The Smurfs 2 (2013)

The Smurfs 2 returns to the mushroom village with the second installment in a franchise that never claimed to aim higher than the Happy Meal. Raja Gosnell directs a hybrid of animation and live action, and the film moves through Paris with the energy of a tour bus running behind schedule. Gargamel, now a stage sorcerer adored by crowds at the Palais Garnier, kidnaps Smurfette for a formula, and the plot grinds forward with the efficiency of a licensed toy commercial. We search the proceedings for a cultural thesis and find slapstick, a few testicle jokes, and Neil Patrick Harris being a good sport about all of it.

That search comes up mostly empty. The blue creatures are blue. The human cast is white and unbothered by the fact. There is no racial commentary, no climate anxiety, no critique of the celebrity economy that made Gargamel a star, which is a genuine missed opportunity given the premise. Smurfette's arc brushes against something resembling self-definition, since she was created by the villain and worries about her origin, and the screenplay even nods toward the old Smurfette Problem of her being the lone female in the village. The film treats this as a matter of feeling different, not as a statement. She finds kinship with the Naughties, learns that belonging is a choice, and the lesson lands softly, the way a bedtime story lands, without a raised finger.

Children will be distracted. Adults will check the time. The moral about family and acceptance is delivered with the gentle insistence of a Saturday morning cartoon, which is to say it instructs without lecturing and resolves without arguing. As cultural documents go, this is a blank page with a Smurf printed on it. The sommelier swirls the glass, finds nothing, and sets it down. Two bags of popcorn, perhaps three, depending on the child.