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Film's playfulness is sure to crack you up
By Susan Wloszczyna, USA TODAY
It's better to have pluck than to be plucked. And they who flock together succeed
together.
There's a bucket full of life's lessons in the cracking-good Chicken Run ( out of four), which boasts
the most delicious collection of desperately funny Brits since The Full Monty -
and this cast is barely clothed from the get-go.
Run is an animated comic-adventure fable that's as rare as hen's teeth, one that
aspires to a sublimely adult level, not sinking to juvenile muck. Except the hens that
populate the painstakingly clever stop-motion clay universe of Aardman Animations (those
Oscar-winning Wallace & Gromit shorts) have teeth. Not lips exactly, but
trembly Chiclet -filled grins that go with their perpetually startled eyes.
Poultry has never been so stuffed with personality.
Yes, there are wonderfully eggs-crutiating puns. But there's also well-drawn dramatic
conflict. The premise is perhaps the best joke. At Tweedy's Farm, the '50s-era coop yard
is like a grim POW camp complete with barbed wire, solitary confinement (actually, a dingy
garbage bin) and snappish guard dogs.
Nudge-nudge references are made to Stalag 17 (the hens huddle for planning
sessions in Hut 17) and The Great Escape, and the music marches to a taut martial
beat.
But instead of Steve McQueen leading fellow inmates to freedom, there's sweet, selfless
Ginger (voiced by Julia Sawalha , the straight-arrow daughter on TV's Absolutely
Fabulous), dedicated to hatching a scheme that will allow her and her feathered
friends to flee to a better existence.
And what a swell sisterhood they are, including bird-brained Babs (Jane Horrocks of Little
Voice), Scottish egghead Mac (Lynn Ferguson ) and know-it-all Bunty (Imelda
Staunton). Holding up the male ranks is crotchety old Fowler (Benjamin Whitrow ), a
veteran of the RAF who gripes that Yanks aren't trustworthy: "Always showing up late
for every war." Integrating the species mix is a none-too-bright pair of scavenging
cockney rats (Timothy Spall and Phil Daniels).
Ginger is at wits' end when a possible savior literally drops out of the sky. She wastes
no time persuading cocky Rocky (Mel Gibson, doing his best Chickenheart as a circus
performer billed as the Flying Rooster) to teach her fellow fowl how to take wing, too.
The brash American digs "English chicks," and they dig him back, but it's clear
by the way he and Ginger butt beaks that love is a peck away.
The humor contains a meaty dark side that will make kids think twice before ordering
McNuggets again. Greedy Mrs. Tweedy (Miranda Richardson), who lords over her henpecked
husband, keeps a laying tally. Those who don't make their yolk quota are invited to Sunday
dinner - as dinner. However, there is always a whiff of playfulness to take the edge off.
In Babe, Chicken's closest companion in barnyard whimsy, the duck cries,
"Christmas is murder." Here, Babs nervously knits a finely crafted noose when
matters grow dire.
Some of the most hysterical scenes are the ensemble pieces, such as when the roly-poly
cluckers engage in group calisthenics (like a gang of half-deflated beach balls doing
Tae-Bo). But the main course that gives Aardman's artists a real workout is the
inventively nightmarish ride through Mrs. Tweedy's chicken pot pie machine.
A little slapstick, a little action, rich characters and a whopping serving of wit. All
baked to near-perfection. (G; opens today in select cities, wide on Friday)
(Requires: Real
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