Chimpanzee

"The astonishing footage of apes in their natural environment is made perfectly accessible and then nearly undone by a narration track that plays to the audience's basest desires for gag-inducing cuteness." - Andrew Schenker

It's cute and the kid liked it well enough. It forces a story of good Chimp tribe Vs mean marauding chimp tribe, preferring to edit the wondrous footage into a digestible tale for children over, yknow, teaching them anything. For some, all you need to know is this: During his groaner narration, Tim Allen calls a chimp a monkey.

Some brilliant photography -which makes the rest even more of a shame. Overdone foley and soundtrack grated but it's the narration; horribly 'pally' from Allen, and the narrative; not only anthropomorphising but imbuing them with a warped, right-wing morality. Made me want to throw shit at the screen -exactly the kind of ape behaviour you won't see in this rotten, twee, faux-documentary. link related: http://goo.gl/RRZLkU

I really, really wanted to like this one, but Tim Allen's narration is just awful.

Remove Tim Allen and the patronizing soundtrack, then you a decent film.

A-

Fun, heartwarming at the end, but man... There is some stuff in here I would not be okay with a 5 year old watching. Chimps tearing apart a smaller monkey and eating it. Madness.

Also flowing through it, though, is Oscar's inspiring story. A story that, we're told by the filmmakers, actually happened. Footage was pulled from a handful of locales, but the core of the narrative was a real-life "act of beauty." And in it we see a shadow of grace as the "family's" weakest member is saved from starvation by its strongest, a glimpse of how we might better act as human families, a projection of God's glory in His beautiful creation. (pluggedin.com)

Entertainment: 3/4. Spirituality: 1/3. Sustainability: 2/3.

When the story changed and they ended up with a film they didn't expect the makers make the mistake of not changing the tone. What results is a film with pretty serious moments but with a whacky comedy and tone. Uneven, badly scripted and wrong choice for narrator. Some great shots but the BBC are hardly scared

Perfect for a lazy, hungover Sunday mornings.

Amazing how a documentary can still have such a Disney plot.

the narration does not ruin the footage, though the style of the tale prevents the kinds of looks into chimpanzee behavior you'd (I'd) want to see, especially considering the complexity of events.

I walked out of the theater. Garbage.

Good enough. The narrator could have been chosen better (Tim at one moment actually did a Tim "The Toolman" Taylor grunt) and the script was so obviously written by Disney. It's still a worthwhile movie to watch if you like primates though.