9/10
With the release of their long anticipated feature film, creator Nick Park’s Wallace & Gromit (W&G) have undeniably earned a place among the great comedy duos such as Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello, and Regis and Kathy Lee. The Curse of the Were-Rabbit was the second stop motion animation film to hit theaters in 2005, but it is otherwise first in every respect.
In an age when 3D CGI seems to dominate not only the world of animation, but live action films such as Star Wars as well, it is ever so refreshing to see a world of make believe that physically exists. The claymation Curse takes the very best of the W&G shorts and turns it up to eleven: charming characters, wild action, compelling mystery, and irresistible humor. Add a touch of horror and a pinch of romance, and you have the twosome’s funniest and most fantastic outing yet.
Eccentric cheese-loving inventor Wallace (Peter Sallis) and his stalwart canine companion Gromit make a good living rounding up rabbits as the Anti-Pesto garden protection service. Their small-town 1950s British home is on high alert as the annual Giant Vegetable Competition is fast approaching and everyone, including Gromit, is keen to win. Shortly Anti-Pesto receives an emergency call from the lovely and wealthy Lady “Totty” Tottington (Helena Bonham Carter), whose unctuous boyfriend Victor (Ralph Fiennes), his eyes on her generous property, intends to her distress to use his rifle to “sort the little blighters out.” Wallace finds himself not only entranced by Totty’s beauty but inspired to permanently solve the rabbit problem by brainwashing away their taste for vegetables. However, although the experiment seems to be a success, the next morning the entire town wakes up to find their gardens ravaged. Facing accusations of failing in their duty, Anti-Pesto must rise to the occasion and stop the mysterious perpetrator before the competition is ruined.
Longtime fans will be well acquainted with Sallis’s humble, lab-wise but street-foolish Wallace and his quick thinking silent partner Gromit. As always, the best lines go to the cynical Gromit. Carter’s ever so proper and yet playful Totty works herself into an admirable tizzy, but it is Fiennes’s pompous twit Victor who very nearly steals the show.
Although not always the most complex or original, the film’s flawlessly executed gags ensure a hearty helping of guffaws. In her greenhouse Totty laments that Victor’s “never shown any interest in my produce”, her hands coming to rest on two large melons. The latter suffers a terrible loss of dignity when his proud pronouncement to Totty that with him “what you see is what you get” is immediately followed by his enormous toupee falling off. Finally you’re sure to have seen the sublime moment in the trailer when Gromit performs an “alluring” burlesque routine with a giant rabbit puppet.
Perhaps one of the biggest reasons for the film’s charm is that despite the production’s formidable scope it remains very down to earth and British. This is reflected in the film’s refreshing lack of knowing pop culture references, and in the way the characters are never overshadowed by the set pieces. Park is not shy about peppering the film with Briticisms, so be sure to bring your phrase book.
Curse is a visual delight of the highest order, every corner of this intricate puzzle crammed full of colorful and endearing design. The claymation is not quite as smooth and polished as Corpse Bride’s puppets, but the handmade look makes it all the more endearing. A few scenes are enhanced with CGI, but most of it is so smoothly incorporated one hardly notices.
Special mention must be given to the wantonly kinetic action scenes, so well choreographed and photographed that it’s easy to forget you’re watching animation. In one thrilling chase Gromit attempts to lasso a suspect while tearing along in the Anti Pesto van, first smashing through people’s gardens and then tunneling under them. The showstopper climax is a divine marriage of King Kong and Top Gun.
The fun, bouncy orchestral score from Julian Nott builds from the familiar W&G theme. Like the animation it is slightly understated, but contains just enough bombast to certify Curse as a feature film.
Best of the plentiful extras is the Cracking Contraptions: three amusing W&G shorts that have Gromit struggling with some new screwball Wallace invention. The most ambitious being an elaborate parody of Apollo 13 in which Gromit must guide a remote controlled shopping cart to a hunk of cheese not in orbit but in the supermarket.
Also excellent are the informative commentary from Park and co-director Steve Box and the behind the scenes featurette. It boggles the mind that more than 100,000 shots had to be painstakingly posed one by one.
Among the other notable features, How Wallace & Gromit Went to Hollywood offers a solid retrospective for newcomers on the careers of Park, Aardman, and our heroes. The Family Album is a tasty teaser of signs, storyboard panels, W&G album photos, and behind the scenes shots, but could have contained so much more. The deleted scenes tack on a few seconds here and there and are interesting but unnecessary. A Day in the Life at Aardman is a very quick and only vaguely informative studio tour, although still neat to see. Not W&G related but equally entertaining is Box’s darkly humorous short film Stage Fright, in which a meek vaudeville dog juggler struggles to survive the advent of film.
As for the young ones, they can play a variation of Whack-a-Mole, listen to Victor drone on about how to be an upper-crust twit, and mix and match Totty’s outfits Barbie style. The only really worthwhile inclusion is a video that shows how to make the film’s little rabbits, although this will probably require Mom and Dad to put down their wine glasses lest they end up scraping plasticine off the ceiling.
The Curse of the Were-Rabbit is very tangibly a labor of love, and a jolly good time for young and old alike. So inspired was I by its plasticine splendor, that I ate an entire head of cheese afterwards. No veggies though. That’s going to take genuine brainwashing.
