Despicable Me

I have a special place in my heart for supervillains. Such intelligence, dedication, and hard work, all in the name of evil. Given the amount of time and effort they expend on their schemes it's hard not to sympathize with them when some do-gooder in a cape just flies in and ruins everything, er, saves the day. The makers of "Despicable Me" have so much sympathy for these evil geniuses that they've made a film with one as their protagonist.
Gru (voiced by Steve Carell) is a middle-aged supervillain whose exploits are well known throughout the world, so much so that he's considered the best in the business. Until upstart Vector (Jason Segel) comes along and steals himself the Great Pyramid of Giza. Feeling threatened by this much younger evil mastermind, Gru knows he must do something more dastardly than he has ever done before. With the help of his old friend Dr. Nefario (a virtually unrecognizable Russell Brand) and his little yellow minions, Gru is going to steal the moon. That's right. The actual moon. With a little help from his shrink ray he will be able to fit the moon into the palm of his hand. There's one problem though. He doesn't actually have the shrink ray yet which is preventing the Bank of Evil from giving him a much needed loan.
Once Gru steals the shrink ray it doesn't take long for Vector to take it from him. Gru doesn't know how he's going to get it back, until he finds out that Vector will only let three people into his evil lair. Three orphans selling cookies. Gru sets his plan to get it back in motion by adopting the three girls in question, Margo, Edith, and little Agnes. As you can imagine, things don't go exactly as planned for our supervillain hero.
The first feature film from Illumination Entertainment, "Despicable Me" is a wonderfully imaginative look into the life of a man who makes something like moon theft seem like a perfectly normal life goal. (It is, isn't it?) We see Gru as a lonely man with a desire to impress his mother (Julie Andrews), something that has eluded him his whole life. His gradual progression as a man discovering his own heart thanks to three little girls actually comes off as the right kind of cute when it could have easily been nauseating. You find yourself rooting for him to steal the moon and to become a loving father all at once.
He also has one of the most wonderful houses you'll ever see in a movie. Or in real life for that matter. Every room and every piece of furniture is befitting of an evil mastermind. You're going to want his car, or whatever you call it, as well. What you'll want more than anything however are your very own minions. They're just cute and funny enough to be loved by small children and just evil enough so that we believe that they would work for Gru. I liked the fact that all of them seemed to truly love their jobs too.
"Despicable Me" is the second great animated movie of the summer and its only shortcoming is the character of Vector. He's not a bad character but as the villain of a supervillain it would have been nice if he had a stronger personality and been given a little bit more to do. He's also probably the least funny character in the film, which is disappointing. This one flaw aside though, this is an extremely funny and incredibly enjoyable movie. Let's face it. At one time or another you probably found yourself watching a film and rooting for the bad guy. This is a movie that encourages you to and what's not to love about that? No matter your age this is one to see as soon as possible. 9/10.