Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted


Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted is a 2012 American computer-animated comedy film produced by DreamWorks Animation and distributed by Paramount Pictures. It is the third installment of the Madagascar series and the sequel to . It is also the first film in the series to be released in 3D. The film was directed by Eric Darnell, Tom McGrath, and Conrad Vernon from a screenplay by Darnell and Noah Baumbach. Ben Stiller, Chris Rock, David Schwimmer, Jada Pinkett Smith, Sacha Baron Cohen, Cedric the Entertainer, and Andy Richter reprise their roles from the previous films, with newcomers including Jessica Chastain, Bryan Cranston, Martin Short, and Frances McDormand.
In this film, Alex, Marty, Melman, and Gloria are still struggling to get home to New York. This time, their journey takes them to Europe, where they are relentlessly pursued by the murderous Monaco-based French Animal Control officer Captain Chantel DuBois. As a means of getting passage to North America, the animals join a circus, where they become close friends with the animal performers, including the new characters of Gia, Vitaly, and Stefano. Together, they spectacularly revitalize the business and along the way find themselves reconsidering where their true home really is.
Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted made its world premiere at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival on May 18, 2012, and was released in the United States on June 8. It has a 79% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes and is the eighth highest-grossing film of 2012 and the highest-grossing Madagascar film with a worldwide gross of over $746 million. A spin-off titled Penguins of Madagascar was released on November 26, 2014. A sequel, Madagascar 4, was initially planned for a 2018 release, but was later removed from the release schedule due to DreamWorks Animation's 2015 restructuring.

Plot

Following the events of, the penguins—Skipper, Kowalski, Rico, and Private—and the chimpanzees Mason and Phil leave Africa for Monte Carlo in their modified airplane. When they do not return, Alex the lion convinces his friends Marty the zebra, Melman the giraffe, and Gloria the hippopotamus that they should go find them and return to their home at the Central Park Zoo. With their lemur friends from Madagascar—King Julien, Maurice, and Mort—they find the penguins and chimpanzees at the Monte Carlo Casino. Chaos ensues, and the animals barely escape from Animal Control officer Chantel DuBois, who is determined to add Alex's head to her taxidermy collection.
When their plane crashes, the animals board a departing circus train. The circus animals—Stefano the sea lion, Gia the jaguar, and Vitaly the tiger—are suspicious of outsiders, so Alex lies by claiming that they are American circus animals. The circus is headed for a performance in Rome, followed by one in London where they hope to impress an American promoter in order to get their first American tour. To allay suspicion, the penguins purchase the circus from its human ringmaster. In Rome, Alex becomes enamored with Gia while King Julien falls in love with performing bear Sonya. DuBois and her men pursue Julien and Sonya, but fail to catch them and are arrested.
The performance in Rome is a disaster: The animals' acts go awry and they are chased off by the angry audience. Stefano explains to Alex that the circus was once famous and Vitaly was its star, skillfully jumping through ever-smaller hoops. However, one day he tried to jump through a tiny flaming hoop and the olive oil he used as lubricant caught fire. The accident caused Vitaly to lose his passion, and the entire circus suffered as a result. Alex convinces the circus animals to come up with a new, exciting, all-animal act that will restore their former glory. Marty and Stefano find a new passion in being shot out of a cannon, while Melman and Gloria become adept at dancing together on a tightrope. Gia persuades Alex to teach her "Trapeze Americano", and the two begin to fall in love. Meanwhile, DuBois escapes from prison and resumes her pursuit.
In London, Vitaly is afraid of failing again and is about to run away, but Alex helps him rediscover his passion for performing the impossible. At Alex's suggestion, Vitaly lubricates himself with hair conditioner and succeeds in jumping through the tiny flaming hoop. The show is a spectacular success, and the American promoter signs the circus to a contract. DuBois shows up, and though the penguins foil her plan, the document she was carrying reveals to the others that Alex, Marty, Melman, and Gloria are not really circus animals, but zoo animals trying to get home. The circus animals feel betrayed and eject the foursome.
The zoo and circus animals go their separate ways but arrive in Central Park at the same time. Looking in at their old home, the zoo animals realize how much their adventures have changed them and decide that their true place is with the circus. DuBois shows up and tranquilizes them, but before she can behead Alex the zoo staff arrive and incorrectly believe that she is returning the missing animals. King Julien makes it back to the circus with the news, and Gia convinces the others that they should rescue their friends. The zoo animals awaken in their old enclosures, now surrounded by high fences. DuBois is being honored by the zoo staff, but secretly loads a poison-filled dart and takes aim at Alex. Gia swings in on a trapeze and rescues him, revealing that the animals have transformed the circus into a "flying circus" of hot air balloons. They rescue the zoo animals, and together they defeat DuBois. Alex and his friends permanently join the circus, and the penguins ship DuBois and her men off in crates bound for Madagascar.

Voice cast

DreamWorks Animation's CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg confirmed in 2008 that there would be an additional sequel to Madagascar and . Katzenberg stated, "There is at least one more chapter. We ultimately want to see the characters make it back to New York." At the Television Critics Association press tour in January 2009, Katzenberg was asked if there would be a third film in the series. He replied, "Yes, we are making a Madagascar 3 now, and it will be out in the summer of 2012." On August 9, 2010, Katzenberg revealed in an e-mail that writer-director Noah Baumbach had done sixty pages of re-writes to the screenplay.
A significant amount of the animation and visual effects for the film had been done at DreamWorks Dedicated Unit, an India-based unit at Technicolor.

Release

Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted opened the Cannes Film Festival on May 18, 2012. The American release followed on June 8, 2012. The film was also converted to the IMAX format and shown in specific European territories, including Russia, Ukraine, and Poland.

Home media

Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted was released on DVD, Blu-ray, and Blu-ray 3D on October 16, 2012. It was the first DreamWorks Animation film to use the UltraViolet System and the Blu-ray and Blu-ray 3D comes with a rainbow wig. As of April 2014, 9.1 million home entertainment units were sold worldwide.

Reception

Box office

Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted earned $216,391,482 in North America and $530,529,792 in other countries for a worldwide total of $746,921,274. Its worldwide opening weekend totaled $137.6 million. Worldwide, it is the highest-grossing film in the series, the fourth-highest-grossing DreamWorks Animation film, the second-highest-grossing animated film of 2012, and the eighth-highest-grossing film of that year. Overall, it is the eleventh-highest-grossing animated film and the 52nd-highest-grossing film of all time. The film took between 66 and 94 days of release, respectively, to out-gross its two predecessors. It surpassed Kung Fu Panda 2 to become DreamWorks' highest-grossing non-Shrek film, and the first non-Shrek film to reach over $700 million.
In North America, the film made $20.7 million on its opening day, which was higher than the opening-day grosses of the original film and its sequel. For its opening weekend, the film ranked at the no. 1 spot, beating Prometheus, with $60.3 million, which was higher than the opening of the original Madagascar but was behind the opening weekend of Escape 2 Africa. It remained at the top spot for two consecutive weekends. In North America, it is the highest-grossing film in the series, the sixth-highest-grossing DreamWorks Animation film, the second-highest-grossing 2012 animated film, and the tenth-highest-grossing film of 2012.
Outside North America, Europe's Most Wanted out-grossed Shrek Forever After to become DreamWorks Animation's highest-grossing film. On its opening weekend, it topped the box office with $77.3 million from 28 countries. It held that position for three consecutive weekends. Its three highest-grossing openings occurred in Russia and the CIS, China, and Brazil. It set an opening-day record for animated films in Russia with $3.7 million and became the highest-grossing animated film and the third-highest-grossing film ever, earning $49.4 million. It also set an opening-weekend record for any film in Argentina with $3.80 million and it set opening-weekend records for animated films in Brazil, Venezuela, Trinidad, and the United Arab Emirates.

Critical reception

Based on 131 reviews, the film holds an approval rating of 79% on review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes and an average rating of 6.74/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "Dazzlingly colorful and frenetic, Madagascar 3 is silly enough for young kids, but boasts enough surprising smarts to engage parents along the way." This marks the best general review consensus of the film series that has showed improving critical favor; the original film has a score of 55%, and the sequel scores 64%. On Metacritic, it holds a score of 60 out of 100 based on 26 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews."
Lisa Kennedy of The Denver Post gave the film 3.5 out of 4 stars and said, "From time to time the improbable occurs: A sequel outdoes its original." Colin Covert of Star Tribune said that Madagascar 3 set a high standard for cartoon comedy and was almost too good for kids. He gave it 3.5 out of 4 stars. Giving the film 3.5 out of 5 stars, Betsy Sharkey of the Los Angeles Times said, "A neon-saturated, high-flying trapeze act with enough frenetic funny business that it's a wonder the folks behind this zillion-dollar franchise about zoo critters on the lam didn't send the animals to the circus sooner." Stephen Witty of the Newark Star-Ledger calls the movie "fun and fast family entertainment. the animals' jazzy circus performance, done in black-light colors and set to a Katy Perry song—may be one of the trippiest scenes in a mainstream kiddie movie since Dumbo saw those pink elephants." Film scholar Timothy Laurie writes that the plot development of Madagascar 3 is "met with large servings of personal growth and side dishes of overcooked romance".

Accolades

Soundtrack

Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted is the soundtrack of the film scored by Hans Zimmer and was released on June 5, 2012. "Afro Circus/I Like to Move It" peaked at 7 on the ARIA Hitseekers Singles chart on the week commencing October 15, 2012.
In some variations of the soundtrack, "Cool Jerk" is featured in replacement of "We No Speak Americano". "Sexy and I Know It" by LMFAO was only used in the theatrical trailer, and not included on the soundtrack and was replaced by "Firework" for the circus. "Any Way You Want It" by Journey and the instrumental "Watermark" from the album of the same name by Enya were also used, but are not included on the soundtrack. "Land of Hope and Glory" by Edward Elgar appears in the track "Fur Power". The "Afro Circus" tune is from "Entrance of the Gladiators", by the Czech composer Julius Fučík.

Video games

A video game based on the film, Madagascar 3: The Video Game, was released on June 5, 2012. The game allows gamers to play as Alex, Marty, Melman, and Gloria as they travel across Europe promoting the circus by performing stunts, circus acts and completing missions. It was released to Wii, Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo DS, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3. Published by D3 Publisher, the Wii, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3 versions were developed by Monkey Bar Games, and the 3DS and DS versions by Torus Games. The game received negative reviews from critics with Metacritic giving the Xbox 360 version a 45/100.
A mobile video game, Madagascar: Join the Circus!, also published by D3 Publisher, was released on June 4, 2012, for iPhone and iPad. The game allows players to build a circus and play mini-games. The game was removed from App Stores on June 16, 2017.

Comic book

A comic book based on the film and titled Madagascar Digest Prequel: Long Live the King! was released on June 12, 2012, by Ape Entertainment.

Spin-off and possible sequel

A spin-off feature film titled Penguins of Madagascar, featuring the penguins from the Madagascar films, was released on November 26, 2014. Its story picks up right after Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted. The plot of the television series of the same name does not tie in with the film.
In June 2014, it was announced that Madagascar 4 would be released on May 18, 2018. However, in January 2015, the film was removed from the release schedule following corporate restructuring and DreamWorks Animation's new policy to release two films a year. In April 2017, Tom McGrath said about the film, "There are things in the works, nothing is announced yet, but I think they'll show their faces once more."