Thankful For Movie Musicals: Ray J's Review - "Sing"

Good morning everyone! Welcome to this week's "Thankful For Movie Musicals" review". This time around, I am heading back to 2016 to take a look at the animated movie "Sing" again🎬🎤 Even though "Sing" tends to feel a bit empty plot wise at times, it is an overall good time, with lovely characters, and a superb soundtrack full of familiar hits newer and old😄🎶

"Sing" takes place in a city called Calatonia (a cartoonish twist on California), full of animals living life day by day, yearning for something more! A koala named Buster Moon (voiced by Matthew McConaughey) is the owner of a theater that has fallen on hard times. Trying to think of something that will revive the theater, Buster meets with his best friend, Eddie (voiced by John C. Reilly), also the grandson of the famous actress Nana Noodleman (voiced by Jennifer Saunders), and comes up with the idea of holding a singing contest where anyone can audition. Buster is able to scrounge up $1000 in prize money, in which he proceeds to tell his very elderly assistant, an iguana named Ms. Crawley (voiced by the director of "Sing", Garth Jennings) to make flyers that state the amount, along with telling everyone to come audition. However, the winds of change have other plans, when poor Ms. Crawley's glass eye accidentally pop's out and add's not one, but TWO more zeros to the prize amount on the flyers, making it read $100,000😬 Welp, low and behold the next morning Buster has a massive crowd waiting outside the theater to audition! After hearing auditions from all kinds of animals, and plenty of different genres of music, Buster ultimately makes his choices. Rosita (voiced by Reese Witherspoon), a pig, and mother of twenty five piglets, and the wife of an oblivious husband, Gunther (voiced by Nick Kroll) also a pig, an eccentric one, who is paired with Rosita to form a duo, Mike (voiced by Seth McFarlane), a troublesome mobster mouse with the voice of Frank Sinatra, Ash (voiced by Scarlett Johansson), a spunky teenage punk-rock porcupine - in the midst of a break up with her boyfriend, who was also her singing partner, Johnny (voiced by Taron Egerton) a gorilla with a soulful voice, trying to escape the ongoing criminal activity of his father, plus a trio of frogs, and a camel named Pete. Meena (voiced by Tori Kelly) a shy elephant, with a soaring voice, also auditioned, but due to her stage fright she ultimately fails. However, the audition is not the last you've seen of Meena🎤😉 As rehearsals move forward, the animals struggle to get into the swing of things, along with keeping up with their personal lives. Will Buster's big secret bring everything crumbling down, or will these animals get their chance to belt into the microphone?

While the movie does feel a tad sluggish in the beginning, "Sing" is ultimately an enjoyable watch. Even though these characters are animals, they are presented as human natured individuals, and sometimes you really feel for them🙂 In my opinion, the characters are the best part of "Sing" in addition to the music! My personal favorite characters are Meena, Johnny, Mike, and Ash.

There is an incredibly wide variety of music in "Sing", and on the soundtrack🎶 Including songs originally by Elton John, Taylor Swift, Bananarama, Stevie Wonder, Frank Sinatra, The Zombies, The Beatles, and more! Some of the covers are sung extremely well too👏👏

Consensus: Even though the plot is lacking, the enjoyable soundtrack and highly likable characters in "Sing" will have you applauding throughout😄🎤🎶🎬

The Ray J's Reviews rating is:

4.5 out 5 thankful hands and music notes

🙏🙏🎵🎵 & 1/2