Shaun The Sheep Movie

While Pixar might dominate movies using computers and CGI, a group of animators over in England continues to deliver with simple clay and traditional stop motion. The results are equally entertaining and enthralling.

In the latest offering from Aardman (the group that brought you Wallace and Gromit), Shaun is a mischievous sheep living on the Mossy Bottom Farm. Sadly, his life has become too monotonous, so he hatches a plan to take a vacation from the humdrum.

Unfortunately, the scheme includes inducing Farmer to fall asleep in his trailer, which becomes loose and rolls all the way to The Big City. Helpless without Farmer to care for them, Shaun, Bitzer the Dog and the rest of the sheep head into town to find him, and it will be the biggest adventure any of them has ever taken.

Can they avoid the Animal Control officer long enough to find Farmer?

Can they survive in The Big City?

With absolutely no dialogue, Shaun The Sheep Movie is one of the most engaging and charming movies of the summer. Much like The Minions, Shaun and his flock communicate with facial expressions, some gibberish and plenty of physicality, which is why children who have the pleasure of seeing the movie will fall in love with the gang.

Sure, writers/directors Mark Burton and Richard Starzak include too much potty humor for my taste, but they create Shaun The Sheep Movie to be a timeless classic devoid of craven attempts to be hip and capitalize on pop culture. You get a few references here and there, but Burton and Starzak don’t feel pressure to make the cover of Entertainment Weekly or include the latest Taylor Swift song. They just want to make us laugh, and it works.

In that sense, Shaun The Sheep Movie is a vacation from the massive summer blockbusters dominating the Cineplex. It’s simple slapstick and sight gags constantly making you giggle and laugh no matter how young or old you might be.

Most of all, it’s great storytelling making you happy, feel a pang of sadness in the right moments and fall for the adorable animals pulling together like a family when the chips are down and the one they love is in danger.

Shaun The Sheep Movie is rated PG for rude humor.