Wallace and Gromit: Curse of the Were-Rabbit

I’ve been playing movie catchup the last few days, since I’ve completely my contract and have a week until I start traveling.

This morning I saw, with much anticipation, the Wallace and Gromit film. I’ve seen all the shorts they made over the years, and my favourite is still the first I saw back in 1991 in university, A Grand Day Out.

Overall I had a good time, but I had hoped I would like it much more. The beginning was a bit odd, since it seemed really really familiar, and I can only assume the first third heavily borrows from a short of theirs that I’ve seen. I thought the “twist” in the plot was quite clever, and I’ll admit I didn’t see it coming! But a good movie will always do this, since the audience is hopefully not getting too many brain cycles to resolve the mysteries.

The animation was great overall, and even though I’m in computer animation, I still have a deep appreciation for stop motion animation. The Hans Zimmer music was good, making good use of the original theme from Grand Day Out so many years ago.

I havent considered a grading system, but I’d say, this is worth seeing in the movie theatre if you like animation. (ie. Qualified Recommendation). Here’s the system I’ll try:

6 Brilliant! Masterpiece! Will change your life!
5 Highly Recommended
4 Recommended, pay full price
3 Qualified Recommendation, if interested in genre or film-makers pay full price, otherwise DVD or matinee’
2 See at Matinee Price
1 DVD
0 Watch if bored
-1 Avoid (if friends invite you)
-2 Mock the film
-3 Mock the film and people foolish enough to watch it
-4 So horribly bad you should watch it and Mock

So, with this I’d give Wallace and Gromit a 3