Le grand méchant renard et autres contes...

The eponymous critter takes centre stage as if he were leading a Scaramouche-style commedia dell'arte, the curtains draw back and after a few false starts, we are now in for eighty minutes of family animation that follows the tales of his and his companions. We begin with the weary stork that's fed up flying around trying to deliver a baby and so he deposits it with the fox, the pig, the rabbit and the duck. Can they repatriate the baby with her folks? Chickens? Why not pinch some eggs and let them hatch? Three new friends for our fox - except, well they take to him like he's their mother. Not great for when the real mother comes around to collect her offspring! Finally, Christmas looks doomed. "Santa Claus" isn't able to deliver the gifts and it's down to the intrepidity of the rabbit and the duck to save the day and get the man in red back on course. All of their antics are done amidst a fear of the big bad wolf (usually accompanied by the briefest of musical excerpts from Prokoviev's famous lupine score) which is never far away and always hungry! The animation is simple yet effective and engaging. The characters - usually with huge great eyes - come across amiably presenting a well written series of fun stories that will keep the youngsters at bay whilst we grown ups can enjoy a little of more substance. It's got all the usual messages of integrity, loyalty and teamwork - but those are delivered here in a much more relaxed and entertaining fashion with lots of daftness thrown in for good measure. It might read a bit incongruous, but these stories come across as a little more real than many of their more commercially successful and brash contemporaries, and I really did quite enjoy it - especially the mother hen!

An excellent set of 3 tales which the entire audience, adults as well as children, seemed to enjoy very much, both times I went to see it. Beautifully animated and drawn, very expressive, enjoyable, good narrative twists and comic situations, a nice change from 3D often look-alike animation & humor, very good voice acting and sweet and funny stories.

This collection of French animated fables is a nice complement to Mickey Mouse, on the one hand, and Looney Tunes, on the other. The do-good instincts of the protagonist always run aground; the slapstick humor is there, but it's understated in favor of a light sarcasm that works for kids and adults.

Sebastian's Rating: 8 Stars Sienna's Rating: 7 Stars Paul's Rating: 7 Stars

Seb's Favorite: Baby Delivery Sienna's Favorite: Saving Christmas Paul's Favorite: Saving Christmas

Watched July 2020.

Quite frankly I found this little masterpiece out of the blue, just watched the trailer and I kind of liked the jokes and the animation style overall so I decided why not... today's animation is tending to be way too realistic and we don't want that in the cartoon, a true cartoon which it totally is. This one is full of surprises - despite the fact that it is dubbed from French with the help of English voice actors, who had done their job outstandingly and their voiceover was simply superb to say the least, you do not feel the boundaries of any specific regional characteristics - it is universally a great movie, with lots of jokes, one of a kind animation, amazing score and nice although outdated and "nothing new" plotlines that still keep you on the edge of the seat and make you live through the performance along with the characters. This is a wonderful gem of a movie and I'd definitely prefer this to most of those millions of Disney lookalikes that are in theaters every month now.

One of the best comedy animation movie i have ever watched