Film Review

09 January 2009 04:45 BST

Charlotte's Web

Directed by Gary Winick, out February 9th 2007 in cinemas, starring Julia Roberts, Oprah Winfrey, Dakota Fanning, John Cleese, running time 97 minutes

In a nutshell…

Fun, moving, oinkworthy animal-animation. If a wee bit preachy.

What's it all about?

Usually it's cats that get nine lives, but in this film pigs don't do too badly either. Wilbur, a runty piglet, just keeps getting saved.

First, youngster Fern (Dakota Fanning) begs her Dad not to kill Wilbur because he's a runt.

Later, wordsmith spider Charlotte (Julia Roberts), who lives on the sty over Wilbur's barn, promises to spin a plan to save him from the frying pan.

Enlisting the help of the other farmyard animals – including a posh sheep and a slop-obsessed rat named Templeton – Charlotte weaves a rescue plot that takes us from the animals' barn to the pig fair and beyond.

This cinematic rendition of classic 1950's American barn-yarn by author EB White is packed with high-tech animal lip-synching action a la Babe.

Who's in it?

Lots of animals – accompanied by voice-overs from some big names.

Julia Roberts catches the right balance of haughty enigma and maternal self-possession as Charlotte.

Oprah Winfrey gives an intriguing African American twang to Gussy the Goose and John Cleese excels as the terribly superior Samuel the sheep.

Unfortunately child actor Dominic Scott Kay doesn't quite deliver the crackling with his all-American high school kid interpretation of Wilbur.

As an example…

Gussy the Goose to Wilbur: "You're so cute and pink but you're wasting your time."

Templeton the rat: "There comes a time when a rat's gotta ask himself: what's in it for the rat?"


Likelihood of a trip to the Oscars

The film has earned no Oscar nominations, so pigs will sooner fly.


What the others say

"Youngsters will warm to the barn's talking animals and perhaps even shed a tear." Time Out

"Witnessing Dakota [Fern] at full shriek is like being attacked by a colony of bats." The Times Online

So is it any good?

As a Christian allegory, this film is as subtle as a pig in muck.

Barn-bound Wilbur, the 'radiant', 'humble' and 'perfectly proportioned' pig, stands for none other than the baby J in the nativity. Meanwhile, Charlotte, counselling the barn animals from aloft while spinning miracle-messages in her master-web for the benefit of awestricken villagers is, well, God.

For the adults, the 'Christiany' message gets a little laboured at times, but for kids the film is certainly a lot more fun than your average Sunday School.

Some of the animation is top notch. The sequence of Charlotte alone at night spinning her miracle web is pretty awesome: the web turns and tiny droplets twinkle and wax into stars, with Charlotte poised at the edge like the timekeeper of a galaxy.

At best this is a visually absorbing, moving and funny film. For those reasons the kids will enjoy it – whatever their burgeoning theological predilection.

7/10

Jack Lamport

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