Review: 'Planet 51' sputters and crashes

Just when you think the state of animated films is at an all-time high, along comes "Planet 51."

Mediocre, clunky and just so not special, "Planet 51" is written by Joe Stillman, the guy who wrote "Shrek," and again this movie features green people. It's time to find another color.

The premise is funny enough. American astronaut Chuck Baker (Dwayne Johnson) lands on a far-off planet thinking he is claiming it for Earth. But it turns out the planet is inhabited by a bunch of green creatures who are caught in an inexplicable "Happy Days" time warp.

You can almost hear the original pitch, and it sounds good. But the movie actually centers on nerdy green guy Lem (Justin Long). He's just landed an assistant's job at the local observatory, and pines for next door neighbor Neera (Jessica Biel), a would-be rebel who hangs out with a bunch of hippie types trying to find something worth protesting.

Enter astronaut Chuck. Since this planet is wrapped up in the '50s, it is obsessed with alien invasion movies; and so he is immediately tagged as a menace and spends the entirety of the film running from authorities, with the help of Lem.

Again, all of this sounds better than it is. The hippie-dippie joke is marginal the first time; the 15th time it rolls around, you're just groaning. The '50s stuff is great ... for 15 minutes. And Chuck's big-chinned, sparkling grin grows tiresome within minutes.

Co-directed by newbies Jorge Blanco, Javier Abad and Marcos Martinez, the film is chock-full of pop-culture references, but its jokes fall flat again and again. It's a series of good concept-bad timing events.

When it comes to "Planet 51," you're better off back here on Earth.

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