Famous actors doing voice actor work

People who make their living doing voice work are truly impressive individuals.

They may seem like they have "easy jobs," because they can sometimes do their work in their pajamas without even leaving their homes, and often get paid handsomely for it.

However, depending on what kind of voice actors they are, they may have to master dozens of different voices, and be able to produce them on cue. Not only that, but if they do recurring characters, they have to make sure they can get the voice exactly right from the last time they did it, and then again for every other time they do it in the future, regardless of how much older they get. (Just think of the Simpsons voice actors, who have been doing the same voices -- sometimes a dozen each -- for a quarter century.)

They also have the difficult challenge of losing a lot of work to "normal" actors. That's where the big animated movies come in. Because the studio needs to make as much money on these movies as possible, they cast a lot of recognizable faces (er, voices) as the leads in these movies.

It would stand to reason, then, that audiences want to hear the actual, default speaking voices they are so accustomed to hearing from these "normal" actors. That's why I find a trio of animated movies I've seen recently so interesting: They feature name actors doing voices that are not their own. In these scenarios, the studios are essentially paying name actors to disguise their trademark speaking voices -- to do the work that a good voice actor usually does.

The first was The Pirates! The Band of Misfits, which it seems like I am talking about almost constantly on the blog these days. Although there are a number of actors "doing themselves" in this movie -- most notably Martin Freeman, Salma Hayek and Jeremy Piven -- the lead actor, Hugh Grant, is up to something different. The voice he's producing as the Pirate Captain is Grant-like, in that it has a few of his trademark affectations, but it is clearly not just Hugh Grant doing Hugh Grant. He's raised the timber of his voice in a way I can't put my finger on. Sometimes, he sounds so unlike Grant that I actually went online to determine if a different actor provided the voice for the British/Australian release of the movie (which is crazy, because Grant himself is British and the pirates are voiced by Brits in the American version I saw last year -- with the exception of Piven and Hayek, I mean).

Then it was The Croods, in which Ryan Reynolds has somehow made himself sound like a teenager. The movie features Emma Stone, an "actual" teenager (in terms of the roles she's still able to play, anyway), as a cavegirl, and Reynolds' character as her caveboy love interest. The role shouts out for someone like Zac Efron, yet Reynolds got the job for his ability to make himself sound like a Zac Efron type. I've always admired Reynolds' ability to do voices, showcased most notably by the spot-on Australian accent he has done on Saturday Night Live (among other places, I'm sure).

The third was yesterday morning, when my son was watching his copy of Alpha and Omega. I actually watched that one with him all the way through about a month ago, and afterward noted that Christina Ricci did the voice for one of the wolves. Since the movie was already over, I couldn't remember exactly whether it sounded like Ricci's voice or not, but on this time through I noted that she was doing a bit of a "baby girl" voice. I could recognize Ricci hidden in their somewhere, but she definitely didn't think she had been hired just to play Christina Ricci. She was kind of doing a Betty Boop version of herself.

If you are one of these actors, I can understand the desire to make the task more challenging for yourself. If you don't have to worry about your facial expressions or your body language, you want the craft of acting to come through in some other way, and what better way than having to master your line readings in a different voice? You could say it's the difference between someone who takes the job as a real acting assignment and someone who just shows up to get paid.

I don't as much understand the studios' motivation to let the actors do a voice, or let the director direct the actors to do a voice. Except that it's probably very simple: The actor is primarily being hired to lend his or her name to the movie poster and the advertising campaign. Once the audience has paid their admission, it doesn't matter if they sound like themselves or like Kermit the Frog.

Kermit the Frog was just a random choice there, but that character may actually illustrate the ultimate challenge to the good voice actor: that he/she is replaceable. After all, Jim Henson was the original voice of Kermit, but Henson died in 1990. Since then, the character has been voiced by a guy named Steve Whitmire. I can't really tell the difference. I guess the more famous a character is, the more talented voice actors are going to have a great impression of that character.

Now, if Ryan Reynolds took over the voice of Kermit ... then I'd be really impressed.

Not as impressed as I'd be if Ricci took over the voice, though.

Three-star animation

I've seen two objectively subpar animated movies in the past ten days - Alpha and Omega and Escape from Planet Earth - and given them both three stars on Letterboxd.

My son saw the Netflix ad for a third objectively subpar animated movie - Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil - pop up after Planet Earth, so he's in there watching it now. I'm in here, typing this, to prevent myself from giving the supposedly terrible Hoodwinked sequel three stars as well.

Something seems clear: I have a harder time recognizing mediocrity in an animated movie than elsewhere.

It's three out of five, not three out of four, but the fact remains that I am giving a passing grade to movies that should probably flunk the test of being worth my time.

I'm entirely too comfortable with rewarding an animated movie for being a "good try." I know that Disney, Pixar and Dreamworks represent really daunting standards to live up to, both in quality of writing and quality of animation, so I'm acknowledging the handicaps that other movies start out with. But that doesn't mean that all other movies deserve the star rating that translates as a modest recommendation.

There are a handful of reasons I think I'm as easy as I am on these movies:

1) The animation, especially these days, is good enough to contain some "wow" moments. Plus, I know how hard they worked on every little detail. Most animated movies are a labor of somebody's love. It's much easier to mail in a live action film.

2) Animated movies tend to get top-flight vocal talent, mostly because it's an easy paycheck and does not carry any particular stigma. Studios will be glad to learn that their money is well spent, as I do tend to be impressed by the fact that William Shatner (who, let's be honest, will do anything these days) voices the villain in Planet Earth.

3) Animated movies are usually smart enough (i.e. safe enough) to stick to conventional plotting with familiar character types. With the amount of money invested in the polished final product, it does not pay to take risks on the story, nor is it possible to slide any remotely objectionable content through.

Vanilla, though, should not be worth three stars. It should max out at 2.5, even if it's pretty well-made vanilla.

However, as I've written before (though never specifically about animated films), I feel like giving something 2.5 or less means it's a thumbs down, an entirely too grumpy dismissal of a movie that's okay to pretty good.

In fact, the last animated movie I remember really slamming was one that did take an apparent risk with its plot -- an impulse I probably should have rewarded, except I thought it was just too wrong-headed of a narrative choice. That movie was Brave, which offered us some cockamamie plot about people turning into bears. I gave it 2.5 stars, but these days tend to think of it as a two-star movie.

So am I saying I like the generic underdog hero story and panoply of colorful sidekicks better in Alpha and Omega, Escape From Planet Earth and (let's throw in one more I saw earlier this year that fits the description) Planet 51? Are they better just because they don't make any egregious errors? Are they better just because the plot was deemed safe enough by every interested financial backer?

I'm a slow learner, apparently, because this is not the first time I've tried to get tougher with my star ratings. It's not even the first time this year. You may recall that back in April, I wrote this post after seeing Trance, frustrated by the instinct that made me want to award it three stars. And I still haven't figured out how to award lower when movies deserve it -- at least not consistently, and especially not with animation.

Maybe this time, I'll do as I write. "It didn't offend me" should no longer be the standard for what gets three stars.

The generosity ends ... now. Again. 

The stink of kiddie

In an age where almost all animated movies are appropriate for five-year-olds, do we really still need to make animated movies that are targeted at three-year-olds?

I may be wrong, but to me, Alpha and Omega (releasing tomorrow) has the stink of kiddie on it.

You've had the experience before. You pop in an animated movie, thinking it's one of the majority of theatrically released animated movies that are filled with pop culture references and winks to their adult viewers. These may not be clever references or winks, but at least you feel like part of the target audience. Then, anywhere from 30 seconds to five minutes into the movie, you realize it's just supposed to be a bunch of bright colors and shapes that will please babies.

Last time this happened to me was last year with Battle for Terra, which featured a very simplistic version of the already simplistic Avatar story (before Avatar was released) in a way that instantly struck me as developed for human beings who were teething.

Back in the day, it used to be easy to tell what kind of animated movie you were getting just from the quality of the animation. When another Winnie the Pooh movie hit theaters, you could be 100% certain it had nothing to offer you, if only because the animation was the furthest thing from cutting edge you could imagine. Now, however, the technology exists to make reasonably credible visuals without giving away your meager means. You can still tell if you look closely, but the average viewer is easily fooled.

So how are you supposed to avoid watching a kiddie movie -- that is, assuming you're not carrying around a little one in a Baby Bjorn?

To assist you in this scenario are Vancetastic's Five Indicators Your Movie is Meant for Toddlers:

1) The characters are all voiced by actors under the age of 12, rather than comic actors who appear in Judd Apatow movies;

2) The trailer is narrated unironically by that guy who did voiceover for that toy commercial you accidentally saw once while channel surfing;

3) Any humor in the trailer has to do with the male character falling on his butt while meeting cute with the female character, or inoffensive bathroom humor;

4) The trailer music is cheesy "adventure music," and the movie is usually about a cheesy adventure of some sort;

5) The animation is at least 20% less sophisticated than Pixar.

Maybe they should also come up with a new rating that's less than G, that says, "Don't watch this unless at least one person in your family cannot form complete sentences."

To be fair, Alpha and Omega already violates at least one of these rules. None of Dennis Hopper, Justin Long, Hayden Pannettiere, Danny Glover or Christina Ricci are under 12, and only Long, Pannettiere and Ricci can play under 12. But you get the idea.

I watched the trailer for Alpha and Omega again just now, and I realize I'm being a bit unfair to it. The animation may only be 15% less sophisticated than Pixar, and it's really working at more of a 7-year-old reading level than a 3-year-old reading level.

But I guess the point in any exaggeration is to illustrate something true, and in this situation, the true thing I'm trying to illustrate is that the most successful animated movies of recent years have made themselves into increasingly sophisticated entities, leaving a huge gulf between them and the ones that are not quite so advanced. Whereas something like Bambi was as much sophistication as anyone needed back in 1942, today, Bambi would be considered highly square, even by pretty young tots. Today, the animated movies kids want to see are the Despicable Mes and the Megaminds, where an evil genius has mastery of high-tech computer equipment. Movies where animals prance through the forest -- like Bambi, and like Alpha and Omega -- are therefore ghettoized as something best suited to show fetuses who are still in their mothers' wombs.

Well, good luck, Alpha and Omega. May you exceed your kiddie stigma at the box office.