“Osmosis Jones” is a combination of live-action and animation. I get what it is trying to do and it is very creative but it ultimately doesn’t work.

In “Osmosis Jones”, an unhygienic zookeeper, named Frank (Bill Murray “Groundhog Day”), finds himself infected with deadly virus Thrax (voiced by Laurence Fishburne “The Matrix”). It is up to police officer white blood cell Osmosis Jones (voiced by Chris Rock “Grown Ups”, “Lethal Weapon 4”) and a special agent pill, named Drix (voiced by David Hyde Pierce), to take him down and save Frank. Basically, everything inside Frank is like a city and it’s an interesting concept but it could have been done a lot better.

I like the live-action segments with Bill Murray the most as he’s really funny and I wish we’d have got more of those moments. I really didn’t care for Osmosis Jones and Drix as much as I should have and a large reason behind that is the poor voice acting by Rock and Hyde Pierce. I’m not sure who I would have liked to do the voice acting but anybody other than Chris Rock would have been an improvement, I’m sure. The villain works for this type of film and Fishburne is good at voicing him. The animation is very good and there is lot of flexibility in the characters’ movement.

“Osmosis Jones” has a lot of things going for it but the writing doesn’t back up the animation and the amusing performance of Bill Murray. Young kids will probably find this film somewhat enjoyable and it might be useful in teaching them about the immune system but for the wider audience, there isn’t enough to recommend it. That’s a shame because this is one of the best looking animated films I’ve seen but it certainly isn’t one of the best written ones.