Stanko's Stance

“Barry B. Benson, a bee just graduated from college, is disillusioned at his lone career choice: making honey. On a special trip outside the hive, Barry’s life is saved by Vanessa, a florist in New York City. As their relationship blossoms, he discovers humans actually eat honey, and subsequently decides to sue them.“

Director: Simon J. Smith, Steve Hickner
Writer: Jerry Seinfield, Spike Ferensten, Barry Marder
Staring: Jerry Seinfield, Renée Zellweger, Barry Marder, Andy Robin, Chuck Martin, Tom Papa
Streaming: Netflix
Release Date: November 2, 2007

I have some questions before I get into the movie.

Why did Jerry Seinfeld want to make this movie? Why the Bee Movie? How did this movie cost 150 million dollars to make? How did it gross almost 300 million dollars world wide. There was a video game made based off this movie? Why has Jerry Seinfeld never acted again? Who was this movie made for? What is this movie trying to be?

Bee Movie is perplexing. There are jokes centered at kids and jokes centered towards adults. It starts out as a child coming to age story and trying to understand his place in the hive to a procedural law tale with a rather heavy lesson at the end. Maybe the writers were pushing the quickly accelerating childhood, adulthood and elderly reflection due to the accelerated lifespan of a bee; but maybe I am giving them too much credit.

The entire story centers around Barry B. Benson (Jerry Steinfeld) and his existential crisis. Looking for a purpose in life he ventures out of the hive and finds himself interacting with a human by the name of Vanessa Bloom (Renée Zellweger). Then the story fast forwards and Barry is going against the human race in court while seducing Bloom and stealing her away from her husband.

Patrick Warburton plays the husband of Bloom and he is the best part of the movie. He is the only one speaking rationally about talking bees! Also he should be pissed that a bee is stealing his wife!

I may be over talking the Bee Movie‘s plot, so let’s get to the humor. There are some clever moments (like the absurdity of the Ray Liotta honey), but for the most part the jokes are just oh-so-simple. You have a bloodsucking lawyer joke, the Larry King skit, the drag queen bee joke and the classic same clothes but let’s be different today gag. The humor was not for me. The humor was not clever. It was in your face and being like NOTICE ME!

Now if you are asking why I watched Bee Movie, it is only because I am going into the depths of my movie podcasts and catching up on episodes I missed. I do not listen to episodes if I haven’t seen the movie, and this particular podcast did a nostalgia review of this movie (for some reason).

STANKO RATING: D+ (2.0/5 Stars)

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