Yogi Bear gets the Hollywood 3D treatment in the new eponymous live action/animated film Yogi Bear. A fully CG Yogi, voiced by Dan Aykroyd, lives comfortably in Jellystone National Park, with his pal Boo Boo (Justin Timberlake) – frequently disturbing the visitors with his picnic-basket-stealing antics. The park is managed by Ranger Rick (Tom Cavanagh) and his deputy, Ranger Jones (T.J. Miller) whose love-hate relationship with Yogi is explored over the course of the film.

All is well in Jellystone, until a corrupt Mayor decides to re-zone the park for logging. Yogi, Boo Boo, and Ranger Rick (with the help of a documentary filmmaker played by Anna Faris) have until the end of the month to raise the necessary money to keep Jellystone open.

Yogi Bear is shot in true 3D – not, as is too often the case – in 2D and converted to 3D in post. A great job has been done in matching the live action plates to the animated characters, and allowing the two to interact flawlessly with one another. The quality of animation is pleasantly high, and although we never get an extreme close up of our bear protagonist, it’s apparent that a lot of time and effort went into the modeling and shading, even if the animation is a bit lax at times.

The movie is geared towards a younger audience, with its biggest laughs won by slapstick humor and sight gags, such as the perennial favorite ‘nut-shot’. While older audiences will enjoy the film as well, it’s not the same caliber of family film that animation studios such as Pixar have been known to produce. The script is bare-bones, the laughs mostly cheap, and the characters underdeveloped. Talented comedic actors across the board seem wasted on a dumbed-down script. The live action cast have all proven their wit in other works (Tom Cavanagh on Scrubs, Anna Farris in the Scary Movie franchise, T.J. Miller in How To Train Your Dragon) and voice actors Dan Aykroyd and Justin Timberlake seem equally stumped. While the cast have perfected their own brands of humor, they are forced to cater to a younger crowd – a stumbling block in most of the cases.

There are plenty of silly antics, and the 3D allows for some nice shock value. In short, Yogi Bear may be a fantastic kiddie film, but those people used to a 2D Yogi may be better off watching the original show.