‘Hotel Transylvania 3: Summer Vacation’ takes to sea with charming results
Summer is a time to lie back a little and take a break. There are a wide variety of ways in which people choose to unwind — taking a vacation, spending time with family or maybe just going to the movies to enjoy the many, many summertime releases.
Going out to watch ‘Hotel Transylvania 3’ is an experience that combines all of these three things into one finely crafted and surprisingly fun platter.
With the third installment of the franchise, the audience is reacquainted with the beloved characters from the previous two films, extending their story arcs while also presenting a fresh, new plot.
This serves both continuity in the franchise while also offering a decent standalone animated kid’s movie.
This time around, the monsters of Transylvania decide to take a much-needed vacation from operating the famous (infamous?) hotel.
After hosting a wedding at his hotel, Dracula (Adam Sandler) realizes how lonely he has recently felt.
Confusing his loneliness with weariness, his daughter Mavis (Selena Gomez) arrives at the conclusion her father needs a break from his exhausting occupation. She takes initiative and books a cruise for all of the monsters without letting them know where they are headed. Once there, they all enjoy plenty of fun activities as well as some not so fun, life-threatening ones; but all within the company of family.
Finding himself in the face of love again years after his wife’s passing, Dracula finds out that running a year-round hotel full of monsters might not be the most difficult task he has to face.
Genndy Tartakovsky, director of this third chapter, brings us an incredibly fun and funny family film that can be equally appreciated by people of all ages. With very simple concepts wrapped around a packaging of monsters, humor and worthwhile themes, the film manages to hit a sweet spot between simple but memorable.
I have seen two of the films in this franchise — this one, and its predecessor, “Hotel Transylvania 2.” They have both been very charming, and they left me with a desire to go back and watch the first chapter of the story to get more time with these characters.
The characters are a great part of what makes “Hotel Transylvania: Summer Vacation” so joyful.
All of them playing different parts that as a whole make up a very dysfunctional yet very realistic family. Dracula and his friends, Mummy (Keegan-Michael Key), Frankenstein (Kevin James) and the Invisible Man (David Spade), have very buddy-type relationships, teasing and joking about mostly anything.
Mavis always shows deep concern and love for her father, as does he for her.
This is one of the most charming relationships throughout all of the narrative.
All of the characters and their distinct personalities and situations make for very entertaining interactions among them. The entire voice cast did a very good job bringing these characters to life and providing the audience with a good time and virtuous lessons in family values and love.