One of the best animations I've seen

Rating: 8/10 (29 December 2003)

Chicken Run comes from the creators of Wallace and Gromit, that should say it all already. The animation is set at a chicken farm (yeah, or a "concentration camp", I got it). Most of the chickens seem pleased with their lives - although you get your head chopped if you don't give enough eggs - but Ginger is determined to get away. When Rocky, a flying yankie rooster falls from the sky and gets his wing hurt, flight plans seem to get more realistic. In exchange of getting a hideaway from the circus Rocky comes from, he promises to teach the chicken to fly.
Visually, the movie is top notch. The fact that you know you're watching a wax animation in the days of CGI graphics makes things more interesting. The characters look familiar from the first moment if you've seen any Wallace and Gromit before (and if you haven't, you should). There are lots of little details everywhere and you can say that lots of hard work was put into this flick. And those little details (like the use of "human" objects such as spoons) make you chuckle. There's probably a lot more to see than catches the eye on the first viewing.
I laughed many times during the movie and on overall, the jokes suit the movie. Of course there are some cliched jokes and characters but that can (mostly) be forgiven because these are stupid chickens (or rats) after all! You get to laugh at the expense of yanks and britons alike, since Rocky is a big-mouthed boy from the States and the rooster of the farm is an old British officer. However, at the end you'll see that to accomplish something great you need the help of everyone involved.
The movie connections are probably multiple. I'm just not good at catching these things but that Indiana Jones action scene was hilarious. The humans are not seen much and they just seem a big threat to chickens but their actions don't make enough sense. When you think of the concentration camp theme, the analogy makes their actions more sensible. Or maybe I just shouldn't think of things like this when watching an animation about talking chickens. And, when you try to look at human actions from the view point of an animal, barely anything makes any sense anyway.
Anyway, Chicken Run is an entertaining movie to watch and since it's an animation, you don't have to care about the plot holes or other shortcomings. I gave this one an 8. One of the best animations I've seen. Recommended!