhem, and the Master Builders all feel sad and sing about how everything is NOT awesome, but this doesn't mean that it has to be the end for them. In the real world, Finn realizes that he was rotten to Bianca and remembers how much fun they had playing together when they were younger, and he makes amends with her by bringing her the Watevra heart. Meanwhile, Emmet is stuck under the dryer and attempts to free himself, but he has limited movement down there. Rex joins him to fight and keep him there, but now that Finn and Bianca are playing, Lucy is free and she goes to help Emmet, and they use one of Mayhem's heart bombs to defeat Rex. Rex realizes how wrong he was, but now that Lucy has come to save Emmet, it means that Rex won't exist. He starts to disappear but bids farewell to Emmet and Lucy. The two are then reunited with their friends.
Finn and Bianca combine their worlds so that all the residents now live in harmony. President Business returns from his golf trip but gets kicked out of town almost immediately. Lucy rebuilds her and Emmet's home and presents him with a surprise: an original album of "Everything is Awesome". Emmet looks closely and sees Lucy on the cover, and it slowly dawns on him that she was one of the original artists behind the song.
Reception
On Rotten Tomatoes,[29] the film gained a 86% fresh rating, received a critic rating of 7.02/10, and an average user rating of 3.8/5. On IMDB,[28] the film received an average user rating of 7.1/10, as well as a Metacritic score of 65. For opening weekend, the film grossed $34 millions and ranked #1 for it's first week, becoming the fourth highest grossing film of 2019.[30] The movie grossed a total of $157.2 million, establishing itself as the 5th highest grossing film worldwide.[31]
Online Presence
In January 2012, the domain TheLEGOmovie.com was registered by Warner Bros for the official website of the film, where visitors could create minifigure versions of themselves and submit their designs for an honorary inclusion in the official trailer. On July 12th, 2012, the official Facebook page for The Lego Movie[10] was launched, along with a promotional contest calling on LEGO fans to submit their own vehicle designs to be featured in the film. In August 2012, the official Twitter account for the LEGO Movie was created. As of March 2014, the Facebook page has more than 2 million likes and the Twitter account has more than 65,300 followers.
Build With Chrome
On January 28th, 2014, Google launched Build With Chrome, a web application that enables users of the Google Chrome web browser to build digital scale-models of objects and buildings with LEGO bricks on a Google Map-augmented construction plate, in a similar vein to other open world construction games like Minecraft.
Created in collaboration with LEGO as part of a promotional campaign for the film, the web application also allows its users to geotag their creations to a real location in the world, share them publicly and browse creations made by others through its integration with Google Plus and Google Maps.
Fandom
Following the digital and home media releases of The LEGO Movie in May and June 2012, the film continued to attract a strong online following as animated GIFs of memorable scenes began to emerge on popular image-sharing platforms, including on Tumblr, Giphy and Imgur, as well as on DeviantART, where the search query "The Lego Movie" returns over 9,000 related artworks created by fans.[12]
Related Memes
Everything is Awesome
"Everything is Awesome" is the official theme song of The Lego Movie, sung by Tegan & Sara and featuring The Lonely Island. The official stop-motion animation music video was uploaded to the Warner Bros. YouTube channel on February 7th, 2014. It gained 30.6 million views within a year.
Though featured several times throughout the movie, the song was also used in the end credits during a brick animation sequence.[13] During the 2015 Oscars, Everything is Awesome was preformed live and featured dancers dressed up as characters from the film, as well as LEGO Oscars handed out to the audience. The song has also inspired numerous YouTube covers[14] and the phrase was frequently used in or as a working title for much of the fan art dedicated to the film.[15]
Everything is Not Awesome
"Everything is Not Awesome" is a corporation-shaming campaign started by Greenpeace in 2014. The campaign aimed at getting the LEGO group to end it's partnership with Shell for plans to drill in the arctic for oil. The video was covered by many websites including The Guardian[16] and Forbes.[17] In less than a week the video gained over 3.1 million views. Although not dissuaded to end their current obligations to the contract, public attention pushed the LEGO group to announce[18] they would not be renewing the contract with Shell once it expired.
Search Interest
External References
[1] The Wrap – Lego Movie Gives WB A New Franchise
[2] Variety – 'Cloudy' Directors Toy With 'Lego'
[3] Rotten Tomatoes – The Lego Movie
[4] iMDB – The Lego Movie
[5] Box Office Mojo – US 2014 Film Grosses
[6] Box Office Mojo – Worldwide 2014 Film Grosses
[7] ComingSoon.net – Lego Movie Sequel Officially Set
[8] Hollywood Reporter – Lego Batman Spinoff in the Works
[9] The Star – Lego Shortage Leaves Stores Between a Block and a Hard Place
[10] Facebook – The LEGO Movie
[11] Twitter – @TheLEGOMovie
[12] DeviantArt – 'The Lego Movie' Search Results
[13] Vimeo – The Lego Movie – Main Title
[14] YouTube – Search Results 'Everything is Awesome (cover)'
[15] DeviantArt – Search Results for 'Everything is Awesome'
[16] The Guardian – Lego Told Everything is Not Awesome in Viral Greenpeace Video
[17] Forbes – Everything Not Awesome with LEGO and Shell
[18] Lego.com – Comment on the Greenpeace Campaign
[17] The Guardian – LEGO Ends Shell Partnership Following Greenpeace Campaign
[18] Tumblr – Tagged Results for 'The LEGO Movie'
[19] Giphy – Tagged Results for 'LEGO Movie'
[20] Tumblr – The LEGO Movie
[21] Tumblr – Heck Yeah, The LEGO Movie
[22] Warner Bros – The LEGO Movie
[23] LEGO – The LEGO Movie
[24] Warner Bros – Ninjago Coming To Theaters On September 23, 2016
[25] Launching Films – The Lego Ninjago Movie
[26] Hollywood Reporter – 'The Lego Batman Movie' Gets Release Date
[27] Variety – 'Lego Movie Sequel' Getting Rewrite From 'BoJack Horseman' Creator [EXCLUSIVE]
[28] iMDB – The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part
[29] Rotten Tomatoes – The Lego Movie 2: The Second Part
[30] Box Office Mojo – US 2019 Film Grosses
[31] Box Office Mojo – Worldwide 2019 Film Grosses
Top Comments
The Cute Master :3 Moderator
Feb 26, 2015 at 01:29PM EST
A Delicious Cut of Roast Beef
Mar 02, 2015 at 02:56PM EST