Shaun das Schaf: Der Film

The very notion of Shaun The Sheep Movie sounds faintly ridiculous, as if the universe were playing a joke on movie-going audiences around the world. A hyper-intelligent sheep embarking on an epic adventure to save the farmer who shears off his wool every year? What utter claptrap. The film has next to no lines of intelligible dialogue and is based on a long-running TV show for kids? How ludicrous. Is anyone above the age of three actually expected to want to watch this film? And yet, there's plenty to recommend this charming, full-hearted gem from Aardman Animation - a studio so passionate and dedicated to its craft and characters that it literally animates entire worlds in exhaustingly tiny increments.

Everyone in Mossy Bottom Farm, including our titular hero (given 'voice' by Justin Fletcher), has settled into a dreary routine. One day, Shaun decides to shake things up a little. So he distracts sheepdog Bitzer and traps the Farmer (both voiced by John Sparkes) in a caravan, all in aid of allowing his entire flock to take a day off from their boring lives. But Shaun didn't account for a steep hill, a runaway caravan and a bout of amnesia. Soon, he and his buddies - with the help of Bitzer and stray pooch Slip (Tim Hands) - must hunt for the Farmer in the Big City, even as they try to keep out of the clutches of Trumper (Omid Djalili), a fearsome agent tasked with Animal Control.

It's easy to gripe about Shaun The Sheep's simple plot: this is hardly a complex film. Indeed, it lingers obstinately in the realm of entertainment for kids, even packing in the requisite learning points about friendship and not taking things for granted. The film can sometimes feel simplistic too, given its persistent lack of dialogue and its cheerfully frequent descent into slapstick comedy. There's very little of the cheeky satire here that makes Aardman's Wallace & Gromit franchise such a blast.

But Shaun The Sheep Movie is delightful in so many ways that it's just easier for everyone above a certain age to give in to their inner child. The characters may be fashioned out of clay and wood and painstakingly animated at an extremely slow speed, but the film itself positively crackles with energy. The narrative pokes fun at the concepts of fashion, incarceration and going viral, even as it bounces merrily through a host of hilarious gags. The soporific effect of sheep leaping over fences is mined for plenty of laughs, while the camera checks in with a particularly crazed inmate of Animal Control and an utterly charming Baa-bershop Quintet.

Quite a bit of thought has evidently been devoted to the development of the film's main characters - certainly more than you'd get in some Hollywood blockbusters. Shaun is a sweetly determined hero, refusing to leave any sheep - or human, or dog - behind, even as he cleans up a mess that is (strictly speaking) of his own making. The Farmer, too, gets a storyline that spices the comedy up with a hint of drama, as he stumbles into a new career through his forgotten but deeply-ingrained skill with shearing sheep. The lack of dialogue in the film also proves to be, quite frequently, a plus. Not only does it push the story in inventive directions, it allows the incredibly expressive characters to take centre stage - their hopes, dreams and fears communicated with barely a word spoken.

This all makes for a thoroughly charming experience at the cinema - Shaun The Sheep Movie isn't likely to make you dig deep or ponder long and hard about life, but it will almost certainly entertain you in breathtaking (and breathless!) fashion. In almost every aspect - from the deft character design to its incredibly catchy soundtrack, the film radiates a sweet, optimistic charm that will win over just about everybody who gives it a chance.

I considered Aardmans last stop motion effort 'Pirates - in an adventures with scientists' to be a bit of a let down when it was released three years ago and wondered if they had gone off the boil a little bit by trying to appeal to the mass market and thus diluting their witty humour as a result. However after 80 odd minutes of Shaun the Sheep I am happy to report that they are back on track.

Shaun is extremely well animated and manages to keep the story ticking along and funny enough to keep your interest without really feeling stretched. Considering as the film has no real dialogue to speak of that is no mean feat, and is reliant on top notch production design, expressive animation and a script that is entertaining and funny without being overly ridiculous. Whilst the Shaun the Sheep/Timmy Time TV shorts are aimed at young viewers, there is a decent amount of underlying humour here that adults will also engage with and thus it doesn't insult your intelligence the way some films do.

After Aardmans infamous falling out with DreamWorks (who wanted them to Americanize Wallace & Gromit) I did wonder if Aardman had sold out for the mass market after feeling the Sony Pictures distributed Pirates had a whiff of compromise to it, and that's partly why I felt Pirates fell a bit flat. However Aardman have teamed up with an independent European distributor for Shaun and as a result it seems they were allowed to make the film they wanted to make this time round. In effect I was not disappointed with Shaun, the simple but hilarious premise of the TV show is expanded successfully to the big screen with no noticeable compromises for the mass market. That the film is also dialogue free should make it an easy sell abroad too and I'm glad to see the film has been well received.

So well done to Aardman for making one of 2015's most enjoyable, entertaining and amusing films so far.

For 'Shaun the Sheep' Aardman Animations gracefully goes back to its roots. If you are not familiar with the character of Shaun, then perhaps I should elaborate. He was first seen in the third Wallace & Gromit short 'A Close Shave'. The world he inhabits has no characters that speak an audible line of dialogue. It is all silent, save for the odd sound effect and the musical score. This is Aardman's sixth feature length film or third if you just count stop-motion.

The plot is of course very basic. But that suits the film just fine, it is not trying to be the next 'Inception' and it doesn't need to be. With silent films the simpler the better. Shaun decides that he wants some well deserved time off from his work on the farm. The group or flock want a day off, but they instead end up in rather a mess. Which eventually leads them to the Big City aka London. Meanwhile, through a misunderstanding their farmer is hospitalized with no recollection of whom he is and Shaun. It is up to Shaun and the gang to set the farmer free and return home, before further trouble is had.

Queue great scenes that are funny, referential and light hearted. The first factor being the most unexpected, considering that there is no dialogue at all. Meaning that Shaun relies heavily upon visual humour, which works a treat. It never forays into dark territory and thankfully keeps the tone consistently light hearted with good intentions. It would be impossible to list all the references one could find when viewing it, but let me bring up a few. They are, The Shawshank Redemption, The Silence of the Lambs and The Wolverine. So even the adults will get a chuckle out of it. This film really is for all ages.

The stop motion animation is fabulous and showcases how far Aardman have come along since 1989's A Grand Day Out. It is even well paced and runs little over seventy-five brief minutes. Meaning it never gets tiresome. But the length proves to still be part of the problem. The film is far too short and I wanted I needed so much more. I would not have minded watching this film even if its running time was in fact doubled. I know this is not a big issue, considering the film is silent and still has warmth, heart and a soul. But, some character development would not have gone amiss.

If you are curious as to where 'Shaun' places amongst the other feature length stop motion pictures, then it follows thus; it is greater than 'Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were- Rabbit', but lacks the shear enthusiasm of 'Chicken Run'. But, could the woolly fella ever compete with such grand competition? Probably not, but there is less than a feather between the overall quality of the two.

'Shaun the Sheep' to the cynical will no doubt appear to be a cash grab from Aardman. (As the gang already have a television show to its name). This could not be further from the truth. Shaun is warm, heartfelt, moving, exciting and soulful. No matter what age you are, you will be in for a delight provided by this excellent film from Aardman, further proving that they can do no wrong. I urge anyone to come forward and say they were bored; the mere thought of which is inconceivable!

For a while, I've held a belief that Aardman can do no wrong, and thankfully this latest example has kept up that belief and then some. It's actually rather difficult to write a review of this movie, because there's not a whole lot one can actually comment on. For instance, I can't say anything about voice acting, or script, because there is literally no dialogue. I mean, there are voice actors (for example Omid Djalili as Tramper the villain) but all they do is mumble (and in the case of the sheep actors, bleat) and stuff. I suppose this, then, serves as a testament to the sheer quality of Aardman's animation. In addition to it being fantastic that claymation can still find its way onto the screen today, it's also brilliant that such a film has found such capable animators; the animation is beautiful, and though you may think they may not be able to convey so much emotion with just facial expressions and mumbles, lo and behold, they do; from glee, to terror, to sadness, to panic, and many more, the characters they've created are absolutely brimming with emotion, and immensely watchable at the same time, and that just makes this movie all the more effective. Lack of a proper script also doesn't seem to trouble Aardman either; this movie is really goddamn funny. The physical comedy sequences, the highlight of which has to be the gleefully chaotic scene in a restaurant, are done to a tee, quite possibly the best Aardman has done them since Flushed Away, while Aardman's trademark sight gags, though not quite as strong as they were in previous offering The Pirates! (the Brian Blessed gag comes to mind), are ever-present and really quite amusing, however obvious or subtle they may be (for instance, "The Big City - twinned with Le Grande Ville, La Ciudad Grande"). My main gripe was that towards the end, which I won't spoil, things do get a bit too cheesy for my tastes, but the rest of the movie, and indeed most of the climactic sequences, more than make up for that. Shaun The Sheep: The Movie only serves to reinforce why I am such a huge fan of the Bristol lads to begin with, and while it is nowhere near as good as their first two features, it is definitely a worthy addition to their fine repertoire of work. If you're looking for some great entertainment on an afternoon, you could do a lot worse than this.

I never ever go to the cinema (I rather wait for the Blu-ray to be released and just paying once but yet I went to London from Spain just to see this movie. I didn't wanna wait for it to be released here.

Shaun the Sheep is a brilliant TV show so when I found out a movie was being made I was totally thrilled. Even though going from the 7-minute episode to a full length movie was a big step, I was confident in Aardman to made the transition easily. They didn't disappoint. First, let me say that I love stop-motion; it's such an "intimate" technique due to the fact that you always have to literally be on top of the character to change it every time he makes the slightest movement. But not only is the technique beautiful, the story doesn't disappoint either. This doesn't feel like a dragged out episode of the show, it feels like a story that goes beyond the usual surroundings of the show while still maintaining how everything works. This movie made me laugh a lot. If there's something that Shaun the Sheep always achieved was the ability to create humor of the most simplest situations. But I also cried a lot. Tears of sadness and happiness. And truthfully, I never expected Shaun the Sheep to reach me so deeply. There's a scene where you can see so much pain in Shaun eyes. And that's just clay! My God, congratulations to whoever did that, it was so moving. And I also had a sweet spot about Slip, the dog that Shaun meets early in the movie and come along for the adventure. She was a new character but she felt like and old member of the gang.

I haven't enjoyed a movie so much in a long time. And I haven't felt so many thing with a movie in a long time either. So thank you, Aardman, for giving a fan such a great gift.