Chicken Little

Childhood fables tell us of an Isaac Newton wannabe who gets konked on
the noggin, panics and pulls all he meets in the way to the king into
believing this catastrophe coming down around them. That is until a fox
takes advantage of their ignorance and polishes them off with some
pinto beans and a root beer. Basically, the moral hovers around “don’t
panic” and “don’t belive everything you hear”.

For Disney’s 2005 retelling, or rather sequel, the moral is more like “never fire Pixar”.

Okay, that’s on the harsh side. The movie, surprisingly, isn’t that
bad. In fact, it’s entertaining, unique from a technical perspective
and introduces some great characters, just doesn’t let them meet up to
their potential. In this story, young Chicken Little (voiced by Scrub’s
Zach Braff), isn’t exactly popular after the “sky is falling” incident
a year earlier nearly destroyed the small town of Oakey Oaks where he
lives. Now the town see’s CL as a little nuts and even his
Disney-Typical single father can’t find much faith in his son. His only
friends are other school outcasts: Abbey Mallard (Ugly Duckling, Joan
Cusack), Runt of the Litter and Fish out of Water. Fish is the stand
out character. Though he never says anything understandable, his facial
expressions and penchant for dramatics leave you wanting more from this
little guy, similar to the claymation dog Gromit. Chicken Little is
coincidently hit on the head again, but discovers that this piece of
the sky is more than he could have expected.

The film is a pretty average affair. The story has more of a twist than
I expected, but still tended to be predictable. There’s a good amount
of comedy, mostly in the form of one-liners and pop culture references,
which actually dated the film right off by including Spice Girls,
Barbara Streisand and Gloria Gaynor references. Still, at a cool hour
21, the film moved along quickly enough to hold your attention.

I have to say though, part of the reason for my rating falls to
technical achievement. Firstly, Disney animators found a way to really
recreate the general feel of a 2D animated film that is lacking in most
3D animations. Something Pixar has yet to do. Animators refer to the
technique as Squash and Stretch, a way to draw that overemphasizes
movement and bends shapes to give movement some oomph. Chicken Little
animators have succesfully done this to the extent that some of my
faith has been restored.

Additionally, select theatres offer Chicken Little in stereoscopic 3D.
This is a new technique however, one that ILM has been developing that
brings a level of depth and comfort I’ve never experienced before in a
3D film. Using polarized glasses, viewers see what I like to call a
“Deep Screen”. Instead of the cheap scares where a hand comes out of
the screen or explosions send shrapnel towards your face, the feeling
is more like a shadow box look instead of a pop-up book. Background
elements appear behind the screen and foreground characters appear
rounded and tangible. The experience is one that is both subtle and
dramatic. It was the first 3D film, animated or not, that I walked away
from that didn’t fell like my eyes needed readjusting. During a special
presentation at our screening, Disney animators promised more films
using this technique, including America Dog and LucasFilms redux of the
original Star Wars Trilogy.

If you have the opportunity to see this in 3D, I can do nothing but
recommend seeing the film. As a standard flic, the movie is cute and
well animated, funny at times and generally light hearted
entertainment. Chicken Little doesn’t hold a candle to The Incredibles,
but take a crack at it anyway….get it? Chicken egg, crack? Aw c’mon!!
All the pro reviews had bad puns in them!!!