George Miller, the director who made us believe that pigs could talk in the 1995 hit, Babe, is at it again with the 3D-animated Happy Feet and, from the 17 minutes of footage I saw at a press event, it looks like it’s going to take the holidays by storm.  

Happy Feet stars the voice of Elijah Wood as an Emperor penguin named Mumble, who can’t sing a heart song, the ditty that all Emperor penguins sing to find their true love.  Brittany Murphy is Gloria, the love Mumble wants to woo but can’t get because his talents lie in dancing, not singing.  When he’s finally cast out of the community by the stern Noah the Elder (Hugo Weaving), he runs into a posse of decidedly un-Emperor-like penguins called the Adelie Amigos who have a Latin bent to them and use dancing as their romantic lure.  With the help of these friends, headed by the Sinatra-singing Ramon — Robin Williams doing his best Fernando Lamas impression — Mumble tries to win his love back with a little Cyrano trick, but it backfires.  Without seeing the ending, I’m guessing that Mumbles finally wins his love by proving that you don’t have to be able to sing to be lovable. But whether the ending is predictable or not, it’s Mumbles’ fun journey finding himself that makes Happy Feet joyous.

From the footage I saw, I believe that this will be the smash hit of the holidays. The humor, especially from the perfect-pitch Williams playing two parts (he also plays a Barry White-type penguin leader named Lovelace), will make kids and adults laugh out loud, and the marvelous renditions of songs will also please all audiences.  The action sequences also appear to be fantastic and will no doubt spawn a merchandising frenzy.  

The rest of the cast is platinum as well, with Hugh Jackman, Nicole Kidman, and Mumbles’ dancing performed by Savion Glover, using the same motion capture techniques used to bring Gollum to life in The Lord of the Rings films.  Also credited is the voice of Steve Irwin, the Australian TV star and animal environmentalist who was killed recently by a stingray off the Great Barrier Reef.  The film also features a new song by Prince and others by Yolanda Adams, American Idol winner Fantasia Barrino, Chrissie Hynde, Patti LaBelle, kd lang, Pink, and more.

I give credit to everyone working on the film, from the writers to the animators.  A lot of times, they put all the good stuff into trailers and, when you go see the movie, it’s a bomb. But even if the rest of the film is slightly worse than the 17 minutes that I saw, I still think it will be a great family film you can’t miss.  My five-year-old daughter who joined me at the screening can attest to my claim.

George Miller claims this film was in production before The March of the Penguins came out of the blue to become one of the most successful documentaries of all time, but it certainly can’t hurt the prospects of this film.  Happy Feet I’m sure will be around through the holidays.  I think the buzz is growing because, over a month out, the studio is starting to run ads on television.  I think they know they have a big hit on their hands and they want to make sure everyone else knows that, too.  I’m doing my part to help them out.

Happy Feet is released by Warner Bros. Pictures and Village Roadshow Pictures and opens November 17 in theaters everywhere.

Rich Burlingham