Disclaimer: I am an Amazon Associate and iTunes Affiliate. I am compensated for sales through links to those sites. My opinions are not in any way affected by my relationships with the vendors.Update 4/11/14: Rio 2 has been released today. To prepare for the film, Amazon has great prices on Rio. Rio (Blu-ray/ DVD Combo + Digital Copy) and Rio (DVD) is $8.
After hearing about Angry Birds for a few months, back in January I finally installed Angry Birds on my Android phone. My daughter discovered my playing it and fell in love. So I bought it for her iPod Touch. Well, she quickly became an Angry Birds addict, sometimes she would wake me up in the morning talking about her Angry Birds dream or asking to play.
Needless to say, we were very excited when we heard about the Angry Birds movie. The anticipation built when the Angry Birds Rio game was introduced. She kept asking me when it was coming out and if it would be before she was getting her tonsils out. Fortunately the movie came out the weekend before she got her tonsils out, so we got to see it on opening Saturday.We made a great movie time choice, 2:20p, since our theater had some special events in conjunction with the Rio release. They had tropical birds from a bird sanctuary there when we arrived. For a donation, you would receive a tail feather from one of the birds. I am hoping that they had fallen out and were not plucked. They were also doing face painting and had coloring sheets available. We had not known of these special events so we did not arrive early enough to participate. After our movie, the birds were gone, but they were still face painting, so my daughter was thrilled to get the Rio logo painted on her cheek.
We really enjoyed the movie. We saw the 3D version which was nice, but I don't think it was necessary. The main character in the movie is Blu, a rare blue macaw who has been living in Minnesota as pet of Linda after being captured as a baby in the rain forest. We learn that there is only one other blue macaw, Jewel, and that Linda must accompany Blu to Rio de Janeiro so that Blu and Jewel can be bred. There is an immediate conflict between domesticated Blu who cannot fly and Jewel who has lived in the wild and wishes to return to the wild. The story follows Blu and Jewel as they are repeatedly captured and escape. There is also a side story with Linda and Tulio from the bird sanctuary.
I was really impressed with the vocal performances, especially Jesse Eisenberg as Blu. There were frequent laughs in the movie. It was able to hold the attention of all three of us. I was a little concerned when they talked about breeding Blu and Jewel whether it would be appropriate for a 5 year old, but I did not find it inappropriate.
My daughter said that she liked this movie a lot better than Hop which she had seen the previous weekend with my parents.
We will definitely be purchasing this movie when it comes out on DVD. We may even go see it again as my husband and father were unable to join us.
