THE BEANIE BUBBLE (2023)
Tagline: The Crazy Behind the Craze
(Drama, Dysfunction, Under stuffed) [R]
Oh, look at what the under-stuffed posable cat dragged in.
In this one, we get the mostly untrue but also partly true story of Ty. He is a toy maker focused on top-of-the-line stuffed animals when Robbie, Sheila, and Maya come into his life and help him turn things upside down creating one of the biggest crazes of the 90s. Beanie Babies.
First off, this movie tells you right at the beginning that they made a lot of it up but that some elements are true. This is not to be confused with the documentary by the same name that came out in 2022. So when I was watching this I was taking it with a grain of salt which leaves me to just assess how the story is told and whether or not it’s any good.
This freaking thing is a jumbled mess in spite of all of its efforts to visually show you the time frame it is in. Some sequences are from the 80s and some are from the 90s and some are so confusingly mixed that they don’t make any sense whatsoever. There is also kind of a weird mix of attempted humor injected into this, but it really isn’t a comedy at all. It is told more as a drama with a terrible man doing terrible things and using people. Then some people being smart enough to seize an opportunity in spite of all that. Ty Warner founded the company in 1986, but beanie babies didn’t get on the shelves till 1993. The initial cost of a beanie baby today is $5.99; I believe they were $5.00 back in the 90s but I never owned one so that could be wrong. Collectors resold beanie babies making some extremely valuable. The most valuable beanie babies are Large Wallace and His Squad estimated to be valued at $600,000. The next most valuable is “Bubbles” a yellow fish worth $130,000 with the tag still on.
In the 2000’s Ty beanie babies took a massive dive in sales and the movie kind of ends right after that happens. They do use a few fake names. Maya is Ty’s online store guru was actually based on the real-life person Lina Trivedi. This brings me to the cast Zach Galifianakis plays Ty and does okay, but it also feels like nearly anyone with the ability to play a jerk could have pulled this off. Once he gets exposed for what he is really doing, you are rooting against him for the rest of the movie, but the performance is just meh. Elizabeth Banks (PITCH PERFECT 2) plays Robbie in this and her performance is uninspired as well. It almost seemed like Galifianakis and Banks didn’t even want to be in this flick. Contrast that with Geraldine Viswanathan (RUMBLE) who crushes her role as Maya. She is also by far one of the most likable characters in the film. They also get into a bit of her family drama which means they spent more time expanding on her character than Robbie’s and we barely saw Maya in the trailer. Sarah Snook (PREDESTINATION) is also really good in this as Sheila and she gets a lot of screen time. Rounding out the main cast we get Tracey Bonner (GREENLAND) who is also solid but doesn’t get many lines.
I really don’t mind when directors and writers get a little unconventional and tell stories in a non-linear way, but this thing is actually annoying to watch. Even the decent soundtrack really doesn’t fix the problems with it. This is one of those movies where every interesting scene is in the previews. Just watch that and you will be way better off, but in the final analysis, this movie just sucks and is oddly painful to watch. I wish I had something better to say, but aside from a few of the performances, this thing is really lame.
THE BEANIE BUBBLE gets a 2 out of 7.
GRAPHICS ARE THE PROPERTY OF APPLE ORIGINAL FILMS AND ARE USED FOR REVIEW PURPOSES ONLY.
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