Chicken Run (Animated) (Wide Screen) > Reviews > Run Chicken Run Chicken Run Run Run

Author's product rating:   

Did you enjoy it?	Loved it
Story	Good
Characters / Performances	Outstanding
Special Effects	Outstanding
How does it compare to similar films?	Good

Advantages:	One of the funniest films of the year
Disadvantages:	None really

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

~ ~ Mel Gibson was all over our movie screens last summer, with two major films on general release.

~ ~ The first was the historical drama about the American Revolution, “The Patriot”, and the second an animated film about life on a chicken farm called, appropriately, “Chicken Run”.
Many critics, and indeed the public at large, were most surprised when Chicken Run turned out not only to be the most successful at the box office, but far more entertaining than the big-budget American drama, The Patriot.

~ ~ This film was Disney’s answer to opposition studio “Dreamworks” two huge successes in this film genre, “Antz” and “Prince of Egypt”.

The Story
~ ~ ~ ~ ~

~ ~ Chicken Run is not a cartoon in the traditional sense, but takes us into the magical imagery of clay animation.

~ ~ The setting for the action is a grim chicken farm set in rural 1950’s England, which is run with an iron hand by the bitter and twisted Mrs. Tweedy. (Miranda Richardson)
She runs the farm along the lines of an old Gestapo prison camp, complete with “Nissen hut” type chicken coops, so comparisons with the Steve McQueen drama “The Great Escape” are nearly inevitable.
The evil Mrs. Tweedy’s only purpose in life is to make money by whatever means at her disposal, no matter how cruelly or badly she has to treat the chickens to do so.

~ ~ “Chicken-in-Charge” is a hen called “Ginger” (Julie Sawalha).
She is constantly scheming and planning new methods of escape to gain the chickens their freedom and escape the wicked clutches of Mrs. Tweedy.
Just when all seems lost, and poor old Ginger is at the point of despair, enter the “hero”, a rooster called “Rocky” (Mel Gibson)
Rocky is a “flying” chicken who has escaped from the circus, and when he (quite literally) crashes into the hen run, Ginger and the others immediately take him “under their wings” (sorry about the pun, I couldn’t resist it) and prevail on him to teach them how to fly.

~ ~ The movie progresses from here to a series of hilarious scenarios about “flying” lessons, which get even more serious when it is discovered that Mrs. Tweedy now plans to turn all the chickens into pies, and has bought some monstrous new machinery to achieve this purpose.

Rating
~ ~ ~ ~

~ ~ I went to see this with my little nine-year-old daughter and her friend. (I get to see lots of kiddies’ films this way, it’s a grand excuse!)

~ ~ The whole cinema was rocking with laughter, including ourselves, and it was truly a movie we didn’t want to end.
The “clay animation” is wonderful, and really brings the “characters” to life in away that a traditional cartoon could never manage, and Mel Gibson shows us (once again) what a truly great and versatile actor he actually is.

~ ~ We watched this on the big screen, but it is now available to either rent or buy.
I enjoyed it so much, I’m actually going to buy a copy, which as a “Scotsman” is not a favourite trick of mine.
If you haven’t seen it already, do so now.