Flushed Away

Flushed Away is the perfect marriage between the American Dreamworks and their crass sense of humor and the British Aardman and their dry sense of humor. Beside the obvious jokes about the sewer there's much to enjoy for the more sophisticated viewer. Like a cockroach reading FranzKafka's The Metamorphosis. The voice-cast is spot on: Ian McKellen as the evil genius The Toad is pure delight, Kate Winslet and Hugh Jackman are clearly having a blast giving their voices to rats Rita and Roddy. But the cream of the crop are the singing and screaming snails. When they sing at the top of their lungs Proud Mary you laugh so hard you have to check your underpants to see if you haven't had a little accident.

This film didn't sound appealing to me when I first heard about it; a rat society living in the underground waterways of England wasn't my idea of an interesting movie. But, I was invited to see a screening of it recently, and I must say that I was pleasantly surprised after seeing it! This film is different, exciting, adventurous, and fun to watch! I liked Rita (Kate Winslet) the best, but that's if I had to choose one character. Roddy (Hugh Jackman) was the star though. The little slugs singing on the side are cute in their own way too. The underlying message of how important family and friends are is well done. It's great for the whole family!

Flushed Away carries a weight of intellect with it not often found these days in American cinema and television. It's sharp-witted yet poignant and fresh at the same time.

I went in with the expectations of it being another animated film in an ocean of animated films, but I was pleasantly surprised and thoroughly entertained.

The message of the film is an ever-fading idea that isolation from each other is how we will become destroyed. The idea that one must go far, far beyond their comfort zone and any form of complacency to find what truly matters in life. The films treatment of this ideology, again, is brilliant in my opinion.

It has excellent writing, the animation is absolutely top notch, and the voice talent live up to their high dollar reputations. Everyone is outstanding in this film and it is a must see during the holidays.

Go see Flushed Away!!! Go now!!

Hugh Jackman is everywhere these days, from reprising his iconic Wolverine role in summer blockbuster X3, to starring twice alongside Scarlett Johansson in Woody Allen's Scoop and Christopher Nolan's The Prestige, and now, just lending his voice to a lead character in the animated film Flushed Away, co-starring his summer blockbuster star Sir Ian McKellen. Soon to come will be Darren Aronofsky's The Fountain. Whew! There seems to be no stopping this Hollywood flavour of the month!

Despite this animated movie being yet another one of many based on talking animals, Flushed Away doesn't try too hard to be funny by steamrolling pop culture into the story. It just is funny with its deft touches, be it dialogue, slapstick, or various sight gags. Although it's set primarily in the sewers, it's beautiful chaos, with loads of little details all over that you'll probably need to watch it twice over to appreciate all the effort put in to create the computerized graphical sets.

At first glance, you might think you're watching a Wallace and Gromit animated show. Yes, this is produced by the same studio, Aardman Animations, in association with Dreamworks, and it is no wonder that the animation, although computer generated, maintained a very clay like look and feel, as well as character designs bearing similar resemblance in style to W&G.

The story is simple enough, yet adequately satisfying by the time the end credits roll. As the trailer suggested, Aristocratic rat pet Roddy from Kensington (Hugh Jackman) thought he just had the whole classy apartment to himself, when an unexpected guest Sid (Shane Richie) from the sewers gatecrashes into his abode, and ejects him through the "jacuzzi". All these in less than 10 minutes. So begins a mad journey in an unknown sewer world which replicated the modern London City above it with junk, where he has to figure out friend from foe, and find his way back to where he belongs.

The themes of family and friends do not come on too strongly, instead the story preferred to let the character interactions bring forth the messages. Supporting or interfering in his quest are characters like Rita (Kate Winslet), The Toad (Ian McKellen), French Le Frog (Jean Reno), and rat minions Whitey (Bill Nighy) and Spike (Andy Serkis). It's quite commendable that in its less than 90 minutes runtime, it allowed for quite a bit of set action pieces to develop, along with almost laugh-a-minute lines of dialogue, a good mix of songs (Hugh sings!) and ooh, a diabolical plot.

But what perhaps is the show stealer, are the sewer slugs. Ever popping up and performing at the right time, I'm sure they are crowd favourites despite their less than pleasant looking exterior. I wonder if they do sell the soft toy version, as it should be quite hilarious.

If too many animated flicks left this year has left you jaded with the genre, Flushed Away just flushes away the competition. Worth checking out on the big screen!

I saw Flushed Away at a press screening in Berlin where it was shown in English to an overwhelmingly German audience. Leaving aside the clichés (Germans DO have a sense of humour - it's just different, okay?!), coming as yet another in a long line of CGI films and with (let's be honest here) a less than gripping concept, Flushed Away had only a certain amount of goodwill from this professional crowd. So when an audience like this, yours truly included, laughs aloud and often then there's something special up on the screen!

The humour is overwhelmingly English and there is none of the morality messaging that makes family films from certain other studios such a cringe-inducing experience. The characters are very well drawn (literally as well as figuratively) and the voice casting is universally excellent. The standard of animation is fantastic but you never once get the sense that anyone is showing off what they can do. This is a story- and character-driven film, with the technology there to serve. Anyone writing it off because it is not claymation is doing themselves a great disservice.

Lovers of Wallace & Gromit and Aardman's work in general will have a ball spotting the oh so many references. The level of detail is amazing and it's going to take many viewings and many hours with the DVD on pause to spot them all. There are the bunnies from Curse of the Wererabbit, for example. I spotted the Lion King on the little girl's windowsill, and so on. And on.

When a film credits several writers, plus comedy consultants, it's usually a sign that the script has gone horribly and tragically wrong. Maybe it did, to begin with, and the start is just a tad slow, but it soon picks up speed and the jokes, verbal and visual, just keep coming.

Like the best family films, Flushed Away appeals to audiences of all ages, but the very young might find it a bit long. Not that it lags at any time, merely that the wee tots might get fidgety, you understand.

The cast do a great job and I'm not going to single out anyone for special mention. The performances are spot on and everyone is obviously having a tongue in cheek good time. For professional reasons, I get to watch some 300 or more films a year. Flushed Away belongs to the very, very few that I wanted to see again right after it had finished. And before you ask, no, I am not being paid, induced or threatened at gunpoint to write this. I had a cracking good time, as did my girlfriend (Julia, German, with sense of humour) and you will too.