Playmobil: The Movie

There is a gentleness and simplicity to the adventure-seeking vibe of Playmobil: The Movie that will work particularly well for very young audiences.

This is a vastly inferior toy-to-film IP expansion, with duller songs, dumber jokes, and forgettable voice work.

There's a plot in there somewhere, but most of the time it's subsumed by a frenetic attempt to showcase the whole Playmobil range in an extended kinetic eruption of primal sound and primary colour.

Playmobil: The Movie isn't as funny as some of the direct-to-video Lego-related movies, either, and that's very much the field it competes in, theatrical release or not.

Best watched running in the background of a playdate for pre-schoolers, buried under the noise of kids' own imaginations but offering the occasional distraction from a total toddler meltdown.

It does not even work as a commercial, never showing us why these toys could be especially fun to play with.

Even when you remove the comparisons to The Lego Movie, it’s a redundant tale with little artistic difference to dozens of other films like it. At best the film is a 90 minute distraction, and at worst it’s a cynical marketing ploy.

Filmmakers are working its way down to the very bottom of the toy box with Playmobil: The Movie.

"...great adventures and a heartwarming sibling relationship, it is unable to offer anything past what others have been able to achieve before it."

It might be a generic animated adventure for most of its runtime, but there's a sense of uncomplicated joy to Playmobil: The Movie that makes it a really enjoyable ride.