The Wallace & Gromit people’s latest stop-motion, claymation feature is about a tribe of Stone Age people having to play a game of soccer to win their valley back from an invading Bronze Age civilization.
However, it’s more complicated than the premise. In the movie’s opening, the tribe’s ancestors lived alongside dinosaurs (creative license, not a stance on the Earth’s true age) and one day a meteor struck, burying most residents in dirt/ash. Once everybody dusted themselves off, they were fascinated by a hot, ball-shaped rock and due to the rock’s temperature, they quickly learned it wasn’t smart to hold it. Instead they instinctively kicked the rock, passed the rock and shot the rock through a structure resembling a goal. The ancestors’ activity was saved for posterity as cave paintings…which nobody can interpret. Nowadays, Dug and his tribe are content hunting rabbits and enjoying their valley surrounded by an inhospitable landscape that one day will be Manchester. Then the Bronze Age invaders led by Lord Nooth arrive and evict Dug and the tribe. When Dug is accidentally transported to Nooth’s city, he meets Goona, sees all the wonders of “civilization” (numerous jokes here) and witnesses a soccer match between Nooth’s champions and I think vikings. Dug decides to take the valley back by beating Nooth’s team, Nooth accepts, insert training montage as Goona whips the tribe into shape and it wraps up with the game followed by the comical aftermath.
Early is a predictable movie so what I was more interested in were the technical elements the claymation animators utilized and the jokes inserted to amuse adults and children. It’s very British since they use the term “football” for the sport. I’m OK with it. I just use the American term for my predominantly American-Canadian audience. The movie’s pace is pretty rapid compared to other underdog stories. Heck, the challenge was issued sooner than I expected.
It’s great for kids. Adults? I can only guess those who like Wallace & Gromit and their other outings like Chicken Run will have any interest. Sadly, I fear Early will go down as a flop due to its first week of box-office receipts being pretty low; it was released over the same weekend as Black Panther and Peter Rabbit is doing better than I anticipated.
Alamo Extras: Old cartoon of a dinosaur hunt; Trailers for a horrible movie I can’t remember the title for and Quest For Fire; stop-motion movie from recent past arguing that birds and dinosaurs are related…before this was widely taught; Scenes of other media showing cavemen: Encino Man, Cap’n Caveman cartoons, Alpha Bits ads, Bic pen ads, Eegah (ridiculed on MST3K), the hilarious “Prometheus & Bob” bits from Nickelodeon in the Nineties, the horrible live-action Flintstones and Ringo Starr’s Caveman flick.