PLOT: A young chicken -- already suffering the mockery and condemnation of townsfolk after yelling, "The sky is falling!" a year earlier -- hesitates to warn his father and friends about an alien invasion.
Entering the computer-generated animation game late, as Disney is doing with Chicken Little, puts an awful lot of pressure on a small fry.
The Mouse has so heavily hyped this CG update on the poult who yelled, "The sky is falling!", anything less than a revelation would seem like failure. That is too bad, because you know they're not coming up with Shrek out of the gate, no matter how well they trained their galley-slaves to use an electronic stylus instead of pencils.
And they didn't. Disney's switch to digital is ground-breaking because it is Disney, because of the old animation factory of Snow White and Lion King that died en route, and because of the limited release Digital 3-D version that's playing on two screens in Canada (Silvercity 10 in Mississauga and the Colossus 18 in Woodbridge).
As a film, Chicken Little is somewhat derivative, and the joke density is below that of, say, Shrek or The Incredibles. But that's still pretty good, and the results are blessed relief for parents with small children.
What's interesting is how Disney-like the results remain, hewing to the edgeless, non-threatening, big-eyed cartoon figure template that's been an artistic trademark of Disney animation for 70 years -- as well as to the company's apparent fixation with dead parents and one-parent kids (Bambi, Cinderella, Simba et al).
Chicken Little opens on the sunny town of Oakey Oaks, home to characters like Mayor Turkey Lurkey (voice of Don Knotts), tomboy sports hero Foxy Loxy (Amy Sedaris), Chicken Little (Zach Braff) and his buddies Ugly Duckling (Joan Cusack), Runt Of The Litter (Steve Zahn) and walking goldfish bowl Fish Out Of Water (Dan Molina).
As the movie begins, our little title character, who looks suspiciously like the bookwormy Looney Toons character Egghead Jr. of Foghorn Leghorn fame, gets hit on the head by, yes, a piece of sky. The extensive panic he creates makes for the most spiritedly anarchic few moments in the movie, and a great opening overall.
No evidence is found, though, and Chicken has to live as a school target (there's a brutal dodgeball scene) and a public pariah -- even his widower dad, a former jock (Garry Marshall), sadly can't bring himself to believe his son.
Of course, there is a reason that piece of sky fell, but it waits for Chicken to set about redeeming himself, through the unlikely route of becoming a baseball hero. Chicken Little thus is two small movies -- a heartwarming cheer-for-the-underdog comedy, and a raucous alien invasion climax that smacks of Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius.
Disney rarely evokes parental concern, but the alien scenes have familiar characters apparently being "vaporized," which might give pause for pre-schoolers.
BOTTOM LINE: This is Disney entering the computer-generated animation game late and coming up just short of the best stuff that preceded it. There are funny pop culture riffs and sight gags, but only half the density thereof as, say, Shrek. Still worth taking younger kids to.
(This film is rated G)
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