When I think about the house I grew up in — my football-themed bedroom, the big family room, the yard — there are always Lego bricks everywhere. And I’m clearly not alone, because everyone in my packed theater watching The Lego Movie this weekend seemed to have the same experience I did: a 100-minute exercise in nostalgia, rendered in RealD 3D.
It's the first big-budget Lego movie in the company's 80-year history, made painstakingly over five years in concert with writer–director duo Phil Lord and Chris Miller. Its cast list is riddled with A-list actors, its marketing is massive and unavoidable — and it's a shockingly fun, remarkably entertaining movie. Sure, it's an hour and a half of advertising for Lego, but if this is the future of marketing, sign me up.