Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005)

One of Britain's most recognisable duos, the claymation Wallace and Gromit (who's other appearances are all cracking adventures too, I might add), bring their home-spun and wholesome humour to the big- screen in a big way with what I can honestly say is one of the funniest films I have had the pleasure of watching, one that is carefully crafted to be a charming and entertaining experience that is almost impossible to fault mainly because there is not a single moment that seems out of place - not to mention the fact that the flick keeps a huge smile on your face throughout; of course it is also beautifully animated and holds a hugely tactile aesthetic that makes each frame feel both grounded and alive, but the piece also places an emphasis on its smartly written screenplay and several nuanced sight-gags to elevate what some could consider simple 'kids- material' into something that can be enjoyed by an extremely wide audience, while its story and visuals also include a couple of nice call-backs to horror movies past which cement the picture as a very cine-literate one that knows its place and relishes it. 8/10

The lovable duo Wallace & Gromit got their first big screen outing in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit. The point was always going to be on how they could stretch the successful shorts into film length and I'm pleased to say that I think they do a fantastic job by keeping much of the same formula that was present in the original shorts. The eccentric characters and subtle humour remain at the forefront thankfully, while Wallace is still an endearingly unconventional inventor and his mute dog Gromit acts as the perfect straight-man. I feel that putting the characters in a film length piece is a logical progression compared to a lot of other TV based shows or series. The plot mixes the zaniness of the shorts with an effective comedic horror approach. In it our title characters run their own humane pest-control company named Anti-Pesto and find themselves overrun with issues involving rabbits in the run up to the village vegetable competition. Suddenly a large beast starts eating the locals' crops, Anti-Pesto look to stop it and Wallace aims to win the affection of Lady Tottington by doing so. It's a fun little plot that knows just when to play up the comedy and when to just let things breathe for a minute. There is a nice twist that may be a little predictable for some people, but for what the story is it offers plenty of laughs and appropriate touches of mystery.In a storyline such as this good characters are crucial and that is what we get. Wallace (Peter Sallis) is as quirky as ever, enjoying his cheese and bizarre inventions. He also gets plenty of funny lines, ''with a big trap'' being particularly amusing. Gromit is still enjoyably brainy and slightly sardonic, while it always impresses me how much personality they get from just his expressions and movements. Lady Tottington is a little bland on the whole, but she does have some fun scenes with Wallace. Victor (an enjoyably hammy Ralph Fiennes) isn't as creative or sinister a villain as his predecessors, but he is good fun. His snooty nature makes you want to dislike him and he gets his fair share of funny lines too. I also really like the local villagers, especially the quick to panic Reverend who is hilarious, and most of their lines are witty as well as memorable.Claymation is always difficult to do and takes a great deal of time, so it is incredibly easy to admire the amount of work that has gone into the films look. There are also a higher number of locations and characters used than ever before. As said I think the comedy in the film is done really well and it fits in with the originals humour as well as being able to appeal to many people. There are a lot of lines that are memorable for how strange or whacky they are, but there's also a number of great references to other films or works of fiction that are usually smart and understated. The climax is excellent and really delivers on the thrills as well as the laughs. The score (provided by Julian Nott) is very good and brings plenty of excitement to certain scenes, while it's always great to hear the fantastic main theme.It's difficult to find a fault with The Curse of the Were-Rabbit, in that it is pretty much what you would want from a Wallace & Gromit film. It does add more characters and a wider variety of jokes, but it hasn't forgotten its roots or what made it so entertaining in the first place. It remembers that people were drawn to the unusual characters and the funny situations. It's easy to appreciate the effort that Aardman have put into the film and it's always great to see characters that have become almost iconic on the big screen.

I watched this movie for maybe 30minutes. Wallace & Gromit were hired by people that had gardens. They had a truck and would capture animals that would ruin people's gardens.They would capture lots of rabbits and them back to their business. There was a built in shoot at in the kitchen like a laundry shoot and they would take rabbits by the bunch and let them slide down the shoot where they all landed and stayed captured. They would dice up lots of carrots and send them down the shoot to feed the rabbit.When things start getting out of hand Wallace starts to experiment how he could brainwash the rabbits into not eating cabbage, carrots and other vegetables. He used an electric helmet attached to his head and put the rabbits in a tube where they get the signals from his brain to theirs.Something went wrong and they changed. At some point I stopped watching because they show a rabbit breaking into a church and breaking the stain glass windows. There was a Cross in the church that ended up on the ground and the minister sees something that scares him and uses two cucumber as a cross to block the scary rabbit and faints.Aardman makes great animation movies and series like Shaun the Sheep. I felt this was insulting so I stopped watching. Humor is good but not when you use religious objects in a offensive way just because it is in a animated movie.

There is something nostalgic about a Nick Park Wallace and Gromit piece. There's never any indication of a specific time span in the films, though there does seem to be slight indications of a narrative flow and an overall sense of travel, but nowhere do we find the sort of thing that one sees with the Simpsons (nobody in the Simpsons ages, though they do seem to move through time periods; but Bart in the early 90s was a kid and 20 years later, he's still a kid, while the family can look back and remember when he wasn't born). Wallace and Gromit can look back too, and perhaps if there was more to their story, we'd also notice they never age... however, their world is placed in a timeless place that echoes the 50s and 60s. Nobody has a computer. Wallace builds a rocket in the short 'A Grand Day Out', but either he missed Neil Armstrong proving once and for all that the moon isn't made of cheese, or that grand worldwide event has yet to happen in his world. Animation has the ability to be timeless, yet it has to relate to us in a way that makes us comfortable. Wallace and Gromit inhabit that rare place of nostalgia. Their adventures are new, but there's a quaintness to them, like sipping hot chocolate and hearing wild yet tamed down stories of the adventures your grandparents used to have. The Curse of the Were-Rabbit is exemplary for providing us just such a tale. It's cheeky in places if you're old enough to get the jokes, but never offensive. It presents modern ideas (vegetarianism, humane treatment of animals), that doesn't share much of a place with the time period it hearkens back to, but is subtle enough that many years from now, we won't feel off put by it. It's a safe, pleasant, quite-often-hilarious tale that we'll want to return to... watching this movie is basically like hugging your favorite pet dog. Of course, your dog is probably less inclined to wake you up in the morning the same way Gromit is.