If you were to rate all family movies containing CG animals on a scale from 1-10 of tolerability, where 1 is an excruciating ordeal like
Air Bud and 10 is a touching Pixar masterpiece like
Up,
Mr. Popper’s Penguins would fall right in the middle. While it’s by no means a classic, the movie does have heart, thanks mostly to the undeniably cute penguins -- which, for perhaps the first time in animation history, are never visually distinguishable as fake. (There were real penguins used in the filming, too, but to the filmmakers’ credit, you can’t tell when you’re seeing fake ones vs. real ones, unless a penguin is doing something obviously artificia...
Released:
2011
Rated:
PG
Length:
94 mins