Yogi Bear 3D

For over 50 years, the smart Yogi Bear, together with his faithful companion Boo Boo, has been trying to steal visitors' "Pickenick" baskets at Jellystone Park, making life difficult for Ranger Smith. After several TV series, specials and animated feature films, the legendary Hanna-Barbera cartoon has made it to our cinemas as a mix of live-action film and computer animation - and even in 3D!

The story here follows the classic pattern of the early Yogi Adventures: while Yogi Br keeps coming up with new tricks to get his hands on the delicious "Pickenick" baskets from visitors to Jellystone Park, Ranger Smith (Tom Cavanagh) has to deal with a whole new set of troubles: Backstabbing Mayor Brown (Andrew Daly) wants to sell the land on which the park is located to make up his small town's financial deficit - and secure election as governor. With the help of documentary filmmaker Rachel (Anna Faris), Smith puts together a big celebration to save the park from closure. But when Yogi Bear and Boo Boo also try to help, the day ends in disaster and Brown seems to have won. But when Yogi Bear realizes that an end to the park also means an end to delicious "pickenick"baskets, he takes up the fight against the corrupt politician and his aides...

"Yogi Bear" presents itself in the exact tradition that the animation-real film mixes of "Garfield" and "Alvin & the Chipmunks" have already successfully conquered theaters. Adorable animated main characters who cause a hell of a lot of chaos in their real-life surroundings - all, of course, with plenty of kid-friendly humor that viewers over the age of 14 will have little fun with. "Yogi Bear" is not a particularly good film, but at least it's a fairly harmless-nice children's film that presents its ecological message wrapped up in a more or less amusing adventure.

A few positive things should definitely be said about the film, though: both Yogi Bear and Boo Boo are very well animated and capture the spirit of the old cartoon series well. Also, some of the 3D effects are really worth seeing. For example, delicious nacho chips fly towards the viewer right in the first few minutes, which is of course absolutely fitting, especially in multiplex cinemas. Also convincing are some of the gags around the completely over-the-top sleazy mayor and his lackeys. The running gag with the car window or his election commercial should get a few small laughs even from older viewers.

Otherwise, the nicely filmed action remains rather flat, but is not annoyingly bad. Especially in comparison to the similarly styled film adaptations of "Garfield", "Yogi Bear" is even relatively well done. Not a masterpiece, nowhere near as charming as the old cartoons, but well worth watching as harmless family entertainment for smaller audiences!

An article by Frankfurt-Tipp