CHICKEN RUN
dir: Nick Park
Remember how Iron Giant had DFFQI abuzz last year
with it's sheer awesome-ness, proving that "kid's"
movies need not be dumb Disney pablum? Ladies and
gentlmen, I would like to introduce you to Chicken
Run.
Chicken Run is hands-down, the best kids movie all
year. I'd say decade, but "The Iron Giant" gets in
the way.
The purity of the claymation, five years of hard work
yielding eighty five minutes of concentrated screen
magic. Magic. That's what best describes the movie.
The character of Ginger, the chicken who wants freedom
more than anythign else, is the best screen hero of
the year, out-doing Maximus or Shaft or Wolverine
simply by being so, well...driven. Not driven like
Shaft pistol-whippin' that street corner thug, driven
like there's one goal important in her mind, and
that's all she works towards.
Ginger is voiced by Julie Swahilia, better remembered
as Edina's daugher on Absolutely Fabulous (Oh God, my
misspent youth watching hours upon hours of that
show...). Rocky the American Rooster who might be
their ticket out is done superbly by Mel Gibson.
Miranda Richardson (DFFQI's favorite Queen Elizabeth
from Black Adder The Second) is Mrs Tweedy, the evil
farmer who wants to convert Tweedy Farms to a Chicken
Pot Pie factory. The RAF veteran chicken and Mac, the
Scottish one, are also very funny.
The only thing I can really do is implore you
to see this.
---
Michael Keegan
6.28.2000
Dairy Farmers For Quebec's Independence