Two By Two

This is the year of Noah. He pops up in a UK TV series and lets Russell of the Crowes loose on the big screen in a worse movie than Exodus. Now the ark has taken to the flood once more in beautiful animation, although the latest incarnation is the animals' story. Beardy man doesn't get a look in. The lion king's cousin is in charge.

A purple and orange soft toy, called Finny, doesn't make it onto the ark. He and his mate Leah are not accepted for bureaucratic reasons and are forced to watch the 2-by-2s as they search for cabin space before The Awesome Rains and the final chorus of Sailing By, or whatever the rap equivalent is, fades away.

The plot doesn't exactly go anywhere. The premise that weird creatures are excused survival because they don't fit in is political dyna**ite. What are they insinuating? Uglies and fatties and the deformed multitude are left to drown? Let's not go there. The undersevens will love the characters and not search for deeper, darker meaning.

The subliminal message is given a scented body wash before the storm is unleashed. The cuties and their new-found friends discover that they like the water and the water likes them which means they would never have discovered their true vocation stuck on a smelly boat for months with inadequate toilet facilities. As they say in the theatre, "All's well that swims well."

Sophisticated children on the cusp of teenage who gave the thumbs up to Big Hero 6 and The Lego Movie are going to find this less inventive than Coraline and as far from Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs as a dolphin is to a bicycle.

Better than Home, but not a patch on Penguins Of Madagascar, Two By Two cannot be dumped in the cartoon graveyard like a Disney reject. It has charm and a lively countenance.

"We are team Slow But Steady."

That's right.

Not a game changer, but a game none the less.