CINEMA: Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa

In which our friends Alex the lion, Marty the zebra, Melman the giraffe and Gloria the hippo finally get to leave Madagascar due to the ingenuity of those pesky penguins who manage to repair King Julien’s damaged plane (oh, and he comes along for the ride too). However, instead of ending up back at New York Zoo, the animals crash-land in Africa and investigate their roots.

As in the original, there are some great visual gags and there’s a strong message about loyalty to family and friends. Also making a guest appearance is the grumpy granny who roughed Alex up in the last movie and she’s more than ready for a rematch, and the talking chimps who discover their native brothers and sisters aren’t exactly hot on the conversation front. Once again, however, the main characters and vocal stars (Ben Stiller, Chris Rock, David Schwimmer, Jada Pinkett Smith) are overshadowed by the awesome penguins who really do now deserve a full-length vehicle of their own.

Their Great Escape antics are scattered liberally throughout, but there’s just not enough of them and things do fall a little flat when they are not on screen.      Dee Pilgrim

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