Animation in Obscurity: Osmosis Jones

It's important to know that this half live action, half animated movie was directed by the Farrelly brothers, who made movies like There's Something About Mary, Shallow Hal and Dumb and Dumber. I have seen those movies and the main problem I have with all of them is the juvenile humour. Before I get off topic, this movie ended up spawning an animated series Ozzie and Drix, which was about the main animated characters, a cop white blood cell called Ozzie, and a cough pill called Drix. And I will admit, I liked watching the show as a kid, but that was before I found out it was based on a movie when I first watched it on TV when I was about 10 or 11.

Story: it's pretty odd when it comes to the plot. For those who don't know about this movie, it's about a live action man named Frank who doesn't care about his health which his 10 year old daughter is concerned about. The animated sequences are in Frank's body and acts as a giant city, where the protagonist acts as a cop and has to stop a virus from killing Frank and the population inside of him. I'm not saying that it's bad, it's just that there's a pretty big contrast between the animated and live action scenes in terms of the tone of the movie. Let me explain. The animated and live action scenes were directed by different people, so clearly they have different thoughts when it came to the tone, like the animated bits are a bit more serious, even if it has a few comedic moments, while the live action segments went for a more gross out comedy route with a smidge of drama on the side for the climax so the animated bits can be incorporated into the story. I will say that I found the concept very creative and we see how some of what Frank does in the live action bits affect the city inside of him. I also liked the friendship between Ozzy (voiced by Chris Rock) and Drix (voiced by David Hyde Pierce) and how they work together to stop Thrax. Another aspect I really liked is the creativity of the city, with the population actually showing what they do inside the body (I don't mean there's actually a  city in your body, I mean how they function) and that the mayor is pretty much the reason why Frank's health is deteriorating. There is a romance subplot with Ozzy and the mayor's secretary Leah (voiced by singer Brandy) in that he always tries to flirt with her at HQ, but she rejects his advances until she realizes her feelings for him during the climax, but I found it a bit pointless, even if it's not focused much. Like I said, it's not bad, in fact the animation bits are good and fun, it's just that the live action scenes really need improvement. Actually, the live action scenes are just awful! The humour is disgusting (seriously, we see Frank vomit, and not a vomit discretion shot, we actually see him puke) and the characters are boring and underdeveloped and I can't stand them, I had to turn away from them!

Animation: If there's one thing that this movie got right with a different director, it's how they handled the animation. Not only does it look very colourful, but the world of Frank's body looks very creative, like how the blood vessels and arteries look like freeways and highways, Frank's dreams are a movie theater, the stomach is an airport and a zit is a nightclub. The character designs are well done and they manage to look really creative with them like Ozzy has an urban style while Thrax kind of looks like something out of The Matrix. The character animation looks really creative, since the blood cells are anthropomorphic and they can change shape depending on where they are or what they're doing. They also use CGI on Drix, which makes sense in a way and it can be creative, but it can look obvious that he's not 2D compared to the others. Whenever they incorporate the animated and live action together, it looks amazing, especially during the climax fight between Ozzy and Thrax near the end of the movie.

Characters: I'm going to look at all the characters, including the live action ones. First, there's Osmosis Jones AKA Ozzy, an urban and funky rebel cop white blood cell who had a pretty bad background and tries to convince everyone about Thrax trying to kill Frank, even though nobody believes him and wants to make a difference. I surprisingly liked him and Chris Rock is pretty good. Drixenol Koldreliff AKA Drix is a cough pill who is pretty much the antithesis of Ozzy, in a sense that he follows the rules, is intelligent and is by the book with everything, so he disagrees with Ozzy's methods, even though they both work together to kill diseases. Thrax (voiced by Laurence Fishburne) AKA 'The Red Death', is the villain of the film, and is a virus which tries to kill Frank, and has killed other people before him. The only issue I have with him is we don't know his motives as to why he wants to specifically kill Frank. Leah Estrogen is the secretary for the mayor, as well as Ozzy's love interest is the sassy type and is the only one other than Ozzy who sees the flaws with what Frank is doing to himself. She can prove that she's more than just the love interest of the movie with her personality, but she doesn't have much screen time. Mayor Phlemming (voiced by William Shatner) is pretty much the guy who's ruining Frank with his junk food habit, as he clearly doesn't give a crap on how the city is being run, and preoccupies everything other than his job because of an election. I didn't like him! The voice acting and the protagonists are actually pretty good and likeable, it's just a few don't have as much screen time as they should.
Now we're onto the humans, starting with Frank, played by Bill Murray, a lazy zookeeper in his 40s who doesn't care about his health, probably because of his wife passing away. I didn't really care for him because he can just come across as a douchebag. Shane, his daughter, I found to be really annoying and unrealistic during the movie and is way too preachy with telling her dad to change his lifestyle (seriously, she says to Frank deodorant causes cancer, WHICH IS NOT TRUE) and thinks she's always right and knows everything. Frank's brother Bob is also annoying. That's all I can say, I'd rather the movie would stop cutting to Frank and actually seeing Ozzy and Drix trying to save him!

I find it sad because this movie had a lot of potential, but the live action scenes are way too flawed to make it anything past OK. The animated scenes are the best in the movie with a fun story, really good animation and some likeable characters, but the gross out humour is way too disgusting and crude and the human characters are annoying and boring. I would recommend this to fans of the Farrelly Brothers' films for the style of humour, and probably for teachers to show elementary school kids about the body and how it works.
Story: 6/10
Animation: 8/10
Characters: 7/10
Human Characters: 3/10
Overall: 6/10