“Annie” opens with a nod to every version of the stage play or movie starring a curly haired redhead and then introduces its modern-day heroine, Quvenzhane Wallis from “Beasts of the Southern Wild.”
She’s Annie, a foster child living with four other girls in the Harlem apartment of a failed singer, Miss Hannigan (Cameron Diaz), who was on the brink of fame when she was fired from her band. Now, she drowns two decades of disappointment in alcohol, flirts with any available man, scolds or ignores or browbeats the girls and collects the money from the state for caring for them.
Annie believes that one day, her parents will find her, and that the same will happen for the others. First, though, she meets an unlikely Good Samaritan in mayoral candidate, cell-phone mogul and germophobe Will Stacks (Jamie Foxx) when he saves her from being run over by a van.
He’s a disaster in the polls and an Internet laughingstock due to a mishap while manning a food line for the homeless, until a pedestrian films and posts the road rescue. A lunch with Stacks and Annie, at the suggestion of the candidate’s conniving campaign adviser (Bobby Cannavale), prompts the girl to ask, “So, what’s the hustle? I’m 10. I’m not an idiot.”
Starring: Quvenzhane Wallis, Jamie Foxx.
Rating: PG for some mild language and rude humor.
Before you can say Social Services home inspection — and there is one, mainly played for laughs, of his penthouse — Annie is living with the workaholic mayoral hopeful and charming the voters. Never far away is Stacks’ company vice president (Rose Byrne), who helps to keep the creepiness quotient down, given that an unmarried billionaire has welcomed a girl into his home.
Directed by Will Gluck, this “Annie” is filled with topical references such as Twitter followers, movie product placement and smart-home technology in Stacks’ sky-high haven. It’s also bursting with photogenic New York scenery and a cast that is a mixed musical bag.
Mr. Foxx is the strongest, most accomplished singer (he leaves us wanting more) and Ms. Diaz the worst, although Mr. Cannavale gives her a run for her money, with background music and voices swelling whenever they’re warbling.
Quvenzhane and her fellow foster kids do a spunky “It’s the Hard-Knock Life” and she performs one of the renditions of a new song, “Opportunity,” as does Australian singer-songwriter Sia, and the girl’s vocal abilities vary from song to song but her acting credentials are solid.
“Annie” has some cameos and asides aimed at adults, along with a hard-to-believe additional hardship layered into the story. As it approaches its two-hour running time, it starts to drag. In the end, it’s good although not extraordinary family entertainment.
‘Annie’ 2.5 STARS
Starring: Quvenzhane Wallis, Jamie Foxx
Rating: PG for some mild language and rude humor.
First Published: December 19, 2014, 5:00 a.m.
Updated: December 20, 2014, 1:19 a.m.
