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The Rotunda
Monday, July 14, 2025

The Reel Life: "The Emoji Movie" (2017)

"The Emoji Movie" (2017)

When thinking of animation, most people don’t think of Sony. They think of the classic Warner Bros cartoons, of Pixar making us cry, or Dreamworks making us laugh. They think of Disney and some of the greatest animated films of all time. They don’t think of Sony.

While Sony has made some great animated films; “Cloudy with A Chance of Meatballs” and its sequel, “Surf’s Up,” and arguably the first “Open Season” film, they have also left some big stains on the world of animation. They may have released some great films with Aardman, like “Arthur Christmas,” but Sony itself was never involved creatively. They could have taken a break for a few years, like Warner Bros. did before LEGO, to clean up their act and refocus with a new direction. Or they could do what they actually did and release “The Emoji Movie.”

“Emoji’s” biggest issues can be boiled down to a handful of things; it’s characters, it’s tone, and its plot. Which is basically all of the film. Tone needs to be discussed first, as it is the biggest issue of the entire film. Most of the time what makes “Emoji” so bad is that it always treats its events and characters as seriously as it can. Not once does the film ever poke fun at itself or how bizarre it is that a movie like this even exists. And that makes some of the excruciatingly boring scenes and bad pacing even worse. It’s like listening to someone go on and on about some bizarre conspiracy theory, and yet you know they 100% believe everything they’re saying.

Gene, the main Emoji does talk to the audience a few times, but it feels canned, like listening to a voiceover in the line before a rollercoaster. T.J. Miller is clearly phoning it in with his performance, and the entire cast is just so cookie cutter. The only voices that sound like they tried were Patrick Stewart and Maya Rudolph. However, even they aren’t good, Rudolph because she just puts on the same voice for the entire film, and Stewart because…. he’s playing shit. Literally.

The plot is also a huge problem. While it is clichéd, it needs to be said that an animated film doesn’t have to have an original story to be good. It must distract the audience from the fact that it is a clichéd story. “Emoji” never does that. It confuses jokes with sentences said in funny voices, and adult humor for just adult events, like marriage problems, set within a kid’s film. Also, the plot completely goes off the rails in the third act, but not only throwing it’s own logic out the window, but by speeding itself up and having the entire third act and ending happen within about 15 minutes.

“The LEGO Movie” showed us that it is possible to make a film about a product and have it be good. However, “LEGO” was clearly inspired by a product, while “Emoji” is about a product. The film could have been about how Emojis are little aliens and phones are their UFOs. It could have taken the idea of Emojis and done something clever with it or its product placement. Instead, it thinks that it’s enough to animate some talking yellow heads and slap it over Just Dance.

Animation wise, it’s okay. “Emoji” isn’t as bad as movies like “The Nut Job,” it clearly has a budget behind it, but there’s just a lack of creativity behind it all. While some designs do look cool, like the Cloud and Spotify, they never try to hide the fact that they are clearly product placements. Instead of saying “Spotify” or “DropBox,” just make up a generic sounding name! The design of the Emoji’s is also just fine. Most are just they emoji icons with stick arms and legs, and they, like the rest of the animation and design, just lack detail.

What makes “The Emoji Movie” even worse is that, what isn’t bad, is just mediocre. If the film were completely bad, then we may have something like “The Room” or “Foodfight,” a film worthy of some Mystery Science Theatre 3000-style riffing. A poorly written, edited, and paced plot, coupled with lackluster voice acting, and some lukewarm animation and designs means that “The Emoji Movie” isn’t unwatchable, it’s just boring. Byte me, Sony Pictures Animation. 1.5/5

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