The Ant Bully (2006)

After Lucas Nickle floods an ant colony with his watergun, he's magically shrunken down to insect size and sentenced to hard labor in the ruins.

Director:

John A. Davis

Writers:

John A. Davis, John Nickle (book)

Stars:

Julia Roberts, Nicolas Cage, Meryl Streep

1 win & 3 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Julia Roberts	...	Hova (voice)
Nicolas Cage	...	Zoc (voice)
Meryl Streep	...	Queen (voice)
Paul Giamatti	...	Stan Beals (voice)
Zach Tyler	...	Lucas Nickle (voice) (as Zach Tyler Eisen)
Regina King	...	Kreela (voice)
Bruce Campbell	...	Fugax (voice)
Lily Tomlin	...	Mommo (voice)
Cheri Oteri	...	Doreen Nickle (voice)
Larry Miller	...	Fred Nickle (voice)
Allison Mack	...	Tiffany Nickle (voice)
Ricardo Montalban	...	Head of Council (voice)
Creagen Dow	...	Mullet Boy (voice)
Myles Jeffrey	...	Steve (voice)
Jake T. Austin	...	Nicky (voice)

Storyline

This is the story of a ten-year-old boy named Lucas Nickle, who has just moved to a new neighborhood, has no friends, and is the target for the local bully and his gang. His parents are leaving for a honeymoon in Puerto Vallarta, so they are too busy to attend to his problems. His sister is distracted by her cellular phone, and the grandmother is obsessed with UFOs and aliens. Lucas is constantly being beat up by the obese yet intimidating neighborhood bully. Because he cannot fight back, he takes out his anger on an anthill in his front yard; He kicks it, stomps it, squirts it with his water gun, and floods it with a hose. This terrifies the ants, who call Lucas the Destroyer. One wizard ant, known as Zoc being a hopeful and adventurous type, is trying to solve this dilemma. He tries to devise a magic potion that he believes will solve all their problems. As the plan to shrink Lucas down to their size with a magic potion and forcing him to live like an ant within the colony--an ...

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Plot Keywords:

ant | bully | colony | potion | wizard | 

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Taglines:

Stomping into theaters August 4th

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Genres:

Animation | Adventure | Comedy | Family | Fantasy

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG for some mild rude humor and action

Details

Official Sites:

Warner Bros [fr] Warner Bros. [us]

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

28 July 2006 (USA)

Also Known As:

Las aventuras de Lucas

Box Office

Budget:

$50,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend:

$282,255 (Australia) (6 October 2006)

Gross:

$28,133,159 (USA) (10 November 2006)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Warner Bros, Playtone, DNA Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

88 min

Sound Mix:

Sonics-DDP (IMAX version) SDDS Dolby Digital DTS

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Julia Roberts, who plays the ant Hova in this film, plays another bug (the title role spider) in Charlotte's Web.

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Quotes

Lucas Nickle: Hello! Earth to ant lady! You were right in the middle of sounding like my mom!

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Crazy Credits

The end credit is in "Chamber of the Ages" style (seen in the movie).

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Connections

References FernGully: The Last Rainforest (1992)

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Soundtracks

"The Ants Go Marching"
Performed by The Ant Buddies
Traditional Arranged by Ralph Sall
Produced by Ralph Sall

User Reviews

Another great animated film

I don't understand why some of the better animated films have semi-low ratings, I think because people were comparing this movie to the film "Antz", I'm not quite sure if it was a sequel, but I thought on it's own "The Ant Bully" was a very fun movie for all ages. The animation and the story were fun and great to watch, I honestly think that The Ant Bully is one of the best animated films I have seen in a while.

Lucas is a boy who is constantly picked on and he ends up taking his anger out on the ants in his front yard by smashing their colony and drowning them with the hose. The ants are fed up and decide to shrink Lucas and give him a taste of what they go through when he drowns and destroys their city. He now has to work as an ant and become one of them, he slowly realizes how important the ants are and how wrong he was. But things get more difficult when he forgets that he hired an exterminator to get rid of the ants.

The Ant Bully was a very touching and wonderful story that I felt is important for kids to watch. I loved how it showed the moral of "What goes around comes around", kids need to learn that more now a days, because it's very true. Not to mention that The Ant Bully in general is just a great animated film that the whole family could get a kick out of. A great cast and a fun filled story made this film work, so don't be so harsh.

7/10