Chicken Little film review

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CHICKEN LITTLE

The animated year gets off to a decent enough start with Chicken Little, a family comedy that's definitely not in the A League of Shrek or Toy Story but nonetheless provides enough entertainment for kids while not being too onerous a watch for their parents. It's one of Disney's final animated offerings before their recent and much-touted acquisition of Pixar, and if anything Chicken Little serves as a good example of why the Mouse House needs a fresh injection of creativity - it looks, to all intents and purposes, like someone has tried (and narrowly failed) to copy Pixar in terms of style and script.

Directed by Mark Dindal, who had success in 2000 with The Emperor's New Groove, Chicken Little is voiced by Zach Braff of Scrubs fame, and is a young chick in a town where animals rule the roost. In a twist on the boy who cried wolf story, one day Chicken Little causes a near riot in the town when he rings the emergency bell after becoming convinced that the sky is falling in.

Nobody believes the young chick, and soon he has run foul of his townsfolk who regard him as little more than a paltry nuisance. None more so than his father Buck Cluck (Garry Marshall), a one time baseball hero who is less than impressed by the antics of his son.

Consequently C Little Jr has two things to do: prove to his father that he is not an inept young bird, and also try to figure out whether or not the sky is actually falling in on the town. Aided by his crew who include a duck, a goldfish and a pig, young Little gets to work.

Despite getting off to a sluggish and slightly confusing start, the film soon finds its feet and the jokes do start to arrive, but they don't quite have the level of polish that might have been expected. The animation is impressive though, and certainly young Chicken is cute enough to appeal to the under-tens. There's a big War of the Worlds-style finale, and while it doesn't turn Chicken Little into a classic, it's not the worst option come a rainy half-term afternoon.

Paul Hurley