A scene from the animated film Epic. Courtesy Twentieth Century Fox
A scene from the animated film Epic. Courtesy Twentieth Century Fox
A scene from the animated film Epic. Courtesy Twentieth Century Fox
A scene from the animated film Epic. Courtesy Twentieth Century Fox

Epic is a decent if uninspired eco-focused animation

Made by the team behind Ice Age and Rio, Epic has all the elements of an old-fashioned classic.

Kaleem Aftab
Kaleem Aftab
London

May 29, 2013

  • English
  • Arabic

Epic
Director: Chris Wedge
Starring: Amanda Seyfried, Beyoncé and Christoph Waltz
***

Inspired by the William Joyce book The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs, and made by the team behind Ice Age and Rio, this tale has the components of an old-fashioned Disney classic.

The set-up creates a wonderful world where humans, animals and folklore creatures interact. But the tale suffers from too much exposition.

Amanda Seyfried is the teenager M?K who inadvertently discovers a tiny advanced civilisation called the Leaf Men and gets caught up in their war to save the forest. Christoph Waltz is the baddy Mandrake, head of the evil tribe of Boggans.

Aziz Ansari and Chris O’Dowd as molluscs provide the very funny comic interludes. Beyoncé voices the forest queen. But for animated eco adventures, search out cartoons by Japan’s Studio Ghibli.

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