Marketic It's no definitive masterpiece but it's damn close.

Platicsco Good story, Not enough for a whole film

Usamah Harvey The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Jakoba True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

bobytom When I saw the trailers and posters of it, I just thought it to be just a typical talking-funny-animal film with shoehorned celebrity voices and lame or derivative humor that we normally expect from non-Disney-or-Pixar animated features. However, after seeing it recently, it was somewhat slightly better than I thought. Not great, but just alright. ----------------First off, the idea is very potential. I mean, we are talking about the old but beloved story about the origins of Christmas, the birth of Jesus. Unfortunately, the way they handled that tales isn't that great, resulting in a rather derivative and predictable underdog plot, where donkey named Bo wants more from his life, but accidentally ends up with Maria and Joseph on a quest to arrive at Bethlehem and help them to give birth to a new king, while at the same time save the couple from a hunter with two evil dogs. But the biggest problem with the film is that it rather wants to be more of a funny-animal cartoon with goofball antics rather than a more serious story about Christ's birth. Maybe the idea of telling the story through the point-of-view of the animals could have worked. I mean, there are many good films with the talking-animal aspect, like 101 dalmatians for example. But the way it did there isn't that strong and they probably aimed it too much for children, resulting in a rather flat and lazy storyline.Granted, it does have a huggable sense of heart when it comes to the couple and I found the ending to be rather sweet and really emotional. I also did like the humor a bit. Some scenes were worth the chuckle, but it does get rather juvenile at times like in the scenes of the cross-eyed goat and the pigeon doing some dumb and out-of-place twerking. Boy, how executive-driven it is, isn't it? I did hear the English version of it, but I only watched it entirely in Finnish dub. I feel it sounds a little better and more enjoyable than the original one, so maybe I did find it to be a bit funnier than I expected. Otherwise, the story is rather flat and sometimes childish. -------------------I personally didn't get annoyed by any of the characters, but there are way too many of them. Bo and Ruth, the dogs and maybe the villain are fine, but maybe not so terribly interesting. Mary and Joseph, on the other hand, are quite lovely and probably the most relatable, since their struggle to have a child of God is somewhat believable enough. The rest is not that important and it's so blatant that many of them are for the sake of name recognition. Dave the pigeon could be enjoyable, but I swear Bo could have figured out the things just by himself. The camels are predictably pointless and even the three farm animals, including the surprisingly talented singing horse, at the end are easily forgettable and useless. Yes, even in both original English and Finnish dub, the actors tried their best and I did enjoy their performances at times, but sadly, it doesn't save the one dimensional and many of the pointless characters in here. ----------But I was pretty surprised how good the film looks. Yes, the budget is rather tiny compared to any mainstream animation and it may not be perfect, but still. Designs are very fine. Animals look very good, but it can get a tad generic. Humans were drawn well too, especially the couple looks really beautiful. I was even more impressed with how the lighting and textures, especially the fur of the animals, look believable and how the artists were able to create a time travel over 2000 years back of how the ancient cities and other places look newer and much lusher than now. On the other hand, the animation and the rendering aren't so strong and smooth and that goat looks honestly kinda ugly and seems to reflect too much on the budget. Even with that, the Canadian animators tried their best with the low amount of money they had. ----------------It could have been something great, but it was obviously targeted at kiddies. Sure, the animation is very nice and it has some great heart, but unfortunately, it ain't Prince of Egypt.

Animated Antic I'll be completely honest here and just go out and say that "The Star" is not a movie for me. I can say that there is an audience for it, but it's probably not going to be a very big one as this is a Religious film. The film is essentially a retelling of the Nativity story with animals, and yeah that's basically about it. There's really not much to go off from this film. It's essentially pretty boring, but it's harmless. It really just went in one ear and exited the other leaving not much of a big impact, though it did have some terrible moments.There's really not much to the story. It is, like I previously said, a retelling of the Nativity story though it does have some animals in it. Essentially, Mary (Gina Rodriguez) gets blessed by God to deliver the messiah and she and her husband Joseph (Zachary Levi) depart for Bethlehem to deliver the child along with a donkey named Bo (Steven Yeun), a dove named Dave (Keegan-Michael Key) and a sheep named Ruth (Aidy Bryant) while a conflict occurs where King Herrod (Christopher Plummer, though honestly he could have been played by anyone else) sends out an executioner and his two dogs to kill Mary. And that's about it. It's nothing really that special.This is the third animated movie released in 2017 by Sony Pictures Animation who had a really, really bad year. I wasn't particularly fond of "Smurfs: The Lost Village" and the less that can be said about "The Emoji Movie", the better. Although this film is nowhere near as bad as their previous film, it is not a good flick either. The story, for the most part, is pretty boring. The film has a really dull, dragged out pace and also tries to throw in some modern day humor rather than attempt to make it timeless which is something that I cannot stand in animated movies. As for the animation, it's okay at best. There's nothing really to brag about as it looks passable for my standards though I will admit that I did like some of the landscapes. The characters are also not exactly memorable either. Bo is just a bland and boring optimistic protagonist, Dave is the annoying comic relief, and Mary and Joseph are just nice but have nothing to stand out about them. The one exception was the character of Ruth who I did like as she had a charming likable personality and Bryant's performance was really well done. However, the same cannot be said for Keegan-Michael Key who really annoyed me as Dave. I honestly think that it's kind of an embarrassment for him because while he was in this boring and bland Nativity story retelling, his comedy sketch partner, Jordan Peele made a bigger splash this year with "Get Out". Yeah, he really needs to do something bigger than this.So, there's really not much to brag about "The Star". It's there for those that want to see it and if you don't you can easily ignore it. I know I didn't put a lot into this review though honestly, the movie gave me nothing to work with either. It's just bland and boring, but it's easily harmless. I'll just leave it there.

erinbug-14340 I loved this movie! I am a teenager and I went to see it with my mother and nine year old sister. She laughed the whole movie, and so did I. I especially like the stupid camel but Bo was also cute. Mary and Joseph were well animated and the voice actors were great! Took me a long time to realize the voice of Joseph was also Flynn Ryder. This movie is great for all ages, and has good and wholesome humor that is unlike other kids movies. By that, I mean it is actually funny and not totally corny. I really hope that Sony will come out with more Bible stories. Sony, you aced this! I think it had a creative and entertaining twist with a good plot, but it still did the story of Jesus's birth a good amount of justice. Perfect to educate kids about Christmas. I never see movies like this anymore.. Almost reminds me of the Biblical Dreamworks movies. I wish more movies like this were coming out, and I think Sony has a talent for this type of movie! I think honestly there is a hidden demand for these types of movies, but it's overshadowed by a lot of the negative and dark movies released today. I love seeing positive movies like this that warm my heart and even give me chills at some parts versus crude humor tucked away in other children's movies, almost like a bone thrown at the adults watching to keep them from falling asleep.

Charles Lia 'The Star' is a delightful animated adaptation of the story of the Nativity of Jesus, aimed for younger children. It includes a lot of entertaining animal characters (some of which accompanied Jesus in the manger when he was born) and some songs to make it appealing to young and old alike. While not exactly Disney-standard, there a lot of redeeming qualities that differentiate 'The Star' from other uninspired adaptations.This film follows the story of Bo, the ambitious donkey working for the town's miller who wants to be part of the Royal Caravan one day. One day he manages to escape with the help of his old friends, who at last recognizes the beauty of Bo's dreams. By focusing on Bo instead of Christ or the story as it is written in the Bible, I was initially afraid that this film was going to be out of focus. You might argue that it still is so it can amuse its very young target audience. But I believe that at in its heart this film is still about Christ, the film just uses Bo's story to give a fresh perspective on the narrative of the Nativity we all know so well.This point is worth some emphasis. 'The Star' focuses more on Bo than on Christ, more on Herod's buff soldier who tries to hunt down Joseph and the pregnant Mary than Herod himself, more on the camels carrying The Three Wise Men on their journey following the Star to the place where the Messiah is born in Bethlehem than on the Three Wise Men themselves and so on. Yet, when taking into consideration its target audience of young children, most of them not older than 7 or 8 years, it wouldn't have made a lot of sense to portray the story of the Nativity as it truly was, with all of the persecution (of Christ by Herod) and bloodshed ("the massacre of the innocents") the real story has. If you want a loyal adaptation of the story of the Nativity for your children, unfortunately you have to look elsewhere, but if you want a lighthearted, fresh and new perspective this is as good as it gets.A lot of comic relief is supplied by Bo's amusing and loyal friend, the pigeon Dave. The villain, as those familiar with the Bible should know, is Herod, voiced by Christopher Plummer. The voice acting, it must be said, is not outstanding, in the sense that none of them really stand out, not even Mariah Carey as the horse, Rebecca, or Oprah Winfrey as one of the Three Wise Men's camels, Deborah. Nevertheless, all of the voice actors manage to get the job done satisfactorily.To conclude, I would like to add something about the film's religious theme and inspiration. Even if you're not a particularly religious person, you cannot fail to appreciate the epic grandeur and poetic beauty of the biblical account of the Nativity, such as the metaphoric and symbolic nature of the Star and the ironic facts that Jesus, the son of God, was born in a manger of all places and that Bo does end up working in a royal caravan by accompanying Joseph and Mary. The point the film wants to emphasize is that we are all following our own unique star, like Bo and Joseph and Mary, even if some of us don't know where it is leading us or going to lead us yet.I would recommend 'The Star' which offers a fresh new perspective to the story we all know so well, obviously keeping in mind all of the liberties in takes. To their credit, the producers do try to preserve all of the Christian values and significance that are to be found in the biblical account of the Nativity (if not the Bible itself). And that's arguably the most important thing in an adaptation like this film.