Over the Hedge (2006)

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

Watching it is like watching the spectacle of a class clown at their best: you laugh at their jokes, instigate their defiance, and "ooooh" when they get in trouble.

With an eclectic cast of zany characters and a sort of selfish, but eventually not, lead (who has an oddly Bruce Willis-like charm about him), this Dreamworks animation retains its own sense of identity and a distinctly non-grotesque visual style that sets it apart from others of its ilk. 'Over The Hedge (2006)' has a standard story with standard themes and standard presentation, but there's entertainment to be had and some nicely done character development amidst all the silly humour, as well as some decent voice-work (Steve Carell as a hyper-active squirrel, who's essentially 'The Flash' or 'Quicksilver' too, is a brilliant choice) and the odd bit of slapstick gold. 6/10

Based on the comic strip by Michael Fry and T. Lewis, this is a loud & lively animated comedy brimming with endearing characters, and some laugh out loud gags. Bruce Willis, back in the days when he still seemed to give a damn, is nicely cast as the voice of R.J., a conniving, self serving raccoon who foolishly tries to steal the food supply of a bear named Vincent (voice of Nick Nolte). When the stash is demolished, R.J. ropes a troupe of foraging forest critters into helping him find a replacement stash. And he believes there will be easy pickings when they go "over the hedge" and into the suburban sprawl that is encroaching upon their wilderness.It is thanks to the success of "Toy Story" from a decade previous that a formula got perfected in this sort of entertainment, with some bright and cutting humor for adults to enjoy. It's not subtle about its criticisms of suburban life, but some people might not mind. And, although it may be rather too intense for the youngest of your family members, kids are more than likely to really take to the critter characters. Some of the humor may be obvious, but it does still work. There is even a sort of nod to Pepe Le Pew cartoons as our heroes give Stella the skunk (voice of Wanda Sykes) a makeover in order to pull the wool over a pet cats' (voice of Omid Djalili) eyes.The animation is slick and first rate, and there's plenty of peppy music in the form of a score by Rupert Gregson-Williams and songs by Ben Folds.The all star main voice cast also includes William Shatner as a possum who's appropriately hammy when he fakes death, a hilarious Garry Shandling as Verne the turtle, Steve Carell as a crazed squirrel named Hammy, Thomas Haden Church as a lunkhead exterminator, Allison Janney as a neighborhood busybody, Eugene Levy and Catherine O'Hara as porcupine parents, and pop star Avril Lavigne as the possum daughter.Quite entertaining overall, especially the way that it continues with gags through the closing credits.One of the brightest bits for this viewer was the way that R.J. educated his newfound friends on the way that humans worship food and give it such predominance in their lives.Eight out of 10.

If you're 7, you might manage to get some enjoyment out of this. But the bad animation, pacing, plot (actually just about everything) will constantly get your attention. It looks very cheaply made, as all the small details in the movie are complete garbage when you actually look at them. They may not have resorted to fart humor, but what you get here isn't really much better. Everything is exaggerated so that you don't notice how little you actually get. Leave it on for your young children. Anyone above the age of 8 is going to find obvious flaws with the movie.

There were some decent jokes but I couldn't help but feel it wasn't all that original. There were a lot of writers involved in this project and I'm sorry to say it shows. By the end it looked very much like they were running out of ideas. It's not all bad though, the film does move along a quite a nice pace although it does get a little baggy in the middle. There are some fun characters and even some funny gags here and there… also the traditional 'homage's' to classic films that filmmakers always seem to put in these days. Over all, not great but worth a look.My score: 5.9/10IMDb Score: 6.9/10 (based on 60,051 votes at the time of going to press).MetaScore: 67: (Based on 31 critic reviews provided by Metacritic.com at the time of going to press).Rotten Tomatoes 'Tomatometer' Score: 74/100 (based on 163 reviews counted at the time of going to press).Rotten Tomatoes 'Audience' Score: 73/100 (based on 507,343 user ratings counted at the time of going to press).You can find an expanded version of this review on my blog: Thoughts of a SteelMonster.