What is up with the recent round of less than stellar animated films to come out recently?

I went into “Happy Feet,” a film from the guy who brought us “Babe”-an excellent talking animals movie, with every intention of giving it my stamp of approval on viewing it. Within the first ten minutes of the film my affinity for it was confirmed and I was contemplating whether or not to add it to my personal dvd collection.

“Happy Feet” tells the story of Mumble (voiced by Elijah Wood), an emperor penguin from Antarctica. The emperor penguins have a belief that unless you can find your “heartsong,” the song buried deep within your soul, and can sing it loud and clear for the world to hear, you are a disgrace, and will likely never find your true love.

Unfortunately for Mumble he can’t sing, but he sure can tap dance. Of course, tap dancing is frowned upon in the nation of singers. Gloria (Brittany Murphy) is Mumble’s one and only friend, but even she is embarrassed by Mumble’s tendency to break into a dance when he is excited.

Auzzies Nicole Kidman and Hugh Jackman give voice to Mumble’s parents Norma Jean and Memphis, and in one of the better scenes in the film we get to hear them sing a duet to Prince’s “Kiss.”

Labeled an outcast from his childhood on, Mumble is accused of causing the ‘wind gods’ to be unhappy with their tribe and therefore is causing the fish to disappear.

Mumble knows this can’t be true, and he sets out on a mission to prove the elders wrong. Along the way he meets up with a band of latino penguins, lead by Ramón (Robin Williams), who love to dance and therefore readily accept Mumble as a friend.

This is where things suddenly shift from a sweet story about being proud of who you were born to be, and instead turns into a diatribe about the evils of overfishing in the Antarctic waters, pollution and animal parks. (I’m against pollution, too, but this isn’t what I paid for.) Humans in the film are called “aliens” and are demonized throughout. When the film isn’t pitting the audience’s emotions against the “evil, dominating nature” of humans, it is making the “aliens” into stupid, thoughtless beings. I guess I can take this dvd off my wish list!

Things really get weird when Mumbles washes up on a beach somewhere in the U.S. and is taken to an aquarium to recover. Real actors are interposed with the animated lead and a boundary is broken that, personally, I felt was creepy and unnecessary. It left me wondering if the producers ran out of money or just got lazy and decided to hire a bunch of unemployed and struggling actors rather than animating the human characters.

For the kiddies in the audience there are a couple of genuinely scary scenes, including an extended one with a leopard seal chasing after our little furry hero. If your children are prone to being frightened or having nightmares, you may want to avoid taking them to “Happy Feet.”

Of course, you may want to avoid going to “Happy Feet” even if you don’t have small children in tow. The more I think about this movie the more I can’t stand it. So make your own decision, but for my money, there are plenty of other animated films out there worth watching.

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