Panique au village (A Town Called Panic) (2009)
Average Rating: 7.2/10
Reviews Counted: 67
Fresh: 55 | Rotten: 12
No consensus yet.
Average Rating: 7.2/10
Critic Reviews: 19
Fresh: 16 | Rotten: 3
No consensus yet.
liked it
Average Rating: 3.9/5
User Ratings: 3,709
My Rating
Movie Info
This unusual feature (a French-Belgian-Luxembourgian co-production) stylistically recalls the work of Art Clokey (Gumby, Davey and Goliath), with its lead cast consisting entirely of stop motion-animated children's toys. The premise concerns two such toys -- Cowboy (Stéphane Aubier) and Indian (Bruce Ellison) -- who plan to buy a birthday gift for their friend Horse (the voice of Vincent Patar) but accidentally destroy his house. A series of wacky, often hallucinatory adventures ensues that
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Cast
-
Stéphane Aubier
Cowboy, Max Briquenet, ... -
Jeanne Balibar
Madame Longrée, Madame... -
Nicolas Buysse
Jean-Paul, Sheep -
Francois de Brigode
Sportscaster -
Véronique Dumont
Janine -
Bruce Ellison
Indian -
Christine Grulois
Cow, Student -
Frederic Jannin
Brick Delivery Man, Gé... -
Bouli Lanners
Postman -
Christelle Mahy
Chicken -
Eric Muller
Music Student 1, Rocky ... -
Francois Neyken
Pig -
Vincent Patar
Horse, Mother Atlante -
Pipou
Michel's Laugh -
Franco Piscopo
Bear -
Benoît Poelvoorde
Steven -
David Ricci
Donkey, Michel -
Ben Tesseur
Scientist 1 -
Alexandre von Sivers
Scientist 2
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All Critics (71) | Top Critics (20) | Fresh (58) | Rotten (12) | DVD (4)
If someone laced Wallace and Gromit's stockpile of West Country cheeses with hallucinogens, they might start to show some of the free-associative abandon of the characters in this trippy debut feature...
Top CriticDirectors Stéphane Aubier and Vincent Patar (who also provide voices) display a pleasantly warped sensibility without going for adult humor.
There's really very little to say about this film beyond that it's absolutely brilliant.
If a precocious 9-year-old with attention deficit issues made a stop-motion animated movie, he might produce a triumph of supreme silliness like A Town Called Panic.
All the silliness unfolds in a complex social structure, where good manners are expected, bad behaviour is punished and birthdays are not to be forgotten.
In a world lousy with computer animation and 3-D whizz-bangery -- j'accuse, James Cameron! -- it's nice to know there's still fun to be had with nothing more than plastic figures and a little imagination.
Stop-motion comedy adventure with subtitles, a few curses.
Anyone who has spent anytime around kids will know exactly what Aubier and Patar are trying to achieve.
full review at Movies for the Masses
Charming and highly original but a little of it goes a long way.
Though it probably works best in short bursts on DVD, it might just be wacky and strange enough to appeal to kids who'll simply accept it for what it is.
Chaotic, warped and impervious to logic ? a total treasure just waiting to be discovered.
A very small amount of this would be funny. But here, there's 77 minutes of it. And that's about 76 minutes and 30 seconds too much to stomach in one sitting.
Bounces around with a hyperactive dementia that somehow never flags.
Studded with surreal and unexpectedly tender touches (kamikaze cows, an elegantly lovestruck horse), this is plastic and fantastic.
Like a very lo-fi Toy Story with the vibe of a live-action Terry Gilliam cartoon and the addled craziness of SpongeBob SquarePants; it's funny for adults and children alike in a refreshing, barking mad sort of way.
A heady and utterly unapologetic roller-coaster ride into a hyper-vivid, hyperactive world created from cheap children's toys.
One of the year's originals -- frantic, unpredictable and very, very funny. Remove brain. See loud.
The action sometimes overrides the subtitles, but children of all ages could well be mesmerised just trying to keep up with the accident-prone story of Cowboy, Indian and Horse.
Deliriously daft, ludicrously lunatic and nuttily nonsensical.
Audience Reviews for Panique au village (A Town Called Panic)
Super Reviewer
Super Reviewer
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- Horse: Excellent cafe!
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Foreign Titles
- Panique au Village (DE)
- A Town Called Panic (Panique au village) (UK)
Its basically a feature length version of the Cravendale adverts, if you like them then you'll love this movie.
It is simply the most random movie to watch though, one minute your on land, then in the artic, and then somehow swimming the depths of the ocean, so a very random but highly amusing french animation!