Rating: 7/10

Writer/Director: Robert Rodriguez
Cast: Kat Dennings, Leslie Mann, Jon Cryer, William H. Macy, James Spader
Studio: Warner Bros.

Robert Rodriguez, maker of both kid fare such as the SPY KIDS series and adult fodder like SIN CITY, brings us this tall tale in short form about what happens when humans have the power to literally get anything they want. As these tales go, things never end up good for us greedy humans.

It all starts with a rock, a magic rock to be exact, found not at the end, but the beginning, of a rainbow. This mystical and mysterious rock holds great power to anyone who holds it in their hand. All they have to do is simply wish it and it is made so. So, what does this bring forth? World peace? Nope. An end to hunger? Not quite. A solution to global warming? Afraid not. As the rock bounces from grubby hand to grubby hand, the results become more and more catastrophic. Tiny UFOs operated by little Pickle-esque green men, giant Lego block-like robots, bipedal alligators, telekinetic toddlers. And that’s only the half of it!

It all starts in suburbia via Picture Perfect, America. It is a seemingly normal town, yet as we soon find out, it’s definitely not. The whole town revolves around the high tech company Black Inc., run by a Steve-Jobs-with-an-evil-genius-twist character (James Spader). The company has created an all-in-one techno gadget simply called “the cube” that can do everything from shave your cat (easy! Keep your mind out of the gutter, it’s a kids’ movie!) to everything in between, making the iPhone look like a glorified TI-83. Black wants what everyone seemingly wants, or at least what Tears for Fears wanted in the 80s and Pinky & The Brain wanted in the 90s. To rule the world!

Along comes the rainbow rock to help, or so we think, literally falling out of the sky and into just about every hand in the neighborhood. Like a wise old uncle once said, with great power, does in fact come great responsibility. As responsibility is thrown out the window by the rock’s users, the results are disastrous, getting worse with every wish made. After all the damage is done, it is good that prevails and it is lessons that are learned. Lessons like getting everything you ask for may not be such a great thing, as it defies life’s natural order. And that the best things in life really are the free things, like friends you didn’t know you had or growing into a newer, better person.

It’s messages like this that are good to see in kids’ films these days, and SHORTS is not afraid to be obvious in this message. It seems our nation’s troubles, as well as the world’s, have made their way into even the most lighthearted of films. Rodriguez works to show this in a fable-like sense, while still being the Robert Rodriguez both adults and children have become diehard fans of. The film is told in a series of chapterized segments, all jumbled out of order as if Rodriguez took a few pointers from his friend Mr. Tarantino and executed them within a kids’ movie. And with this being a kids’ movie, it does what it does best – entertain kids. However, this is a kids’ movie from a director who knows how to please. After all, he is up there with Tarantino as a man of the fans that generally makes genre films. Rodriguez doesn’t fail to please here anymore then he does there, providing fun moment after fun moment. I mean, did you see the list of kid/James-friendly qualities this movie has? Robots! Aliens! Oh, and don’t get me started on the giant computer-generated booger monster!

In the end, SHORTS is a movie for kids by a filmmaker who knows how to make appealing, crowd-pleasing films, no matter the age. After all, the man literally wrote the book on it (read “Rebel Without A Crew”). But he’s also a dad. A dad that knows the big bad world and its big bad evils and what can happen if you succumb to them. Under the fart jokes and the giant nostril monsters, SHORTS is a little movie with a big heart and a long message.

Take the kids, they will love it and you will too, if only for the reason that you can leave the theater feeling like it may impart some well-meant messages into their young, shaping minds. And, if not for that reason, you can appreciate the fact that it marks the return of not one, but two, PRETTY IN PINK alumni, which I’m pretty sure was purposeful. It must be nice to be both a director and a fanboy!