Customer Reviews

Creature Comforts - The Complete First Season

5 star:		(31)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

The premise of the original short, Creature Comforts, was to take interviews with ordinary people & transform them into comedic animal representations via the medium of claymation. Nick Park & his team developed this brilliantly funny concept through an entire 13 episode series.

This dvd is amazingly funny - even what may be perceived as the weaker episodes have their sparkling moments. If you're a fan of Wallace & Gromit or just a fan of funny animation, this dvd is for you. The format has no definite story line, but rather is a topical discussion - kind of like Dr. Doolittle meets Oprah. Addressing such questions as "Where do we come from?", "Are there aliens?" and "Cats vs. Dogs" - these installments will leave you in stitches. The animation is flawless, the interview editing superb. Just an overall delight.

This DVD, containing 13 new episodes of Creature Comforts is a joy to watch. Like the original, it features claymation animated animals speaking dialogue taken from interviews of British citizens. The animation is beautiful, making the characters really come alive. The humor is typically dry, and like Wallace and Gromit, you will probably either love it or hate it, with no in between. The extras are a wonderful look into the process involved in creating such a work.

I am just adoring Creature Comforts, the BBC series by Nick Park. If you've never seen the original short, you must.

Not too long ago I found out that Aardman Animation did this series with the same concept. In the original Oscar-winning short, people visiting a zoo and living in a nursing home were interviewed, and their responses to the questions were edited and animated so you get to hear animals at the zoo talking about life in the zoo. In the series, that same concept is taken into every other aspect of animal life--animals in the garden, at the beach, in the sea, working jobs, flying, and even discussing evolution and the origin of the species...es. What's the plural of Species? Speci?

When I read the reviews at Amazon.com, I was surprised to see several folks say that "it gets old fast." But I figured I knew what that was about, so we've been rationing ourselves since a friend plucked this DVD off my Amazon.com wishlist and had it sent to me for my birthday. We've been watching no more than three or four a night, including the original short, which is also included on the DVD.

There are some real characters that you get to know through the series. A rat couple sitting out front of their house, relaxing and enjoying the sun. A dog and cat that lounge about on a sofa and have lived together for so long that their comfort together just couldn't be greater. A terrier with an amusing outlook on life and an infectious laugh. Two performing circus monkeys that... hehehe... well, to the educated listener, you can tell they're a little kinky. *snort* It's just so fun!

The wide variety in dialects available to the interviewers and animators clearly helped them with creating these characters--each animal is an ideal choice for the voice and content of its comments. If you didn't know about it, I highly recommend putting it on your list.

Absolutely genious. In traditional Aardman form, they bring clay to life like nobody else can. I'm a fan of animation, and have been waiting for the US release of Creature Comforts since I first saw it at the Ottawa Animation Festival in 2004.

It amazes me how the clay creatures really "live". Even as an animator, I don't find myself analyzing their processes, but rather falling in love with the characters, and every once in a while saying, "Oh yea, they're not real..." Human actors have a hard time achieving such subtlety of emotion.

It was also great to see the extra DVD stuff showing the human actors taping what they wanted the characters to do.

I love it.

Brian Hoard, Animator
BHH Studio
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This series of short episodes is one of the funniest things I've ever seen. The creators have interviewed random Brits on the street and then created mini Mockumentaries as if animals are being interviewed. The animals hold forth on a range of topics, from whether they believe in aliens to what motivates them to perform in the circus. My four-year-old boy, a devotee of Wallace and Grommit, becomes bored with this quickly since it's all talk and no action. My husband and I, however, have enjoyed it mightily and have passed it around to our adult friends.

Just when you think there is no more quality humor in the vast universe of so called entertainment, along comes Creature Comforts. As far from reality TV as you can get, this series combines first rate claymation with decent scripting and superb delivery to fracture your funny bone.
The attention to detail is a delight. Each scene has background activites and ploys to keep your attention. The mannerisms of the clay characters are spot on as they raise an eyebrow, or scratch their back, or roll their eyes making them more real than half the people in the check out line at your mega store.
The only drawback is the too thick British accent at times. But that is a small challenge to the major mirth marathon burned on this DVD. My dog even enjoys it. 5 stars

I have been a big fan of Aardman Productions since I first saw some of the early Creature Comforts bits at a film festival in the states. That was some time ago. I also enjoyed the Wallace & Gromit episodes.

I saw the '05 Christmas special and loved it, and I was thrilled to get Season One on DVD.

The thing I love about the characters is the great detail and patience which obviously goes into every one of the vignettes (the bonus documentary on the DVD shows you just how it's done). I especially love how they show human emotions in the animals, things you normaly wouldn't pick up on talking to a person, you see much more clearly with the creatures (eyebrow raises, movements of the face and body, etc.).

And the fun thing is they didn't have to write any of it! The Great British Public is a howl when it comes to the asking of mundane questions (What's It All About, The Beach). Cute, funny, sometimes thought provoking, you can't help but laugh all the way through.

Thank you Golly, Nick and all the rest at Aardman!

The first season of this clever series shines on this DVD. You get the first 13 episodes of the series, with hilarious claymation animals talking in the voices of The Great British Public about any number of interesting topics. It sounds like the makers interviewed ordinary British citizens and then took the best bits and animated a character for each voice.

The premise is awesome, but what truly brings this to brilliant new heights is the skill and loving care with which the series was created. I guffawed my way through the first one, watching in disbelief at how clever and funny it was, and finally dragged my unwilling boyfriend in to watch it with me. After about ten minutes he was chortling along with me and we enjoyed the rest with great enthusiasm.

This is meant more for teens and adults than children, because the humor is often subtle or dry and the accents can be hard to understand for Americans. But there isn't anything unsafe for younger kids in here as far as I could tell, I just don't think they'd really "get" it.

If you like Wallace and Gromit and want to try something new, give this winner a try - it is well worth the money and is one that I intend to watch over and over again.

As a long-time fan of Wallace and Gromit, I ordered the feature-length movie and added Creature Comforts as an extra. It turns out that Creature Comforts can be viewed again and again with increasing enjoyment. Each short is a stand-alone of just the right length. The only drawback is the repeated musical theme which bores a hole in ones brain.

This is not a mad slapstick movie ending in a chase, as some Wallace and Gromit fans might be led to expect. Instead, it's a warm, funny, and sometimes poignant look at human life as told by animals. If you can't appreciate that (like one reviewer and his six year old) this isn's a video for you. But if your sense of humor goes beyond the Three Stooges, you just may find it something you'll return to time and again.