Hey folks, Harry here... Clay chickens... heh heh... hee hee.... ohboyohboyohboy.... Nick Park... work your magic spell.... Force the American Movie Going Public to understand and worship you! Yes... Yes.... It will be so, but by the magic brown stains of Quint's underwear, I know it to be true. Why just the otherday Quint pulled out his... Why don't you just read the spy report.... this is a sick rememberance of Quint when he was only 18.
Yo Harry, Withnail here...
Of all the summer movies on the way, there’s only one that I’m desperate to see. Not X-Me, Not MI2, but Chicken Run!!!!!
Being based here in good old blighty, means we don’t get the test screenings that you folk stateside are treated too. And then we have to wait weeks after a US release for a movie to come to the UK.
Imagine how loud I screamed when a close pal said he might be able to sneak me into a Chicken Run preview in London.
It was held last week at the big Warner West End Cinema, and it kicked off with co directors Peter Lord and Nick Park saying how things were going on the movie. They talked a bit about how the original idea came from the simple concept of an escape movie for Chickens! They’d come straight from the edit suite to the screening, and hoped everyone would enjoy it.
The exec producer then introduced how the screening would work - cos the film hasn’t been finished he’d show a sequence, then explain what happened next, before showing another sequence, explaining what followed etc. In all they showed about 40 minutes of pretty finished footage.
The opening (after a few technical problems with sound) looked fabulous - setting up the the main premise of Ginger (voiced by Julia Sawallah) trying yet another escape - but being caught by the dastardly Mr Tweedie and his vicious dogs.
A later sequence showed what happens when one poor chicken hasn’t laid any eggs for 5 days. At a POW camp style roll call, Mrs Tweedie orders it to be taken to the toolshed to be killed.
Rocky - the chicken voiced by Mel Gibson - enters the movie later on. Ginger is outside praying something or someone to help them, when Rocky appears sailing through the air. It turns out he’s escaped from a circus and Ginger agrees to hide him on the farm, but in return he’s got to teach the chickens how to fly so they can escape.
I don’t want to give too much away, but the animation is stunning, not only in concept but execution. They showed the film’s major set piece where Rocky helps Ginger escape from a huge pie machine full of cogs, levers and equipment - the whole sequence lasts about ten minutes - and is filled with in jokes - including a great Indiana Jones gag - you’ll know it when you see it.
The genius of Nick Park and Peter Lord is that you start of thinking ‘ wow, that’s amazing! How the hell did they do that with clay figure animation.’ Then after a while you forget you’re watching an animated movie, and start really caring about the characters.
They didn’t show us what happens in the last part of the movie - but ended on a monatge that comes close to the beginning of all the chickens various escape attempts - for which Ginger always ends up being punished, and shoved in solitary where she bounces a sprout against the wall Steve McQueen style.
Even though I’ve now seen a lot of it - I can’t wait to see the whole finished movie. Forget Cruise, forget Wolverine, I’m going with Rocky and Ginger.
Withnail.
