In this animated feature Lance Sterling (Will Smith) is the voice of a respected secret agent who accidentally gets turned into a pigeon through an invention produced by Walter Beckett (Tom Holland) a young genius who graduated from MIT at age 15 and designs gadgets. Together they work to bring down dangerous enemies who probably want to control the world.
The hook here is that Sterling spends most of the film as a pigeon with some advantages along with limitations like not having hands.
Beckett’s inventions produce a spray that brings out pictures of little kittens which when seen moves folks toward peaceful existence with each other. Ben Mendlesohn is Killian a technology based terrorist with a bionic arm that controls a large array of weaponized drones that threaten the world.
The body of the film is filled with chase scenes and cliff-hangers which place Sterling either as an agent of pigeon in danger of complete destruction only to be saved by his skill the ability of the pigeon and the products that Beckett appears to have stored away in his bag of tricks.
The presentation is lush and filled with bright colorful landscapes and water scenes. There is some comedy especially when Sterling as a pigeon and Beckett find themselves at St Mark’s Square in Venice. That square is know for the pigeons that gather and surround visitors who have seed or bread crumbs to feed the birds. We can imagine how interesting it is to see the villain battled by Sterling, the pigeon and the massive flock of St. Mark Square pigeons.
There is a bit of political statement in Beckett’s philosophy, when he says fighting fire with fire does no good for anyone, his equipment is designed to bring peace between factions.
The action is convincing and at time exciting, but runs a bid dry as the film moves on. There are only so many dangers that can be absorbed by the audience, particularly the little ones.