Film Review - Smurfs
Images courtesy of Paramount Pictures.
What the actual Smurf was that?
Paramount’s Smurfs (2025) is a misguided attempt at a live-action animated musical fantasy comedy that tries to cash in on nostalgia, TikTok trends, a star-studded cast, and the now-tired trope of multiverse travel without offering any quality product in return. Directed by Chris Miller (no, not the Spider-Verse one, though you’d be forgiven for the confusion), of Shrek the Third (2007) and Puss in Boots (2011) fame, this film is less a labour of love and more a blatant soulless cash grab starring Rihanna.
From the moment the first trailer dropped, all the marketing centred around one name: Rihanna. The campaign almost aggressively ignored the rest of the voice cast (which includes the likes of John Goodman, Amy Sedaris, and James Corden - who has apparently been released from musical jail), solely focusing on Rihanna’s turn as Smurfette. And let’s be clear: she’s not playing Smurfette; she is Smurfette.
Which brings us to her flagship track, “Friend of Mine” a repetitive, club-tinged loop that feels like a half-smurfed voice memo of three lines accidentally turned into a single to lure in her old fanbase. Oddly enough, the song is nowhere to be seen in the actual film. Instead, another song “Everything goes with Blue” by Tyla is shoehorned in, over what looks like the “Friend of Mine” music video, complete with trademark mismatched lip-syncing; possibly because the team couldn’t decide which track to use during production and just hoped we wouldn’t notice? The result is eerie, confusing, and undeniably lazy.
Speaking of lazy; the animation itself. Smurfs attempts a bold blend of 2D and 3D animation reminiscent of Into the Spider-Verse, but the execution falls flat, feels jarring, and completely uninspired. The character design is bland with the Smurfs all blending into each other due to their lack of distinctive shapes. The last third does explore other animation mediums when the Smurfs hop through alternate dimensions, such as a claymation world and a clever sequence where they appear as 2D drawings on lined paper,but this singular example of originality and artistry is sadly a minutes-long side plot.
The plot itself is a pathetic recycling of previous Smurfs films: Smurfs dipping into the real world, wandering Paris, Smurfette having an identity crisis over her origins, Papa Smurf getting kidnapped (again). The entire film reeks of desperation. Even the emotional arc centred on Corden’s No Name Smurf trying to find his “thing” is basically resolved in the first twenty minutes when he discovers he can do magic. The film struggles to keep the audience engaged with the overused ‘Smurf as a substitute for swearing’ gag, tired jokes, and outdated pop culture references to a deathly silent cinema. My 7-year-old niece, aka the target demographic, laughed maybe twice throughout the film and asked for her colouring sheets halfway through. She didn’t have any pencils. She just found staring at her half-coloured-in Smurfs picture to be more entertaining than the overused tropes playing out before her.
To the film’s credit, there are glimmers of potential: a surprisingly solid duet between James Corden and Rihanna (and a random joey singing from their mum’s pouch?), one too many jokes about Smurfette’s love of salty food: a clever nod to Peyo, the Smurfs' creator, who once replaced “salt” with “schtroumpf” in a moment of linguistic lapse and thus created history, and the creative use of thought bubbles which could have been a charming homage to their comic strip roots, but ended up feeling like a half-baked after thought due to their inconsistent and ultimately purposeless execution.
In the end, Smurfs feels less like a movie and more like a studio study in just how little effort they can put into a product while still squeezing money out of loyal fans, tired parents, and Rihanna ride-or-dies. It’s not even “so bad it’s good.” It’s just… blue.
So if you’re into the overuse of formerly witty Smurf language play, Rihanna reading her lines like she’s starring in a gritty noir drama, and Cardi B rapping in a kids movie? (No seriously, why is Cardi B rapping about her body being a “bang-bangladesh” in a children’s movie? The studio clearly knew it was inappropriate - the line was omitted in the official lyric video. So why is it in the movie??) Then Smurfs is the film for you!
2 out of 5 rotten Smurfberries from me, and 100 out of 5 TikTok dancing Smurfs from my Niece (I think she wanted to spare my feelings)
Smurfs is screening in cinemas now. For tickets and more info, click here.