Here it is, the movie based upon the show, BASED upon a character from a Wallace & Gromit short, Shaun the Sheep Movie is the feature length adventure of Shaun and his flock, a near silent comedic film that is great and would have easily been this year's best animated feature if it weren't for a certain Pixar film. I've always been a big fan of Aardman, the stop-motion animation they do is impressive and their humor is hilarious for me, watching this was a must for me, even then I probably would've seen it the second I heard it was near silent anyways just to see if it works, it DOES. While I prefer dialogue in my comedies, I do find myself enjoying silent, physical humor as well, especially in animation, in fact I've been wanting an animated film that is mostly silent for quite some time, that void has been filled, thankfully it's filled by this movie.
While there are voice actors here (Justin Fletcher, John Sparkes and Omid Djalili amongst others), they never do much beyond grunts and animal noises, which all work perfectly, the story is conveyed perfectly with the visuals; the grunts and such don't add much but are pleasant touches to this. What impresses me most about that approach is that despite the lack of dialogue, the characters, mainly the sheep, are pretty easy to distinguish from each other; most films would require some dialogue from similar looking characters to make the audience understand the differences, here we know based on the way the sheep act; it might not seem like much, but trust me it's an impressive feat, especially considering these characters are easier to tell apart compared to the dozens of minions that are indistinguishable beyond physical differences that are hard to notice in a group. Trumper might be Aardaman's most fun antagonist since Feathers McGraw, he's a self absorbed character who is a bit of a menace, but he steals the show whenever he comes on screen. Overall the cast is as lovable as they are in the shorts.
If there is one issue the film has is the Farmer sub-plot, it's not horrible, but it does feel a tad out of place. I honestly feel the hair stylist jokes run dry after the first instance it is done, personally I would've preferred seeing him take on multiple jobs for a more humorous sub-plot; that being said, it isn't bad, in fact due to how short that sub-plot is I feel this is probably a bit more like a nitpick, maybe, I still think they could've done something better there. Another minor nitpick (that I truly feel is just that) is the music, aside from "Feels Like Summer" none of the songs feel right in the film, they aren't bad by any means, they just feel out of place.
If you love Aardman you really don't need me to tell you to watch this film, it's one of their better efforts. I may prefer dialogue over silence in comedy, but there's no denying that this is great because of how well the story and humor is told through visuals, highly recommended by me, go watch Shaun the Sheep Movie, it's fun for all ages so long as you can drop all cynicism before watching.
Written By Octaviano Macias
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