'Storks' is a contrived but watchable film.

At least when it comes to me, one of the good things about last year was that I managed to watch a lot of animated films. I think I saw most of the animations that were released in 2016 and that had gotten decent reviews.

Of those dozen or so animations, none of them were that disappointing. Even though films like Angry Birds and Sausage Party could have been better, most of the movies that were released were fairly entertaining and well made.

In any case, a couple of days ago I managed to see 'Storks', an animated film that was also released last year. This film had received somewhat positive reviews, so I had to check how good the animation turned out to be.

In a nutshell, the story is about a stork and a girl that work in a special courier firm. This special stork powered firm used to be a baby delivering company that delivered babies for couples that wanted to become parents.

In the story we also have a young kid who is bored of being the only child in the family. This kid is more or less being neglected by his career-oriented parents, so he wants a brother or a sister that he could play with.

In the film, the kid sends a letter to the courier firm, which leads to the stork and the girl accidentally creating another baby. This baby has to be delivered to the kid and to his parents, which of course turns out to be easier said than done.

Over the course of the next hour and twenty minutes, our main characters stork and the girl run into all kinds of obstacles. These obstacles include all kinds of complications that prevent them from delivering the baby to the right address.

When it comes to the animation as a whole, I think the film is fairly entertaining and funny. Considering how contrived and derivative the premise is, I didn't expect that it could keep my attention from start to finish as well as it did.

This is not to say that there aren't any significant problems with the film and its story. Like probably many others, I couldn't help but to notice how the movie had problems with its exposition and how things didn't always make sense.

For example, the characters weren't that well drawn or well defined. I think it was fairly obvious that the writers could have done a better job with fleshing them out, even though the characters weren't by definition unlikable.

The story also felt as if it was stretched too thin and that there weren't enough story beats in the script. There were numerous scenes that didn't progress the story that were simply there to add to its running time.

Yet, despite these obvious flaws, 'Storks' as a whole managed to be relatively uplifting and enjoyable. There are certain unexpected moments in the movie that manage to surprise you and that make you feel better about it.

So if you're like me and want to be entertained, there's no reason why you shouldn't watch 'Storks'. It's not a great film, but it's still a solid animation that provides some laughs and keeps you entertained throughout its length.