Babe - un cochon dans la ville

Many people just don't get it. They may tell you this movie is too dark for children. Don't believe them. This is a great movie for children. Didn't "Snow White" have an old hag try to kill her with a poison apple. Death is darker than any "dark tone" laid out in this gorgeous piece of cinema, but "Snow White" didn't get as many negative comments as this movie. The kids that watched the original "Babe" have grown up, and so did the franchise. Sure the movie may have a few adult moments than the original; for instance, most kids won't understand the whole Mrs. Hoggett cavity search incident. But overall this movie presents the great moral that everyone should be good to each other over everything else, even to someone who might have done something wrong to you. That is a message that everyone, adults and children, should hear and consider. In the end, "Babe" achieves respect and gains a whole new group of friends from his good deeds, and everyone is happy including the audience. I think this movie will be considered a classic sometime in the future, as it should be.

Those who liked 'Babe' will wonder whether 'Babe: Pig in the City' is a good enough sequel. My answer is: definitely! Here are adorable pig is seen with some new colourful friends, lots of them, in a new adventure. Just like the first one, this one too is sheer delight, albeit a little more serious. I don't understand why people are complaining that this isn't a movie for kids. Why not? I think it's an excellent family film. There is no death or blood. It portrays a part of reality (e.g. that accidents happen, that there are others who are less fortunate than us etc) without getting to graphic and that's why it's great for kids too. It's a lot of fun and even suspenseful. I was in my teens when I first saw this film. There's one scene where Flealick follows the van but one he loses hold, he slides onto one side of the street and lies there motionless while the wheels on his 'scooter' rotate. For a moment my heart had stopped beating (as I thought he was dead) and I was so hoping that he hadn't passed away. The sequence that followed brought me back to laughing mode. Magda Szubanski has more to do here and she displays her comic abilities brilliantly. A strange thing I noticed was she had an American accent in the first film but here it's Australian and British. The rest of the voice-acting is done very well and in sync. The fictitious city (it may be Sidney as the famous opera-house was visible in one scene) is suitably dark and mysterious. I found 'Babe: Pig In The City' more uplifting than the first movie. I wish there was a third movie that would have made it a complete trilogy.

It's so technically well executed and gorgeous to look at (obviously George Miller asked for and got a huge budget this time around) but almost every thing that happens to these cutest-of-cute animals is *mean-spirited*. The sweetness of the last film is gone, as is that movie's easy-going but tightly-woven plot. Instead we have Hollywood histrionics and chase scenes and randomness that just seems like delay tactics for the first 3/4 of the film. For example, we follow that duck every now and then as he chases after but never finds Babe. The duck arrives in the city and is immediately shot at by twenty members of a rifle range. Funny? No. It's done in an ultra-realistic way, it looks like he's actually injured, there's no Roadrunner & Wile E. Coyote cartoonness to this violence.

Finally after much depressing animal cruelty the surviving heroes get together and head off towards a final rescue act, but by that point I'd turned off. It involved the farmers wife in a clown suit bungee jumping around a restaurant and a bunch of balloons and other silly fighting. Not a very fun movie, and it could have been!

worst moments:

* Andy Rooney, made up as a clown, led off to die in a stretcher.

* Cute puppy says, "my human put me in a sack and threw me in the water"

Fresh from sheep dog trials success, Babe and Farmer Hogget are the toast of the land. However an accident puts Hogget in traction and leaves the farm dangerously close to being repossessed. Mrs Hogget sets out to America with Babe to attend a major Fare with a large appearance fee, however a misunderstanding at customs results in them missing the fare and being stranded in the city. The pair go to a hotel that illegally takes animals of all sorts but Mrs Hogget's arrest and the capture of the animals leads Babe to once again show determination against the odds.

At the end of the film Babe, Farmer Hogget says `that'll do pig, that'll do'. It is a wonderfully touching moment that is fitting for such a charming story that was told without malice or clumsy humour – just one warm moment after another. However the studio didn't hear Hogget's words and pumped out a sequel that will have all but the least demanding child clambering to watch the original to wash away the bad taste in their mouths from this. The plot is nothing like the original in theme – it tries to set out it's stall (sorry) as being a tale of how the brave heart overcomes etc but it is nonsense, instead it is more like Home Alone with monkeys than Babe.

The humour comes with things falling etc and the plot is far too dark and cruel to have anything like the original's charm. It is just plain dull to be honest and I never found myself involved in the hectic going-ons that were occurring before me. Worse still are the characters. On one hand we have a few famous (read American) voices added to the cast (Wright, Rooney and a few I couldn't place) but they don't ever get close to being as good CHARACTERS as the original had. Where the original had animals that we knew or grew to care for as Babe did, here we have comedy monkeys (one alarmingly dressed as an `Nu Yark' hussy!) and dogs that barely get a line. These are animals played for laughs (oh, look at the monkey getting dressed!) and not played as characters as in the first film.

Overall this is not awful it is just very poor and difficult to enjoy. Kids will laugh at the animals chasing humans etc but adults will be unmoved and uninvolved. For me this film was worse than it actually was as it traded on the name of that charming film Babe. It slightly ruined the memory of the original for me with a sour taste and I shall never wish to see this thing again. If you loved the original and were interested in seeing this – don't. Just don't.

Very, and I do mean very, strange picture that is suffering an identity crisis in every major cinematic area. "Babe: Pig in the City" is of course the sequel to the critical and box office smash of 1995. This time the titled animal must go to the city with its owner's wife (Magda Szubanski) to raise money from guest appearances after his success in the original. The farmer (barely seen and totally wasted James Cromwell) suffered an accident and his property is about to be taken by the bank. Thus Babe must come to the rescue once more. In the city Szubanski finds a hotel full of dogs, cats and even monkeys and stays there. The story-line then goes out of focus as animal rights and the place that all of God's creatures have in the world becomes the major focal point. The subject matter is dealt with in a distorted way that is more dark than funny. Director George Miller (who produced the original and assisted with Chris Noonan's Oscar-nominated direction in 1995) does a great job with visual effects and art direction, but struggles with a screenplay that has no earthly idea what it wants to do. The fact that Miller is not the director that Noonan is becomes an apparent problem pretty quickly as well. The original worked because of warmth, compassion, intelligence and believability. None of those attributes are in this sequel. 2.5 out of 5 stars.