Review: Barnyard

UK Release: 20th October 2006

This CGI cartoon crosses the thematic conceits of The Lion King with the skewed world presented in Gary Larson’s Far Side cartoons, where animals stand up and talk whenever humans aren’t looking.

Kevin James voices fun-loving cow Otis, who must face up to his manly responsibility when his father (Sam Elliott, who does a mean Johnny Cash impression at one point) is killed by coyotes. Writer/director Steve Oedekerk, better known for his live-action films Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls and Kung Pow: Enter the Fist, brings a strong cinematic sensibility to the proceedings, and Barnyard brims with often laugh-out-loud sight gags and one-liners.

Younger children may be a little disturbed by the violence and the movie’s dark undertones, while the more literal-minded will just feel confused by the film’s muddled biology: all the cows, male and female alike, have udders.

Radio Times rating:

***

UK cinema certificate PG
Running time 89mins

Review by Leslie Felperin

News: Danny Glover

Still much-loved for his turns in the Lethal Weapons films, playing Barnyard’s Miles the Mule must have been a nice break for Danny glover, who’srarely away from the front of the camera these days. He’s already completed one other movie, while two others are in post-production, three more are currently filming, and yet another two are in pre-production. Quite how many see the light of day, however, we can but wait and see…

Most promising, from advance buzz at least, is likely Dream Girls, due out in the UK at the start of February 2007, where Glover will appear alongside Afro-American Hollywood bigwigs Jamie Foxx, Eddie Murphy and pop princess Beyonce Knowles, set around a ficitional 1960s black female three-piece singing group based heavily on Diana Ross and the Supremes. The stage version has been running since 1981 – and it’s just possible that Dream Girls could immitate Chicago‘s successful transition to the big screen.

Glover has also got a role in the next film from Michel “Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind” Gondry, the Jack Black-starring Be Kind Rewind, following the travails of two movie store clerks who accidentally wipe their entire stock, and so have to recreate famous flicks for their most loyal customer. It could be genius, it could be nonsense. hard to say this early.

He will also crop up in the Marky Mark Wahlberg-starring actioner Shooter for King Arthur director Antoine Fuqua (due May 2007 in the UK), with Glover playing the lengthily-named Colonel Isaac Fitzsimmons Johnson. That is almost certain to be mindless nonsense, but could nonetheless make a packet from those of us who like our action flicks big and mindless…

News: Courtney Cox

Following her initial apparent big-screen success with the Scream movies, the curse of the former Friends stars seems to have come back to hit Courtney Cox, Daisy the Cow in this week’s Barnyard, with a vengance. If initial responses to her next film are anything to go by, she’ll soon be doing even worse than fellow ex-Friends star Matt LeBlanc, whose spin-off sitcom Joey is at least still going, even if it is rubbish.

Her next project is the Tim Allen “comedy” Zoom, where Allen shamelessly rips off last year’s mediocre Sky High as an ageing superhero teaching a group of kids how to take over his mantle. But ignore the plagiarism – the worst crime is the utter lack of any laughs. How long until Jennifer Aniston, with her string of so-so romantic comedies, is the only Friend with anything resembling a Hollywood career – and so how long until the increasingly inevitable reunion special?

News: Steve Oedekerk

The director of this week’s animated comedy Barnyard will see his live-action comedy script Evan Almighty – a sort of sequel to 2003’s Jim Carrey vehicle Bruce Almighty – hit our sceens in July 2007. Although Morgan Freeman will be returning as God, Carrey is replaced by fellow comic Steve Carrell – most famous for The 40 Year Old Virgin and the US remake of The Office – who appeared in the last movie as the focus of Carrey’s wrath. As the Evan of the title, now a US Congressman, Carrell is approached by God to build a new Ark – of the Noah variety…

Oedekerk will also provide the voice of Mr. Beady in the TV spin-off series of Barnyard, planned for next year, as well as doing an Orson Wells by appearing in the lead, writing and directing Kung Pow 2: Tongue of Fury. Hardly Citizen Kane, but still… Busy guy.

News: Kevin James

The voice of Otis the Cow in this week’s Barnyard may remain best-known for his TV work in the lead on US sitcom The King of Queens, but after starring alongside Adam Sandler in next year’s I Now Pronounce You Chuck And Larry, all that could change. James and Sandler play two Philadelphia firement who decide to pretend to be gay to qualify for couples allowance and, with a cast that includes Dan Ackroyd, Steve Buscemi, Jessica Biel and living legend Richard Chamberlain (one of the few big-names of movieland to have publicly outed himself), it could well prove a hit.

Three more projects have also recently been announced where James finally gets the big screen lead: Field Trip, where he’ll play a substitute teacher with an unruly class; Monster Hunter, where he’ll play a shildpsychologist who gets rid of monsters under the bed; and Man in Uniform, where he’ll – erm – play a man who dresses up as a policeman for some reason, no doubt with hilarious consequences… Still, looks like this is a comedian on the up.