Film Review - Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile
Images courtesy of Sony Pictures.
What are you expecting from a Sony rendition of a decades old kid’s cartoon strip about a singing crocodile, adapted for the big screens for 2022 with Shawn Mendes taking the lead as the titular Lyle, the crocodile? If you say a middling family movie, ripe for the holiday period of the year then you have no imagination. Sure, you have a good intuition, but where is your soul?
If you’ve been paying attention to Sony recently, they’ve actually gotten pretty good at this whole animation thing - and especially good at corn, or maybe you call it camp. All I’m trying to say here is that after their forays with Venom and (don’t kick me for this one, just wait to see where I’m going with it) The Emoji Movie, their animation department has become quite adept at creating beautiful, mediocre characters who are an absolute joy to look at. And the best part is, they have the budget to keep going and never stop, no matter how middling their movies typically end up being.
With Lyle, the thing is, he’s adorable. Ever since Baby Yoda it’s been a wild competition between these scary studios to create the single cutest protagonist to slap on a poster and make into a plushie. And while I don’t think Lyle is on Tickle Me, Elmo!’s level of Christmas list demand, the guy is just incredibly delightful to look at. There’s a little bit of the Godzilla problem in the beginning where they try to hide the big guy away for dramatic flair, but that’s entirely unnecessary in a movie about a singin’ croc. It’s cute, but when two hours feels a little too long anyway, I can see where the cutting could’ve been easiest for those involved.
And that Mendes kid, how’s he doing these days? Can he act? I don’t know! True to the character, his role in the film is relegated to the soundtrack where he can only sing - that’s right, no talking. It’s cute, and it saves Shawn from having to dabble as deeply as Corden and Swift did with their acting in Cats. Truth be told anyway, we don’t need the man to talk, his singing is the cream of the crop, and Lyle doesn’t skimp with the songs, dancing, or cutesy cookie-cutter characters.
The supporting cast is an arrangement of fools you’ve seen before; stereotypes of anxious dorks, or archetypes of neighbours from hell, but what Lyle doesn’t have is a solid antagonist. I don’t see it as much of a problem, but Alvin and the Chipmunks figured it out so I think Lyle could’ve too.
Lyle, Lyle, Crocodile is screening in cinemas from Boxing Day, Monday 26th December 2022. For tickets and more info, click here.