Norm of the North

"You want some perspective to how bad this movie is? Rob Schneider is the star of this film. ROB SCHNEIDER is the star of this film. ROB SCHNEIDER IS THE STAR OF THIS F*CKING FILM!!!"
— BlackCriticGuy

Norm of the North

After its release, it became a great lesson in how not to make such movies!

Genre:	Comedy
Directed By:	Trevor Wall
Written By:	Daniel R. Altiere Steven M. Altiere Malcolm T. Goldman
Starring:	Rob Schneider Heather Graham Ken Jeong Colm Meaney Loretta Devine Gabriel Iglesias Michael McElhatton Bill Nighy
Distributed By:	Lionsgate
Release Date:	January 15, 2016 (United States) March 18, 2016 (Ireland)
Runtime:	88 minutes
Country:	United States India Ireland
Sequel:	Norm of the North: Keys to the Kingdom

Norm of the North is a computer-animated comedy film produced by Splash Entertainment and distributed by Lionsgate.

Plot

Norm the polar bear doesn't know how to hunt, but he does possess the unique ability to talk to humans. When the wealthy Mr. Greene unveils his idea to build luxury condos in the Arctic, Norm realizes that his beloved home is in jeopardy. Accompanied by three mischievous lemmings, Norm stows away on a ship to New York. Once there, he meets a surprising ally who helps him hatch a scheme to sabotage the shady developer's plans.

Why It Sucks

Similar to many television shows and movies animated by Splash Entertainment, this movie has bad, weak, and cheap-looking computer-animation with a few mediocre graphics, to the point where it looks more like a early 2000s computer-animated film rather than one made in the 2010s.
Dull plot, with an unsatisfying ending.
Unoriginal ideas, such as but not limited to:
- Norm being an outcast and becoming accepted by his community at the end of the film through saving them is similar to Chicken Little's plot.
- It even steals elements from other animated movies, such as Happy Feet^GMW, Open Season^GMW, The Lion King^GMW, and Madagascar^GMW.
The movie relies heavily on unfunny and immature humor and gross-out scenes. One example is a scene where (and we're seriously not joking about this) the lemmings urinate in a fish tank that goes on for 30 seconds, and the ending has Norm twerking.
- To add insult to injury with the first scene, Vera even calls the Lemmings "cute and very marketable" because of them urinating in the tank.
- And speaking of which with the ending, the movie showcases twerking throughout the whole thing.
The film suffers from atrocious writing. For example, Mr. Greene becomes popular after trying to shoot an innocent bystander (that being Norm) with a tranquilizer gun at a "public" restaurant, and there are multiple fake-out deaths with Norm and his grandfather. The film also repeatedly points out how ludicrous a talking polar bear is, which, unfortunately, does not make the idea any less ridiculous.
Several aspects of the movie are very nonsensical and unrealistic. For example:
- Hunting is treated as if it was a sport in this movie when it's something animals are required to do so they can survive. Also, Norm is said to not be good at hunting. If that is the case, then he should have starved to death long ago.
- At one point in the movie, Norm mentions that the lemmings do not have any bones, even though lemmings in real life do have bones.
- Mr. Greene's plan is contrived and dumb since the idea of buying houses in the Arctic is very unreasonable. First of all, why would anyone think that it is a great idea to build condos in the Arctic when the ice caps are unstable and melting? Second, if the condos that were built are destroyed due to the melting ice caps, then the condo owners can sue Mr. Greene and win the case.
The heroes' plans don't make any sense either.
- Norm plans to pretend to be a human disguised as a polar bear, because somehow real polar bears look like fake polar bears. How can real creatures look like fake ones?
- There are several instances where characters carelessly approach polar bears, which are dangerous animals. Although Norm is fictional, that's why.
- If Norm had never left the Arctic, nothing would have happened anyway since the approval rating to sell houses in the Arctic was only at 1%.
Several characters have poor and annoying characterization. One example is Mr. Greene, who constantly runs and jumps around as if he is meant to be in a 1930s cartoon. Also, his energetic animation clashes with the other characters, who are more stilted and realistic. The film also tries to portray the characters as sympathetic despite not giving them any kind of nice and likable characterization or even just some decent development.
The lemmings are easily the worst characters in the movie, being little more of rip-offs of the Minions from the "Despicable Me" franchise, only even less funny and a hundred times more obnoxious. Their voices are also very ear-piercing.
Confusing plot holes, such as Vera not recognizing Norm as the bear who chased her in the Arctic for some reason, or the fact that "only" Norm and his grandfather can properly communicate with humans for some reason. Also, Vera inexplicably knows Norm's name despite never telling her his name at any point.
Nothing in this movie seems to make sense. Several aspects are either explained poorly or simply not explained at all.
The direction lacks spiritedness and looks very unprofessional, with bland transitions and useless camera movements and shakes.
Lackluster voice acting, particularly in one scene where Mr. Greene is yelling at Vera, which sounds like the actor was far away from the microphone.
- In another scene near the beginning, Norm's voice sounds distorted, which is probably because of an issue with the recording equipment.
Overuses of pop culture songs such as "Shut Up and Dance" by Walk The Moon.
Terrible music score.
The character designs are extremely repulsive to look at, especially the one for Norm himself, who looks like a reject from Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts^CGW.

The Only Redeeming Quality

Olympia is at least a likeable character.

Reception

Norm of the North was heavily panned by critics and casual moviegoers for its animation, plot, characters, writing, soundtrack, voice acting and humor. It holds a 9% on Rotten Tomatoes based on 69 reviews, with an average rating of 3/10, with the site's critical consensus read, "A pioneering feat in the field of twerking polar bear animation but blearily retrograde in every other respect, Norm of the North should only be screened in case of parental emergency.". Metacritic scores a film a 21/100 "Generally unfavorable reviews" while IMDB scored the film a 3.5/10 rating.