Stuart Little Review

The Littles - Mom - (Geena Davis), Dad - (Hugh Laurie) want to adopt a little brother for their son George - (Jonathan Lipnicki). Bewildered by the variety of choice at the orphanage they`re entranced by Stuart, a mouse and even though they`re warned against adopting outside their own species, they embrace Stuart as their own. It doesn`t go down too well with George and it`s especially galling for the family cat Snowbell - who fears he`s going to be a laughing stock being the pet cat of a mouse. This totally delightful tale is based on a classic book by the author E.B. White, it`s very similar in theme to Babe and it uses the same technology to bring Stuart to life. He`s voiced by Michael J. Fox. But the hit of the film is the bad guy Snowbell voiced by Nathan Lane. What works in this very sweet fairy tale is that it honours its origins, it doesn`t try to be too cute and it plays it for real, there`s little self congratulatory humour here although there are a heap of laughs. Geena Davis and Hugh Laurie are especially good. Directed by Rob Minkoff who co-directed The Lion King and co-written by Oscar nominee M. Night Shyamalan and Greg Booker, Stuart Little is a charmer. David`s comments:Clever animatronic animation in the Babe tradition is the main pleasure of this simple adaptation of a 1945 children`s book by E.B. White. Once the set-up is established - the fact that no-one really questions the existence of this talking mouse - it travels fairly familiar territory. Sweet but a bit insubstantial.