Customer Reviews

Chicken Little

5 star:		(60)
4 star:		(55)
3 star:		(36)
2 star:		(18)
1 star:		(21)

 

 

The Disney studios dropped traditional animation. It is, for historical reasons, very sad and this is definitely the end of an era for animation, and cinema in general.

I must say the trailer for Chicken Little did not make this movie very appealing. We took our 4 year old daughter to see it and all enjoyed it after all. The humour is upbeat, no doubt modern, but never trivial or vulgar. The characters play much better than expected (the fish is a truly classic but effective cartoon character) and even though the storyline probably does not go any further than the average"Goof Troop" tv episode, the dialogues and the action surely deliver good entertainment.

For animation fans, which I am, I don't think we should try to compare Chicken Little with a Pixar film for it would not live up to that but still, this one comes highly recommanded.
Unlike some of the dreamworks 3D flicks, Chicken Little has a heart and you can feel that the animators and directors really have a good appreciation and understanding of animation.

A certain heritage and tradition of American animation lives on throught this movie.
Seeing that Disney scored at their first attempt at 3D animation is a relief, now let's wait for their next release to confirm the hopes.

I do not have kids, I saw the trailers of this movie and thought I wanted to see it. The other night we were out to dinner with friends and we went out to see it with them and we laughed almost from beginning to end.

This has to be one of the best animated movies in years. It even starts, in a way, making fun of some of the great movies that came before. The story is appealing to any kid, or grown up for that matter, who ever struggles not being popular or understood. There are lessons about perserverance, friendship, hard work to overcome a handicap, powerful lessons for kids and big kids alike. The characters are all in high school, so the dynamics of being popular and fitting in and being a success are all there.

One of the things that got me was how quickly the time went, I laughed so much throughout the whole thing that the movie was over in minutes, seemingly.

Unlike some of the previous releases, there are no inuendos, and the adult humor is clean stuff that only the adults would laugh at not even Bugs Bunny adult humor. Even the music was tame, no heavy hip hop during and after the movie. It was something anyone could take their kids to and even buy when the DVD comes out. I am putting this on my wish list, first time for me to order a cartoon movie. I just think it is a movie that does not have crass borderline things in it.

Some may say that the teasing of the weak or unpopular in the movie is a negative, however, it is all with positive results with friendships being strengthened and the unpopular overcoming things and hanging together.

I have my favorite scenes, but I do not want to spoil this for anyone, the last scene will make you laugh and laugh when they make a movie about what Chicken Little and the gang did. The reflections and allusions in the movie are so on target. Disney hit a home run in this movie. A must see for young and old. The whole family needs to see this together.

I took my 7 year old son and 5 year old daughter to this movie thinking it was going to be a boring kids movie. Boy was I surpised when I laughed just as much as my kids, may be more. There was adult humor and songs from my past that went right by them but was very funny to me!

I saw Chicken Little a few weeks ago and I was not impressed at all.

The plot was not very interesting, there were few humorous parts, and halfway through the movie I was squirming in my seat waiting for it to end.

I do not recommend seeing this movie, I had high hopes....and that was all that they were.

Well this is one of those rare instances where the plethora of mediocre reviews littering the internet were invaluable at lowering my expectations going in. To be honest, I liked this one far, far more than I expected to based on popular consensus alone. I think the reason for this is due in part to the simple fact that I've done the old fable turned modern CG film many, many times in the past and can attest to how horribly wrong it can all go (try any of the Unstable Fables, Happily N'ever Afters and so on).

What we have here is a cutesy CG piece that by no means pushes the animation envelope (even for 2005 standards) that works off the tried and true formula of decent narrative rather than retina-popping visual appeal.

Zach Braff voices the title character; the resourceful little chicken of popular myth who sends the town into a panic when he rings the bell in the school tower while announcing that the sky is falling. Unable to find the piece of the sky that he saw fall, his father Buck Cluck (Garry Marshall) is naturally humiliated and tells his son to lay low for a while. Chicken Little abides by his father's wishes, and, in effort to follow in his father's footsteps, even joins the baseball team at school. Unfortunately just as it seems that things are okay between the father and son's strained relationship, another piece of the sky happens to fall (directly onto Chicken's head no less). The poor diminutive fowl is reluctant to even attempt to explain it a second time considering he hadn't even lived down his first lapse in judgment.

Chicken Little in the company of his best friends Abby Mallard (Ugly Duckling (Joan Cusack))) and Runt of the Litter (Steve Zahn), discover that sections of falling sky are in fact panels from a UFO being piloted by alien beings with a plan of total global domination.

Naturally he is unable to get anyone to believe him after his earlier humiliation but impending invasion waits not for the reconciliation of the boy who cried wolf, oh wait wrong fairy tale!

Like The Wild, Valiant, and Bolt, Chicken Little represents that period where Disney and Pixar's relationship was quite strained and "the Diz" was doing all they could to prove to the public (and to themselves) that they could pull off a computer-generated masterpiece without the help of Pixar.

Did they succeed with Chicken Little? Actually the answer to that one is a surprising yes. Not that this one raises the bar by any means; it can just as easily be viewed as committing no major gaffes either. What's here is a charming little piece that actually (and rarely) takes a fairy tale base and turns it into a modern-day adventure with a fitting homage to films like War of the Worlds.

Additionally impressive here is the humor, which actually relies upon well developed characters and solid scripting over visual gags or (ahem DreamWorks) sexual innuendos. In fact the film, like most Disney animated pieces, earns the G-rating and manages to pack some pretty intense sequences into the generally restrictive criteria. The world consists entirely of personified animals and casting Don Knotts as the jittery turkey mayor, Wallace Shawn as the canine school principle and the duo of Fred Willard and Catherine O'Hara as the alien couple proves that Disney's knack for selecting appropriate vocal talent was never in jeopardy.

Rather than take itself too seriously, Chicken Little keeps things light by integrating an incredibly rich in-film soundtrack that bounces all over the spectrum: everything from a catchy ditty written specifically for the film by the Bare Naked Ladies to the requisite It's the End of the World as We Know It (REM) during the alien invasion sequence. Other gems include an impromptu karaoke session to the Spice Girls' If you Wanna Be My Lover and the Bee Gees Stayin' Alive as character motivation (heck even the credit roll begins with a pretty funny rendition of Elton John's Don't go Breaking My Heart).

Living legend Hans Zimmer is responsible for the film's scoring so soaring highs, creepy lows and perfectly appropriate mood settings are a given.

In all the gags work with varying degrees of success: Runt of the Litter being a big Barbra Streisand fan will likely be lost on the vast majority of the intended audience but the Indiana Jones segment, for example, is fantastic stuff.

While the general opinion seems to label Chicken Little as a failure (or at the very least a failure in living up to its expectations), I tend to consider this, the first fully computer generated feature film produced in-house by Disney, a thoroughly enjoyable experience from beginning to end with just enough charm to appeal to viewers of all ages.

On my recent trip to my in-laws for Christmas, I got the opportunity to see quite a few movies with my nieces and nephews. Chicken Little was on the DVD player, so I had the opportunity to watch it.

Chicken Little is Disney's first fully rendered computer graphics animation, throwing in its hat to compete with the Pixar folks (who once worked with Disney, but no longer). Now that these kinds of movies have become ubiquitous--see any movies about talking fuzzy animals lately?--there's actually a standard to compare these films. Unfortunately for the competition, Pixar has set the bar very high.

We all know the story: the eponymous Chicken Little (Zach Braff, he of Scrubs fame) is outside playing when a piece of the sky hits him on the head. Freaking out in grand fashion, Chicken Little proceeds to tell everyone that the sky is falling. Only it isn't, and Little kind of looks like a fool, because he overreacted. It wasn't actually a piece of the sky falling, you see. And thus we have a simple fairy tale similar to the boy crying wolf: Don't overreact to potentially bad news, or people won't believe you when there IS bad news.

That's the first five minutes of Chicken Little.

Moving forward in time, we see that Chicken Little has it rough. His mom is nowhere to be found, and his exasperated dad, Buck Cluck (Garry Marshall), tries to keep up with his son's eccentricities. A huge geek, Chicken Little suffers a host of indignities that life throws at him (nearly getting run over, getting pummeled in dodgeball, losing his pants, the list goes on and on) but Little overcomes them with cheerful ingenuity. Facing the thousand cuts of school along with Little are his friends Abby Mallard AKA the Ugly Duckling (Joan Cusak), the very fat pig known as Runt of the Litter (Steve Zahn), and the weird Fish Out of Water (Dan Molina). Their arch nemesis is Foxy Loxy (Amy Sedaris).

All Chicken Little really wants to do is make his dad proud. So he joins a baseball team and, like a typical feel-good coming-of-age sports parable, makes the winning play and earns the love of friends, family, and the community. It's like a film within a film.

Then the sky falls again. Finally, Chicken Little switches to the actual plot: a War of the Worlds-style invasion by aliens. Of course.

So what exactly is wrong with an underdog character overcoming an alien invasion, the prejudices of the community, poor past judgment, and did I mention an alien invasion?

TOO ADULT. Whereas the Pixar films speak to both adults and kids, Chicken Little talks down to kids and throws in stupid slapstick that feels pointless, just to keep the little ones entertained. Then it adds in awkward adult scenes in parts where it doesn't make sense. Do we really need a romance (and a kiss!) between Abby and Little? Or Runt singing, "If You Wanna Be My Lover"? Worse, many of the in-jokes are very dated.

TOO UGLY. Pixar characters are undeniably cute, be it a fish, a car, an ant, or a toy. Chicken Little is an ugly little toad; his feathers look like spines, his eyes are beady, and he has a tiny beak for his massive head. Runt is grossly overweight, Abby is literally an ugly duckling, Fish Out of Water is completely nuts...these are not characters you readily connect with. Braff's voice acting goes a long way in making Little a likable character, but it takes awhile.

TOO SCI-FI. I actually liked this movie a lot, once I realized it was a riff on War of the Worlds. How often do CGI cartoon characters run screaming from aliens? Okay, they did it in Jimmy Neutron too. The problem is that Chicken Little switches abruptly from a cute morality play to terrifying invasion scenario that involves characters getting zapped out of existence. They all turn out to be okay later, of course, but it sure as heck looks like the aliens killed the cute characters.

That said, my niece and nephews watched it twice. All three of them (my twelve-year-old nephew, seven-year-old niece, and my three-year-old godson) loved it. So perhaps where Chicken Little fails in its pseudo-appeal to adults, it succeeds with the kids. Or maybe they just like to see a fat pig run from alien tripods.

He said the sky was falling
They thought it was a joke
They taunted and they teased him
And they laughed when' ere he spoke

Only a tiny acorn
His father did attest
He was ashamed his little son
Had caused the town unrest

Shunned by all except his friends
He prayed for just one shot
to prove what he was really worth
and please his dad a lot

He hit a homer, won the game
became a minor hero
but then the sky fell down again
and set him back to zero

It's then the movie takes a turn
In comes from outer space
Invaders from War of the Worlds
To vaporize the place

Then it's Chicken to the rescue
A plucky little bird
We go from so-so CGI
To blatantly absurd

Though kids will like the cartoon
The music seems so wrong
Elton John and Kiki Dee
And Gloria Gaynor's song?

Some parts are geared to older folk
While some are for much younger
If you are starved for cartoon fare
This one won't quench your hunger



Amanda Richards, September 1, 2006

My husband and I took our two children, 3 and 5, to see this film. We were all disappointed. My husband joked that the best part of the film is that it was only 70 minutes!!! The children, who are usually enraptured in Disney movies, could not have been any less interested. In the way of the Shreck films, the movie humor was geared towards adults... not that we found it in the least bit funny.
Forty dollars later, we found ourselves asking why did we bother? The best part of the outing was getting to spend time with our children. Save your money and find another way to spend your valuable family time. This film is a waste of time.

I was very disappointed with this one. I was expecting a smart movie full of imagination and beautiful animation. Well, the animators did a great job, but the writing was really bad as was the direction. Most of the characters I didn't care about. The rest were just annoying. Like the pig. I was bored all through this movie.

Disappointing, is an understatement with both the film itself and the DVD package. Chicken Little has a great soundtrack, big name TV stars, Zach Braff (Scrubs) and Adam West (Batman and Family Guy) supplying voices you'd think a great movie result would be a breeze. Unfortunately the big money must have gone to their salaries and to pay for the songs with only the bottom of the barrel writers being able to be afforded. Chicken Little struggles for original ideas with characters like Fish being pretty much clones of other characters (Kenny, South Park). The War of the Worlds is pretty much plagiarised as well by the alien attack scenes. Throw in the fact that Chicken Little barely passes the hour mark in length and you know there had better be some great bonus features or you've been ripped off.

Great bonus features however there aren't, with very poor efforts put into the meagre bonuses included. As if there is any chance you won't find fish in the Where's Fish? trivia game. Alternative beginnings are mostly hand drawn sketches, they couldn't even bothered creating them. Save your money for other DVDs.