Panique au Village(A Town Called Panic)
Saturday, April 9, 2011, 2 p.m.
All showings are in the Mother Theresa Hackelmeier Memorial Library Auditorium
Panique au Village (A Town Called Panic)
The giddy, chaotic pace in Stéphane Aubier and Vincent Patar’s first feature, a marvelous fantasia made using meticulously detailed stopmotion animation and a cast of 1,500 plastic-toy figures, never lets up for a second. Gleefully defying all logic, A Town Called Panic finds its heroes, Horse, Cowboy, and Indian, living together harmoniously, with Horse partial to taking long, soapy hot showers. After a gaffe involving an order of 50 million bricks mistakenly placed online, the trio travels to the center of the Earth, the frozen tundra (where they must battle an evil giant-robot penguin), and a mysterious underwater universe. During their far-flung adventures, incurable romantic Horse tries to impress an orange-maned mare, Madame Longrée, the town’s devoted music teacher. Seemingly inspired by the manic energy of the Marx brothers and old Warner Bros. cartoons, A Town Called Panic, which originated as a cult-favorite TV show, is ultimately in a class of its own, its playful, nonstop anarchy bound to appeal to children and adults alike.
Director and Screenplay: Stéphane Aubier & Vincent Patar
Running time: 75 minutes
Production: France, Belgium, Luxemboug, 2009
Language: French with English subtitles
Rating: Not rated
