Valiant

Valiant

****

Reviewed by: The Dude

From the producers of Shrek and Shrek 2 comes the exciting story of Valiant (Ewan McGregor), a small country pigeon with dreams of joining the big pigeons in the exclusive Royal Homing Pigeon service towards the end of World War II.

With morale and recruitment running low, Valiant finally gets his chance to work in this elite unit with some unlikely colleagues, including Bugsy (Ricky Gervais) who can burp the entire alphabet and Gutsy (Hugh Laurie) the most accomplished Homing Pigeon Commander of them all. As always, trying to succeed where bigger and stronger pigeons have failed is always a challenge and having the evil Nazi falcon Von Talon (Tim Curry) on your tail doesn't help much either!

Copy picture

Despite the odds, Valiant and his noble team of surprise heroes give it a good old British try, and well... you know who wins the war.

All of the voices are excellently suited to their characters, my favourites being the repulsively base Bugsy and the brave, if not slightly confused pigeon-of-war, Mercury, voiced by John Cleese. I went to see this film with my nephews and they absolutely loved it.

Valiant is a good attempt at putting British animated film into the running with its more famous American counterparts, though disappointingly there isn't as much duality in the dialogue. This one's a little bit more for the kids, as far as funny goes, but if that's a bit of a turn off, think of it as a good way to introduce youngsters to an important part of British history, especially since pigeons like Valiant really did exist!

I highly recommend the film for its creativity, ingenuity and good sense of humour. Also, the scenery and flying scenes are really well done. If you're looking for a pick me up, where the underdog gets what he deserves, then please, please go. You and your little ones won't be sorry!

Reviewed on: 25 Mar 2005
Share this with others on...
Valiant packshot
An unlikely hero leads the way in the Allied WWII victory.
Amazon link

Read more Valiant reviews:

Josh Morrall **

Director: Gary Chapman

Writer: Jordan Katz, Matt Manfredi, George Melrod, based on a story by George Webster

Starring: voices of Ewan McGregor, Ricky Gervais, Tim Curry, John Cleese, Jim Broadbent, John Hurt, Rik Mayall, Olivia Williams, Hugh Laurie, Pip Torrens, Brian Lonsdale

Year: 2005

Runtime: 109 minutes

BBFC: U - Universal

Country: UK

Festivals:


Search database:


If you like this, try:

Chicken Run

DJDT

Versions

Time

Settings from settings.local

Headers

Request

SQL queries from 1 connection

Templates (9 rendered)

Cache calls from 2 backends

Signals