Infinite Monkeys

Crappy Feet?

So, we saw "Happy Feet" yesterday. It's a strange film. It begins as "March of the Penguins" meets "Grease" and then quickly becomes something... else. It's Elmer Gantry. It's a quest movie. Then it's "The Shawshank Redemption". Then it gets stupidly political. Yet, somehow, I sort of enjoyed it. I felt ... I felt like... dancing!

Well, not really.

Michael Medved really hated "Happy Feet". I agree with several of his observations, without buying into his conclusion. "Happy Feet" is incoherent, but not bad. It's pretentious, but relatively harmless. It's political, but dumb.

Medved is wrong on a couple of details, however:

• "The first menacing structure they see is a church."

  Well, no. The first menacing thing the birds see is an excavator. But it is true that a church appears in an unlikely place. Strange.

• "the aged leaders of the flock ... worship a false God called “the Great Wind."

  No. It's "The Great 'Guin." As in Penguin. Get it?

• "An ardent love affair is frustrated for no apparent reason, with the main character’s inamorata choosing a crude, fat penguin she cares nothing about and producing many progeny."

  No. She's unattached. (Remember, penguins are monogamous.) She tells Mumble they are music teachers. The Fat Penguin teaches rhythm. She teaches the blues. And Mumble sent Gloria away because he did not want to subject her to the risks of the journey he was undertaking... seeking the "aliens."

These are hardly points worth warring over. But I think Medved goes too far. "Happy Feet" is not a kids' movie. The PG rating should tell parents that much. But it is not as insidious as Medved suggests.

Posted by H.L. Monkey at November 25, 2006 10:32 PM