Netflix And Chill: Unfrosted (2024)

Please feel free to read the following in the style of an exaggerated Jerry Seinfeld impression. What's the deal with non-bread breakfast that you put into the toaster? We have bread for that. Oh, you want fruity goodness too? Put some jam on top. Got a sweet tooth? Add chocolate spread. Want it all feeling as if you have some kind of acceptable hot pocket to start the day with? Just fold it over. But no, someone had to go and invent Pop-Tarts, a filled pastry product made by popping it into your toaster.

A satirical look at the breakfast cereal landscape, and the creation and marketing of the Pop-Tart, Unfrosted is directed by Jerry Seinfeld, stars Jerry Seinfeld in the main role of Bob Cabana, and was written by Seinfeld, Spike Feresten, Andy Robin, and Barry Marder. While it doesn't really help anyone to understand the landscape of breakfast brand creation and marketing, it certainly helps people to understand why Seinfeld seems to have spent the last few years going on about people not being able to just be funny any more. While constantly bemoaning a cultural landscape that he believes is restricting and throttling comedians, Seinfeld has really been signifying to us all that he is just no longer all that funny. And Unfrosted proves that.

Look, I'm no comedian (successful or otherwise), and I have had nowhere near the amount of experience that Seinfeld has. But has Seinfeld actually done much on his own to allow himself to be positioned as some wise commentator on the state of society as a whole, and how it has specifically affected comedy? I am going to say no. Seinfeld is a half-decent stand-up comic who has had his greatest achievements due to the work of other people, whether that is Larry David behind the scenes or the co-stars that we all think of when we think of Seinfeld. And that's a show named after himself.

But let's get back to Unfrosted, as unfunny and charmless as it is. Aside from Seinfeld in his main role, the cast also includes Jim Gaffigan, Amy Schumer, Christian Slater, Melissa McCarthy, Cedric The Entertainer, Thomas Lennon, James Marsden, Tony Hale, Hugh Grant, and many more. Everyone gets a moment, with the slight and silly plot just used as a framework to jump from one selection of gags to the next, but only a select few can do enough to rise above the material. Schumer isn't bad, McCarthy is as much fun as she usually is (I'm a fan, but that statement will also help those who dislike her usual schtick know that they can avoid this), Slater is a lot of fun as a threatening milkman, and Bill Burr is very funny in his portrayal of JFK. It's Grant who steals the film though, looking slightly shame-faced as a classical actor hiding away inside the suit of Tony The Tiger, that well-known breakfast cereal mascot who assured us all that the bowl we were served every morning tasted "grrrrrrrrrreat."

I'm sure that everyone involved in this had fun. There are so many people popping up for one or two scenes, so many different ideas and gags added to the mix, that it feels as if someone came up with the premise to simply gather friends together and have a lot of fun. Good for them. It doesn't translate to a fun viewer experience though. Did I laugh a few times? Yes. Did I hate the whole thing? No. It just all seemed so random and pointless though, and as smug as many other Seinfeld appearances I have seen in recent years (whether he's having coffee in cars with someone much funnier than himself or being interviewed about how he and his peers can no longer deliver jokes to audiences who just don't recognise comedy any more).

People can still very much recognise comedy. It's just that people no longer recognise some of Seinfeld's material as being very funny. Maybe it never was, considering how he has spent his career surrounding himself with layers of other people's talent, or maybe I'm just judging him too harshly after having wasted 97 minutes of my time on this nonsense.

3/10

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Netflix And Chill: Bee Movie (2007)

Look, I am easily pleased by puns and CGI that is halfway-decent. That means that most modern movies aimed at younger viewers will tend to keep me amused. I'm not always the most mature person in the room, and I am absolutely fine with that. I am fine with being able to sit back and do my best to be open to whatever a movie is trying to provide. But that doesn't mean that I'll just sit there and give everything a free pass, even if it may seem that way sometimes when I am reviewing movies while being more charitable than some.

Bee Movie isn't as bad as you may have heard. It's also not that good. It sits squarely in the middle, hampered by some strange choices in the plotting and voice cast.

Jerry Seinfeld is the voice of Barry B. Benson, a bee who doesn't necessarily want to move straight into his working life when he is deemed ready for it. Despite the protests of his friend, Adam (Matthew Broderick), Barry heads off for a trip into the wider world outside. He then ends up befriending a human named Vanessa (Renée Zellweger), which leads to him finding out the horrible truth about just what happens to all of the honey that the bees make. Something has to be done, but what will the repercussions be?

Directed by Simon J. Smith and Steve Hickner, two men who have a directorial selection composed of more shorts than features (although the latter has a much more extensive selection of projects he has worked on as an artist), this is a strange central concept that is squeezed into a fairly traditional, family-friendly, movie. A lot of people worked on the script, including Seinfeld, and it feels like all of them had a different idea of just what kind of film they were making. Ironically, that makes some of the crazier moments among the most fun, certainly for older viewers (the highlight being a moment in which Ray Liotta is called as a witness in a court case, playing himself).

As much as I like Seinfeld, his voice doesn't feel right for the lead role here, and I'd struggle to think of any animated movie that would work with his particular vocal stylings at the centre of things. Matthew Broderick is better in the role of the best friend who is happy with his lot in life. Zellweger is also good in her role, helping to sell the fact that her character can become firm friends with a bee. But the best work comes from the three people I can enjoy listening to at any time: John Goodman (as a lawyer), Chris Rock (a mosquito), and Patrick Warburton (a human who has his life turned upside down by Barry).

Children should enjoy seeing the world that is created for these bees to be living, and working, in. Adults should enjoy the more random moments, such as that Liotta highlight and a honey-steeped homage to The Graduate. Few people will enjoy the whole thing as a cohesive movie experience, but there are enough moments to amuse and help the runtime pass by painlessly enough. Oh, and the CGI is halfway-decent. Halfway.

5/10

You can buy it here.
Americans can buy it here.