Better than expected and better than most of the animated features this year if only ‘cos it’s marginally different in subject matter from the zillion farmyard/backyard/barnyard productions that have been systematically spewed out. The screenplay is incredibly formulaic but it does contain a lot of good lines, from my favourite, “What are you doing out of bed, tiny Lucas?” to a fairly heavy exchange between the kid and the ant leader following his “sentence” that he must “become an ant” before he can return home – “This isn’t human!” “Yes it is.”

The message of the movie strikes me as being particularly weird and it comes across very preachy to me, almost propaganda-ish even. I don’t like preachiness in any movie, but in a kids’ movie in particular, it really does bug me (no pun intended). But overall it’s sort of a sweet story and I found myself even with a bewildering tear in the corner of my eye during the end credits, but that might just be John Debney’s brilliant score which had my ears buzzing a lot like John Powell’s Antz score did 8 years ago.

It’s not great … but, y’know, even Pixar have dropped the CG ball this year with Cars so nobody’s perfect. And giant jelly belly beans … fantasy of the year right there, lol, and a beautifully rendered set.