Chicken Little

Several critics have invoked variations of the line Chicken Little lays an egg in their reviews of Disney's first attempt to produce an all-computer-animated feature. One of them is Joel Siegel of ABC's Good Morning America, who also refers to an ad that Disney is using to promote the film, showing a picture of the title character ducking -- along with the caption The End Is Near. Comments Siegel: Sadly, unless [Disney heeds] Walt's timeless advice [that] the most important thing [in a film] is story, the end may be near for Disney animation. They just don't know how to do it anymore. Steven Rae in the Philadelphia Inquirer mourns what he says is the fact that the movie is entirely lacking in anything 'Disneyesque.' Comments Joe Morgenstern in the Wall Street Journal: For those of us who grew up on the magical splendors of Disney animation, this magic-free film is heartbreaking. Many other reviews express less sadness over the studio's latest offering and much more of what sounds like contempt. A. O. Scott in the New York Times says that the film has the distinction of being a terrible movie -- a hectic, uninspired pastiche of catchphrases and clich?s, with very little wit. Gene Seymour, writing in Newsday remarks, The whole movie comes on like a strident stand-up comic begging and pleading for laughs. But if the script is weak, can the computer animation strengthen it? Not with this movie, say the critics. Jack Mathews in the New York Daily News writes that it's almost rudimentary compared with such Pixar/Disney hits as Finding Nemo and The Incredibles. And Lou Lumenick concludes in the New York Post: The artistic bankruptcy of Chicken Little makes a pretty good case that Disney should re-up with Pixar. The film does draw one positive review from among the major critics. Mike Clark's in USA Today, but it's not exactly a rave. Writes Clark: As creature features go, lusciously pigmented, child-friendly Chicken Little is no Howard the Duck [a 1986 flop from George Lucas]. But it also isn't quite the computer-animated home run Disney really needs post-Pixar.