The last 1/3 sadly leaves an unnecessary bitter-sweet flavor

Rating: 6/10 (1 April 2007)

The first and the second act of the movie (the first being Mumble thinking he's not worthy of staying in his flock, and the second one restoring his self-confidence) were a pleasant surprise to me, since the trailer failed miserably to impress me. Light, fluffy, and funny, "Happy Feet" succeeds in bringing new atmosphere to the usually "by-the-book" storytelling in today's animation...and it does so with what could barely be called a plot...but I certainly can't hold that against the movie because it manages to entertain nonetheless, plus the animation looked really nice.
There were some moments when I found the musical portion highly annoying, but at others it gave me goose bumps, so I'm pretty evened-out on this element of the movie, although the idea was at least fresh.
However the last 20 minutes slow the pace, try to quickly inflict us with a feeling of guilty conscience and remorse (which they do), and then without at least ending what it starts on a high moral note, or any explanations, for that matter, it quickly wraps up the charade. It all feels terribly forced and unnecessary (albeit the topic of human pollution is one that "shouldn't" be overlooked) and had the movie just glanced at some of those serious topics it would have probably made a greater impact. But in this case I was left pondering if I just saw a light-hearted family movie that unsuccessfully squeezed-in some serious elements, or a failed attempt at a moral lecture that was sadly turned into a joy-ride.