Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked (2011)

The third installment in a franchise that has never pretended to be about anything, Chipwrecked deposits its singing rodents on a cruise ship and then on a tropical island, where a volcano eventually erupts and everyone learns a small lesson about listening to Dave. It is a jukebox musical for the very young, and it conducts itself accordingly. There is no thesis here, no argument about how we ought to live, no sermon dressed in family-friendly clothing. The film wants to sell soundtrack downloads and nothing else. In that ambition it succeeds modestly.

Our audit finds the picture almost entirely innocent of contemporary social programming. The cast is overwhelmingly white, with the Chipettes supplying the only nominal gender balance and Luisa D'Oliveira appearing briefly in a minor role. That is a demographic fact, not an agenda, and the score reflects the modest credit due. The Chipettes get a subplot and a female antagonist in Zoe, but the girls remain defined by their attachments to the male chipmunks, and the film offers no critique of that arrangement. It simply is.

Everything else sits at zero. Ian Hawke's scheming is personal greed played for laughs, not an indictment of wealth. The volcano is a plot device, not a parable about the planet. Theodore's weight is a running gag, not a celebration of bodies. Simon's shift into a French adventurer named Simone arrives via spider venom and amnesia, a comedic contrivance and not a portrait of a mind that works differently. There is no race here, no history to revise, no LGBTQ subtext, and no lecture. The film preaches nothing to anyone. It is the rare specimen that asks only for ninety minutes and a tolerance for squeaky voices. We record it without objection.