After the success of the Angry Birds Toons webseries, Rovio subsequently began development on an adaptation of the Angry Birds video game series, and would proceed to make a proper announcement in December 2012.[8][9] The first image from the film was revealed in October 2014, with Sudeikis, Gad, McBride, Hader, Rudolph, and Dinklage revealed to be part of its cast at the same time.[10] Rovio and Sony Pictures announced that they would spend roughly €100 million for the marketing and distribution of The Angry Birds Movie,[11] surpassing the €8.5 million budget of Big Game (2014) to become the most expensive Finnish-produced film up to that point.[11]Sony Pictures Imageworks was responsible for handling animation services for the film.[12]
The Angry Birds Movie was released in the United States and Canada on May 20, 2016. The film received overall mixed reviews from critics and grossed $352 million worldwide. A sequel, The Angry Birds Movie 2, was released on August 14, 2019, co-produced by Sony Pictures Animation, who were not involved with this film.
Plot
Red, a bird with a short temper, is an outcast on Bird Island, an island containing a village inhabited by anthropomorphic, flightless birds. When he accidentally causes a premature hatching of a bird family's egg, he is sentenced to anger management class, the highest penalty allowed on the island. Two of Red's classmates, Chuck, who is hyperactive and can move at hypervelocity, and Bomb, who can cause explosions with his anger and fear, try to befriend him, but he avoids them.
One day, a boat docks at the island's shore, damaging Red's house. The birds greet two green-colored pigs, the captain Leonard and his assistant Ross, who claim to be peaceful explorers bringing offerings of friendship. They introduce the birds to various innovations, including a giant slingshot, but Red becomes suspicious of the pigs' motives and sneaks into Leonard's boat. Chuck and Bomb follow Red, and they find more pigs hidden below deck, contradicting Leonard's claim that he and Ross are alone. When Red returns and shows everyone the other pigs, the birds accept Leonard's explanation that he only lied to see if Bird Island was safe for his simple-minded cousins.
Still suspecting that there is something off about the pigs, Red recruits Chuck and Bomb to find Mighty Eagle, Bird Island's missing protector and the only bird who can fly. They find Mighty Eagle on top of Eagle Mountain, but he has become an overweight, self-absorbed slacker who has not flown for years. Red discovers the pigs planting dynamite around the island and stealing the eggs while the birds are distracted by a party. When Mighty Eagle refuses to help them, Red admonishes him. Red, Chuck, and Bomb attempt to warn the other birds and stop the pigs, only for the pigs to destroy the village with the dynamite and escape with the eggs. The other birds apologize to Red for not listening to him. Red forgives everyone and under his leadership, they organize an army and build a boat from the rubble to follow the pigs to Piggy Island.
The birds discover the pigs living in a walled city ruled by Leonard, known as "King Mudbeard". Deducing that the eggs are in the castle at the center of the city, the birds use the pig's giant slingshot to launch themselves over the walls and into the city's castle. Most of the birds miss the castle but destroy other buildings. Red, Chuck, and Bomb are successfully shot into the castle. The pigs lower the eggs into a giant pot, planning to cook and eat them. Mighty Eagle, having had a change of heart, arrives to retrieve Red, Chuck, Bomb, and the eggs. One egg falls out of the net and Red battles Leonard for it. They fall into a room containing the pigs' reserve of dynamite, which Leonard accidentally ignites. The dynamite explodes, destroying the city, but the giant pot falls on top of Red, shielding him and the egg from the blast.
All the families, except for one, reunite with their eggs. Red emerges holding the egg, containing three blue hatchlings[a], and returns the brothers to their parents. Mighty Eagle approaches Red, Chuck, and Bomb, claiming that he merely appeared lazy so that they could lose faith in him and find faith in themselves, and takes credit for saving the eggs. As Bird Island is rebuilt, Red discovers that the other birds have rebuilt his house in the center of the village. The pigs survive their home's destruction, and Leonard plots a new plan.
The film was officially announced in December 2012, although IGN noted that this was "after months of speculation".[8] The success of the Angry Birds Toons series, according to Rovio employee Jami Laes, "validated" the idea of creating a feature film.[9]
The first image from the film was revealed in October 2014, with Jason Sudeikis, Josh Gad, Danny McBride, Bill Hader, Maya Rudolph, and Peter Dinklage revealed to be part of its cast.[10] Gad at first refused to star in the movie, feeling that it was too similar to his role as Olaf in Frozen (2013) but the director eventually convinced him to sign through a 30-minute "visual pitch".[18]
The film's budget is estimated at $80 million (€75 million).[11] Rovio and Sony Pictures announced that they would spend roughly €100 million for the marketing and distribution of the film,[11] giving it the largest budget in the film industry in Finland, outvaluing Big Game's (2014) €8.5 million.[11] Despite the massive budget, Rovio CEO Mikael Hed stated that "it is the one that I don't ever lose any sleep over",[19] calling it "tremendously strong as a story".[19] During August 2015, Rovio announced that they were expecting to cut 250 jobs equaling 40% of the company, the only sector spared being personnel working on the movie.[20]
When multiple major studios approached Rovio to discuss the production of the film adaptation in 2010, Hed eventually decided to have Rovio establish its own in-house animation studio and have it work on the film, rather than risk losing creative control in allowing a third-party studio to produce it. David Maisel, the founding chairman of Marvel Studios, offered to help Hed and Rovio produce the film,[21] as well as John Cohen from Illumination Entertainment and Catherine Winder from Lucasfilm, who later served as the film's producers.[22] Animation services were handled by Sony Pictures Imageworks in Vancouver,[12][23] while Skywalker Sound handled audio post-production services.[24]
The Angry Birds characters were not depicted in their anthropomorphized cinematic designs until the film's announcement so as to avoid spoiling it for audiences.[25]
"Wonderful Life" was replaced in international screenings of the film in English with "You Should Be Dancing" by the Bee Gees. Michael Jackson's Bad is featured in 2 trailers.
Marketing
The film's marketing budget was an estimated $300 million, which, along with its production budget of $400 million, was the biggest budget at the time for an animated Sony Pictures film.[6] Tie-ins with McDonald's, Citroën, Ziploc, Panasonic,[36] and a series of six Lego sets were used to promote the film.[37][38] A balloon themed after Red debuted at the 2015 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.[39]
During the film's marketing campaign, the app icons for most Angry Birds games were changed to depict the cinematic version of Red. A series of free-to-play tie-in games were also produced: Angry Birds Action!, Angry Birds Evolution, and Angry Birds Match.
Release
Theatrical
The film was initially scheduled to be released on July 1, 2016,[40] but was later moved forward to May 20.[41] The film was released in Finland on May 13, 2016, and in the United States on May 20, 2016 in RealD 3D and 4DX.[41] An animated short film titled The Early Hatchling Gets the Worm was shown alongside the film in selected theaters.[42]
Home media
The Angry Birds Movie was released on digital HD on July 29, 2016, and on Blu-ray, 4K/3D Blu-ray, and DVD on August 16, 2016 by Sony Pictures Home Entertainment, with four "Hatchlings" shorts included.[43] The film topped the home video sales chart for the week ending on August 21, 2016.[44]
Box office
The Angry Birds Movie grossed $107.5 million in the United States and Canada and $244.8 million in other territories for a worldwide total of $352.3 million.[7] It is the fourth highest-grossing video game film of all-time both worldwide (behind Warcraft,[45]Detective Pikachu, and Rampage)[46] and the sixth highest-grossing domestically,[47] and is also the most successful Finnish-produced film of all time.[48]Deadline Hollywood calculated the net profit of the film to be $72 million.[49]
In the United States and Canada, the film opened on May 20, 2016 alongside Neighbors 2: Sorority Rising (2016) and The Nice Guys (2016), and was projected to gross $35–40 million or as high as $45 million from 3,932 theaters in its opening weekend.[36][50][51]Deadline noted that the film had the benefit of being the only animated movie in theaters until Finding Dory (2016) on June 17.[51]The Angry Birds Movie was the top selling film for the weekend, and grossed $800,000 from Thursday night previews[36] and $11 million on its opening day.[52] In its opening weekend it grossed $38.2 million, finishing first at the box office and marked the third biggest Sony animated opening of all time, behind Hotel Transylvania (2012) and its sequel Hotel Transylvania 2 (2015).[36][53] It also scored the second-best debut weekend ever for a video game adaptation, behind the $47 million debut of Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001).[54] It dropped 51% in its second weekend, against X-Men: Apocalypse (2016) and Alice Through the Looking Glass (2016), grossing $18.7 million.[45]
Reception
On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, 44% of 160 critics' reviews are positive, with an average rating of 5/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "The Angry Birds Movie is substantially more entertaining than any film adapted from an app has any right to be—which may or may not be much of an endorsement."[55]Metacritic, which uses a weighted average, assigned the film a score of 43 out of 100, based on 27 critics, indicating "mixed or average" reviews.[56] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale.[57]
Lindsey Bahr of the Associated Press gave the film a positive review by writing, "Ultimately, The Angry Birds Movie does a decent job exploring the merits of anger. It's no Inside Out, but it has heart and life, which isn't too shabby for any film—app or not."[58]Variety's Guy Lodge called the film: "A fast, fizzy and frenetically entertaining extension of the manic gaming franchise that, at its zenith, had children of all ages glued to their smartphone screens".[59] While Rafer Guzman of Newsday found the film's plot to be "pretty thin gruel," he thought the script was quite funny and that the animation was brightly colored and appealing.[60]
Glenn Kenny of The New York Times gave the film a negative review, writing, "The kids of today deserve better. So do I, come to think of it."[61] In his review for TheWrap, Alonso Duralde wrote, "Let's be clear, then: The Angry Birds Movie isn't pointless because it's based on an app. It's pointless because it's pointless."[62]
IDW Publishing launched a comic book miniseries, titled Angry Birds: Flight School and situated after the events of the film, on February 22, 2017.
Rovio Entertainment has released a new online video spin-off miniseries that takes place sometime after the events of the film, titled Angry Birds Blues, and focuses on the mischievous antics of the newborn Blues. The first episode premiered on Toons.TV on March 10, 2017.[68]
In the summer of 2017, GoComics announced that it will be running a comic strip series based on the world of The Angry Birds Movie, with each issue available to view on its website.[69] The strip ran for over a year, from August 3, 2017 to September 20, 2018.
On June 6, 2024, Rovio announced that a third film was in production, with new parent company Sega Sammy Group producing alongside Rovio Animation, Prime Focus Studios, One Cool Films, Flywheel Media, and Dentsu. It is currently unknown if Sony is involved.[75] John Rice has been attached to direct with Jason Reicher co-directing, Thurop Van Orman, Qui Nguyen and Adele Lim writing the screenplay and John Cohen, Dan Chuba, and Carla Connor producing, while Jason Sudeikis and Josh Gad would reprise their roles as Red and Chuck, respectively.[76]
^Sorensen, Jim, ed. (June 1, 2016). The Art of The Angry Birds Movie. IDW Publishing. p. 9. Hed: "We were first approached in early 2010 by Hollywood studios to discuss making Angry Birds into a feature film...I had in my mind a vision for what the world of Angry Birds was, and I wanted to make sure that we would be in control of what the story of the movie would be. If we had given Angry Birds to another studio to be developed, we would have lost that creative control. So I ultimately decided that we had to try to make the movie ourselves, even if I didn't know how to make that a reality. That is, until I met David."
^Sorensen, Jim, ed. (June 1, 2016). The Art of The Angry Birds Movie. IDW Publishing. p. 10.
^Sorensen, Jim, ed. (June 1, 2016). The Art of The Angry Birds Movie. IDW Publishing. p. 9. Maisel: "[W]e also talked about how to make the movie as big as possible. Mikael and I agreed back in 2011 that...we should do certain things to protect the movie...Let's not let the birds have arms and legs until the movie comes out. Let's not have CGI-grade animation until the movie comes out. These were things that, we knew, if we could protect those things, then the movie had a chance to be really special..."
