Chicken Run
This Ain't No Chick Flick!
Nick Park and Peter Lord take their superbly original combination of cracking character based animated comedy and wonderfully manic machinery which worked so well with Wallace and Gromit and transfer it to the big screen with the first full length feature from Aardman Animation - the undisputed masters of claymation. And this is a Good Film! Not only does the humour stretch very successfully over ninety minutes, the extra time allows the comedy and the characters to be developed in one film rather than having to make three short films to get there.
This film is essentially The Great Escape… with chickens.
The barbed-wire enclosed Tweedy chicken farm takes the place of Stalag Luft North and the plot revolves around hen with a dream, Ginger (Julia Sawalha) and her attempts to organise a mass escape from the farm. After repeated failed escape attempts, a resigned air descends over the farm with Bunty leading the faction who start to say that the problems are caused by the escape attempts and that life would be better for all if they just accepted their lot.
Two events give the escape plans a new impetus. The first is the arrival of Rocky the Flying Rooster (Mel Gibson) who, after pressure from Ginger and swooning hero worship from the rest of the female population of the farm, agrees to stay and teach them all to fly to freedom. The second event is the discovery of Mrs Tweedy’s plans for the future of the farm.
This is a superb film, packed with great characters all of whom are well realised. Miranda Richardson’s characterisation of Mrs Tweedy as a superbly stereotyped northern battleaxe, the two rats who act as scroungers, Wing Commander Fowler and his constant RAF stories and the spinelessly inept Mr Tweedy all effortlessly add depth and humour to this ensemble animation.
And then theres the sight gags. There are tons of these and one with so much going on in the background that you’ll need to watch the film several times just to see it all.
It took five years to make Chicken Run. I sincerely hope we don’t have to wait another five years for the next Aardman feature. But if we do, it’ll be worth it.
Sunday 13 Aug 2000 | Paul Pritchard | Animation and Anime, Comedy
[…] n techniques have seen huge improvements over the years and, compared to the claymation of Chicken Run or the detailed cel animation of Princess Mononoke, Gerry Anderson’s Supermariona […]