Chicken Run

Chicken Run Good For Grownups Too

Main Cast: Voices of: Mel Gibson, Julia Sawalha, Miranda Richardson, Timothy Spall

Director: Nick Park

Each children’s movie that is released has escalating levels of adult humor scattered among the fun. Disney’s Hercules may have done this better than anyone else although Who Framed Roger Rabbit certainly had more adult humor per minute than just about any other kid flick.

Chicken Run follows bravely in its footsteps. My wife and I took our 3 boys to see the movie tonight. They’re 14, 12 and 7. They each howled with laughter at different spots — the mark of a quality movie reaching across to all age groups.

And speaking of reaching across to age groups, the takeoffs on Star Trek and The Great Escape had my wife literally laughing out loud. Sadly, she may have been one of the few to catch some of the references because I noticed some folks looking quizically at her, but shame on them if they missed the references.

From Mel Gibson’s Rocky character screaming “Freedom” as his opening line to the Scottish chicken who calls out, “I can’t give you any more power!” a la Star Trek’s Mr. Scott, the movie is chock-full of adult fun. Personally, I kept waiting for some killer lines from Animal Farm, but maybe they were too obvious.

There were plenty of couples in the theater tonight, mixed in with the families. I think this movie is going to generate enough word-of-mouth to make it a must-see for the summer. There’s nothing too scary for the little ones and enough action to keep teens interested. And there’s a ton of hidden sub-references in here to keep adults busy.

Try out Chicken Run — this is one original recipe.

–G. Bounacos