Justin Timberlake and Anna Kendrick on Dreamwork's Trolls

Trolls come from the brainy and comical minds behind Shrek.  As Trolls director Mike Mitchell and Walt Dohrn  explained Trolls is a super irreverent comedy that echoes Shrek in wit with jokes that  can be enjoyed  by a 90s dad and his school aged daughter.  He also said that we were all born with happiness and all need help every now and then discovering or rediscovering it.  So that is the mission of the unique and funny Trolls.

With every great movie is a great soundtrack.  Justin Timberlake does triple duty here.  He’s the voice of Branch, a sorta grey and blue Troll that see’s the world in black and white. Timberlake’s other roles that will garner just as much attention as his famous voice and for the first time in his film career, he’s the executive music producer.  Although JT has proven his musical brilliance to us many times before, he did not take full credit for the entire soundtrack.  He stated that there was a team of them that listened to countless songs in order to select the ones that were right for Trolls.  He added that he’d written four original songs with a 70s flare, that were specifically for Trolls as well.  This was all uncharted territory and a new league that he’s become a part of.

    


Anna Kendrick signed up for double duty in Trolls.  She is the overly optimistic Poppy who see’s the world as one gigantic hug with an abundance of color.  Kendrick also has a big secret that I’ll share with you..and that is….she has an absolutely beautiful voice.  I’m not sure that anyone in the audience knew this.  She was so humble in accepting the compliment from Justin.  He also added that her vocal talents make Trolls into a Broadway Disney!  Anna was personally coached by Justin, via Skype, on what pitches and tones to hit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyjm5VQ11TQ&feature=youtu.be


Trolls’ inserts its own throw-back-Thursday with the reintroduction of the glitter troll, Guy Diamond, from the 90s.  Mitchell playfully admitted that this troll is a bit liberated and doesn’t wear clothes…only glitter.  The glitter troll was actually one of the biggest challenges, as far as imagery for the film.  Dohrn states that computer’s don’t really understand the glitter, but they managed to nail it.  They also kept it consistent allowing the Trolls’ to keep their amazing hair that does everything from change colors, shapes, stretches and can hold on to stuff! Now that’s some serious hair..or might I say #hairgoals!

One message that we can take away from Trolls is that they are a lot like humans.  They like glittery things, are varied and all have something special about them.  For the record, there are about 300,000 variations of Trolls, a whole universe of them according to Mitchell.  It’ll be a great movie to connect multiple generations.