Hit or Miss Trailer Predictions: Capture the Flag

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Welcome back to Hit or Miss Trailer Predictions. This is a series of first impression articles covering the newest trailers on animated films, and breaking down the good or bad that the trailer offers.

When you watch a trailer for a movie, you want to make sure what you see is easily translatable to the normal moviegoer. You want them to know the set-up, the characters, and maybe throw in a few jokes/action sequences to fill up the trailer. Basically, you don’t want to confuse the moviegoer with what kind of story your movie is telling. Apparently, no one told that to the individual who edited the English trailer for Capture the Flag, a Spanish-animated film being directed by Enruique Gato, who you might know as the director of Tad the Lost Explorer. Definitely off to a good start, aren’t we? (Once again, notice my sarcasm). Let’s get to it. Here is a trailer for the film, and you can make your own conclusions.

 

The Animation



Honestly, the animation doesn’t look terrible. This film seems to have a bigger budget for the animation department than many other foreign CGI animated films, and it doesn’t look as clunky as say, Tad the Lost Explorer or The Snow Queen. It still doesn’t look as good as anything Disney or Pixar releases, but you can tell they put a little more effort into the overall presentation.

 

The Story



Unfortunately, this is where I have the biggest problem with the trailer; the story looks to be all over the place. Capture the Flag seems to have four different movies in one. You have a surfing movie, a ‘kid trying to bring his family back together’ movie, a space flight movie, and then a family-oriented sci-fi movie at the end. It should never be this complicated. For example, you watch the trailer for Ernest & Celestine, one of my all-time favorite films, and the trailer shows off an offbeat/quirky friendship that the two characters make, and one that their respective societies don’t think should happen. It’s easy to get into, and you aren’t confused by the end of it. Capture the Flag just looks confused in what it wants to be.

 

Art Direction



I honestly don’t have much to say about this part of the film. It has a generic Pixar-style look. It at least looks better than Snow Queens or Legend of Oz: Dorothy’s Return.

 

Humor



This is sadly another part about which I don’t have a lot to say. The humor sounds generic, and I’m not saying this film needs to be laugh-out-loud hilarious, but it would help if the writing was better, and I couldn’t see the jokes coming a mile away. Or, just make the writing more charming.

 

Any last minute good/bad comments?



Capture the Flag sounds like it’s trying to be hip and ‘with it’. With all the surfing and terms like “dude” being used, this would have been more fitting, even if still dated, if it relwased in the 90s. It reminds me again why films like How to Train your Dragon, Toy Story, Beauty and the Beast, and Song of the Sea work. Just be your own thing, and not stress out about being modern with the young kids. Remember, the kids who are seeing this are probably being taken by their parents. Entertain both!

 

Prediction: Critical Miss Maybe?



I feel like this film will probably be a critical bomb on release here in the states, but who knows. It could be like Dreamwork’s Sinbad film where it tries too hard to be for the younger crowd, but still has all of those elements that make any Sinbad film fun to watch. I’m glad to see the animation is better than most, but if they would just dial back on the pandering, take out a few of the plot elements, and be a more relatable or stable film, it would be much better. I don’t think Paramount, Capture The Flag’s distributor, has a huge hit on their hands, but we will have to see.