Remember "March of the Penguins?" How hard a penguin's life truly is, with cold winters spent guarding an egg and endless treks across frozen wastelands?
According to "Happy Feet," their lives also include a lot of singing and dancing that "March" completely missed. I would like to thank the makers of "Happy Feet" for bringing this toe-tapping fun to the world's attention.
With the dancing moves of Savion Glover, who did motion capture for all of the dancing penguins, "Happy Feet" whips us into a beautifully rendered Arctic world where penguins fall in love with each other through song. One unfortunate penguin named Mumble (Elijah Wood) can't sing, but boy can he dance ... as well as a penguin can dance. It's a little strange at first to watch the moves of a legendary dancer mapped onto a creature without knees.
Beyond the initial "that is soooo adorable" reaction to penguins dancing and singing, "Happy Feet" actually has some deeper pleasures. There's a perfect, though far-fetched, children's movie storyline, Brittany Murphy belting out a fantastic version of Queen's "Somebody to Love" and Robin Williams being Robin Williams over the course of three different characters. And there are some jokes just for adults thrown in — a nice return to the kind of animated musicals that Disney has seem to have forgotten how to make.
The animation in "Happy Feet" is stunning, as the Arctic wastelands spring to life with such clarity that the artists may have rendered each individual snowflake. Adding to this vibrant animation is George Miller's ("Babe") fantastic direction. The scenes involving dancing are sharply choreographed. Prepare to hold on to the edge of your seat whenever Mumble is being chased or is sliding down snow on his belly. The camera follows him like you're on the ride with him.
The movie features some scenes that may scare younger children, like an evil-looking seal chasing after Mumble and a few close calls with death. But maybe that was just me, since I didn't hear a peep out of any of the children in the theater. Kids might just be made of sterner stuff these days.
<1b>Matthew Razak