TROLLS: BAND TOGETHER
Cert U★★★ In cinemas now
Excited parents may want to hold off on Christmas shopping for a while. I suspect many letters to Santa will be hastily rewritten once kids are hit with the third feature-length advert for the flame-haired toys.
At least this time, there’s something to sugar the pill for adults – a nostalgic reunion of sorts for 90s boy band NSYNC who have a troll-shaped cameo and belt out title track Better Place, their first song for 21 years.
An opening flashback to “back in the day” sees former band member Justin Timberlake return as Branch. Now, he’s the cute Mark Owen one in an all-sibling boy band called Brozone.
“We’re not in sync. There’s only one direction for us to go – to the backstreets!” quips one of his older brothers as the lads agree to split up.
As they leave for solo adventures, little Branch is left on his own with his grandmother. His abandonment will see him grow into the Victor Meldrew troll we met in the first film.
But 20 years later, his bossy band leader brother John Dory (the Gary Barlow one) returns to rope Branch and his hyperactive girlfriend Poppy (Anna Kendrick) into a mission to rescue another long-lost brother.
Floyd has been kidnapped by Milli Vanilli-style pop frauds Velvet and Veneer (Amy Schumer and Andrew Rannells) who have trapped him in a diamond perfume bottle so they can milk his talent.
To free him, the band have to get back together to deliver a diamond-shattering “family melody”.
Despite making roughly zero sense, Band Together hits most of the right notes for a family movie.
It’s frenetic, unhinged, beautifully animated and gently amusing. As an added bonus, James Corden fails to appear as the oversized blue troll from the previous two films.
The soundtrack provides the only disappointment.
There are solid pop tunes but none with that “sunshine in your pocket” catchiness of Timberlake’s original earworm.