Most of the rest, however, give lackluster performances with don't lend well to the lackluster plot. Actually the latter two give the best vocal performances of the bunch, particularly will.i.am, who I could foresee having a lucrative future in the business. I suppose the idea of a quick and painless paycheck was reason enough for those two, George Lopez, Jamie Foxx and will.i.am to sign on to the project. The film somehow assembles a cast of A-listers, including Jesse Eisenberg and Anne Hathaway as the stars, though their voice acting does little to keep up with the zippy, meandering plot.

More than anything else they're simply a nuisance, slowing down Blu's attempt to get back home to Linda and into the wings of Jewel. The villains are smugglers, and a dastardly, vicious bird named Nigel, but they're all too hapless to be frightening and too dumb to be entertaining. Instead they focus on Blu's romance with the spunky macaw Jewel and Blu's own insecurities. The story touches on themes of conservation and the dangers of poaching and smuggling, though unlike films like 'Wall-E' in doesn't make a point of truly addressing the importance of the topic. But when an Brazilian ornithologist named Tulio convinces Linda to bring Blu to Rio de Janeiro to mate with the other of the two blue macaws, he finds his world upside down, and much like a fresh college graduate he must face the challenges of real life.

Best friend of the rather sad Linda, Blu is content in drinking hot chocolate and keeping Linda blissfully unaware of how lonely she really is. Now grown up, Blu finds himself more of a human than a bird, snug in his little bookshop paradise in Minnesota and completely uninterested with the animal world. One of only two of his species left in the world, as a chick Blu was captured by smugglers and by sheer luck fell into the lap of a little girl named Linda. In this case it is a blue macaw, ingeniously named Blu, who has never learned to fly.

Like 'Happy Feet' and 'Finding Nemo', our central character is an anthropomorphized animal who struggles with limitations that his brethren do not. Once again Hollywood has banked on the kiddies being wowed by the pretty lights, sweeping into the corner any suggestion of delivering a script with messages other than believing in yourself and the power of friendship conquering all. One crack of that egg and it becomes all too apparent how little substance is supporting all of that style. 'Rio' is a bit like a Faberge egg, pretty and glittering with a completely hollow inside. Written by: Don Rhymer, Joshua Sternin, J.R.

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