The first computer-animated picture from the stop-motion masters of England’s Aardman Features (Wallace & Gromit) and made in California with DreamWorks Animation, this tale of an English pet mouse who must fend for himself in the sewer system depends on distinctly American storytelling: it’s loud, rushed and overly reliant on comic violence. Yet when it pauses to catch its breath, the movie gets its Aardman personality back. The flushed mouse runs into trouble with a French toad, for example, so that many of the jokes revolve around the centuries-old Anglo-Franco rivalry (there is a brilliant running mime gag). And if the reliance of rock songs on the soundtrack – another Americanism – proves grating, hilarious relief comes in the form of serenading slugs who pop up to occasionally comment on the action.
