Slugs In Harmony

[the_gneech]

lythandra and I went to see Flushed Away this evening; it's the latest offering from Aardman Animations, the lovely folks who created Wallace and Gromit.

It was very good; I highly recommend it. :) Particularly if you'd enjoy a gender-reversed version of The African Queen starring CGI rats, which I certainly always would. ;) I would have preferred claymation to CGI (really ... I'm just tired of CGI), but on the other hand trying to do most of the effects in this movie with claymation would have been a nightmare.

High points include Sir Ian McKellan as the villain, a Marcel Marceau frog with a cellphone over his face (believe me, it makes more sense in context), and the "We surrender!" joke. The only real low point was the junk they showed in the previews -- does the world need another CGI movie starring penguins? Now they're surfing, randomly. Although Charlotte's Web looks like it might be good to catch on Netflix.

There were lots of Wallace and Gromit in-jokes, of course, and a handful of Wolverine gags; but mostly it's designed to stand on its own, and it does. :) We enjoyed it.

-The Gneech

Comments

[frostdemn.livejournal.com]

Hm, I'm still on the fence about that.
As for the movie being CGI, I'm fairly sure they'd have gone with claymation if it weren't for that tragedy a few months (years?) back with the fire and everything? Hm, maybe they wouldn't have been able to anyway.

[doodlesthegreat.livejournal.com]

No, the film was concieved and put into production prior to that fire. It was originally concieved as claymation, but as you suspect, the complexity was too much even for them. But they did build a RL set of Ratopolis that they were going to try to use for the claymation, and it ended up becoming the exact model for what was created in CG.

[frostdemn.livejournal.com]

Fascinating!
Though as I said, still on the fence about watching it.

[the-gneech.livejournal.com]

Go see it! It's good. :)

-TG

[rhanlav.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I had the same thought. I guess at least with a digital studio, it wouldn't be as hard to replace stuff if things happened. Digital back ups fix everything.

[doodlesthegreat.livejournal.com]

Did you notice the plush bunny in the room where Roddy lives? =};-3

[the-gneech.livejournal.com]

Yes, actually, I did. And the DVD on the shelf. ;)

-TG

enjoyable Flick

[eddiecanis.livejournal.com]

saw it with a few friends.
don't mind if it was not cg as long as they keep the writing up :)

[c-eagle.livejournal.com]

You've never seen Charlotte's Web?

[the-gneech.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen the new live-action one from Nickelodeon, no, 'cause it isn't out yet! ;)

-TG

[larksilver.livejournal.com]

Salutations!

Now I've a barbershop quartet singing "Some terrific radiant humble thingamajig of a pig! He's Zuckerman's famous pig!"

Man, I loved that cartoon. I'm hesitant about a live action version, if only because the original was (is!) so terrific.

[himura-tiger.livejournal.com]

Oh, cool! ^.^ I can't wait to see it, myself. :-) Thanks for the quick review! ^.^