Happy Feet: O Pinguim

I am 44 years old, and I am actually looking forward to this film's upcoming DVD release more than my children. As a victim of childhood taunts due to birth defects, I side with Mumble and his pain as the other young birds mock his differences. When Gloria's heart song Boogie Wonderland is finally answered by Mumble's feet song, the rest of his young Emperor sisters and brothers break into dance with him, embracing him, chanting his name in joyful unison--simply stirring. To anyone who has been ridiculed or spat upon, it is a moment of sheer triumph. I can't remember feeling this good about any other film in recent years. Beautifully animated and acted, this is a joy.

Other than the flippity-flappity of the lead lovable character it is the subtle references to the ignorant human intervention in nature's food cycle that elevates George Miller's Happy Feet into a superior film, way above the other similar films in its genre, ultimately making you tear up regardless of your eating/entertainment choices. TN.

This movie set the bar at a new level for animation. This is a great companion piece to "March of the Penguins". (In fact, you should see "March of the Penguins" before seeing this one.) While the stock animated movie script still seems be 'cute-yet-quirky animals on quest', this one pulls it off better than most.

Arguably, the film makers tried to cram too many songs into the soundtrack. And the story didn't need to be as long as it was but the overall environmental message was good.

In the end, you'll look how the choices of our 'modern' lifestyles affect the rest of the world.

This movie is definitely worth the watch -- and a discussion with your kids afterward.

Tap-dancing penguins could never have been pitched if the mega-hit doc Marching Penguins (2005) had not caught the imagination of every breathing human. Only this time around Happy Feet is not a doc but a high-class animation (from the director of the very humane Babe) and much more anthropomorphic than Marching Penguins because these are tap-dancing penguins.

Besides the themes of individualism and environmental destruction, Happy Feet's special effects take animation as close to 3-D as could be possible in a 2-D medium. One scene with frolicking penguins careening down a mountain has the sight and sound of rapid descent so authentic as to make me cringe at each turn for fear of flying off the snow into the sky. The colors are luminous and the long and helicopter-like shots stunning enough to make you feel you're watching IMAX.

Mumble (voice of Elijah Wood) has no singing voice, so he can't sing a "heart-song," the signature croon of a male to attract a female for life. But as Nature frequently compensates, that boy can dance. A hard-to-accept-it dad (Hugh Jackman) laments, "It just ain't penguin." The adventures of this hippity-hop outcast bring him to a band of diminutive Latinos headed by a savvy Ramon (Robin Williams), who helps him to find his inner heart-song in his feet and eventually the source of fish depletion (the "aliens" are a familiar race of buccaneers—us).

Along the way Mumble finds soulful love with Gloria (Brittney Murphy), a young lady strong in song and belief in Mumble. Speaking of song, much of the score, while replete with pop standards from the likes of the Beach Boys and Sinatra, adapts several gospel tunes to accentuate the theme of a savior being rejected by his own kind.

Happy Feet is a happy film that features cutting-edge CG while it teaches young and old about tolerance and talent. This is the season for the tuxedo crowd—shaken and stirred.

This is the kind of movie that conceals deeper depths and vividly exhilarating emotion overall.

First interpretation: "Ok, it's a movie about a penguin that dances and has trouble finding a mate. How profound can this movie be?" Then the movie revealed themes I never thought they would accomplish such as Religious fanaticism and Human's destruction of the environment.

It reminded me of 6th Sense because it was so twisted yet taught a very important moral lesson.

Robin Williams is the highlight of the movie, his 2 characters are both well portrayed and well voiced.

Highly recommended. It made me want to go out and save the penguins.