Think of every trope associated with animated family movies and you’ll find them all in “Norm of the North,” a thoroughly uninspired story of a polar bear attempting to save his habitat from a hypocritical hippie seeking to develop condos in the Arctic.
Does “Norm of the North” focus on a protagonist who happens to be a furry creature? Yes (see above). Like most movie polar bears, Norm is terrible at hunting seals but very good at twerking.
Are there other even cuter creatures that serve as adorable comic relief? Yes. As Minions are to the “Despicable Me” movies, lemmings are to “Norm of the North.”
Does a lot of the film’s comedy rely on scatological humor? It does. Finally, a movie that’s brave enough to show what happens when cartoon lemmings pee into a fish tank.
Is there one scene that involves the characters gratuitously getting their groove on to contemporary pop songs? More than one. Come on, the people who made “Norm of the North” are no slouches. They even manage to shoehorn a legitimate social issue — climate change — into the movie’s plot in an effort to convince adults to take the movie semi-seriously.
What happens in “Norm of the North” is this: After learning of plans to build luxury real estate in the Arctic, where the ice is noticeably melting and cracking, Norm (voice of Rob Schneider) heads to New York to become the mascot for Greene Homes, the company behind the new development. But the evil yet Zen-like Mr. Greene (Ken Jeong) and his reluctant marketing chief (Heather Graham) don’t realize that Norm plans to transform from spokesperson to crusader for leaving his homeland untouched. He also, incidentally, hopes to find his missing grandfather (Colm Meaney).
At times, director Trevor Wall and his three screenwriters almost own up to what a mess they’ve made. During a scene in which an attempt to shoot a commercial for Greene Homes goes awry, the commercial’s director says, “Anything can be fixed in post” (i.e., post-production). “In one of my movies, I wrote the plot in post!” It’s unclear whether this is a joke or a confession.
