If I say to you Christmas Day cartoons, you'll probably instantly think of The Snowman and its subsequent tie-ins, The Snow Dog and Father Christmas, but there is another children's author who can give Raymond Briggs a serious run for his money when it comes to inspiring classic animated films that become festive faves : Julia Donaldson. After the hugely popular adaptations of The Gruffalo, Room On The Broom and Stick Man, you may have seen The Highway Rat on BBC1 this Christmas. If you missed it, fear not - it's released on DVD today !
The Highway Rat is a delightful 25 minute animation, produced by Magic Light Pictures, the Oscar-nominated creators of the aforementioned family faves The Gruffalo and Stick Man. It is based on the richly imaginative book that was written by Julia Donaldson and illustrated by Axel Scheffler and is a swashbuckling adventure of bandits and biscuits ! It features a ravenous rat who craves buns, biscuits and all things sweet. Tearing along the highway, he searches for sugary treats to steal, until his sweet tooth leads him to a sticky end.
The voice talents come from an all star, home grown cast, including David Tennant (famous for Dr. Who, Jessica Jones, Broadchurch) in the starring role; Rob Brydon (Gavin and Stacey, Cinderella, Stick Man); Frances De La Tour (The History Boys, Into The woods, Alice in Wonderland); Tom Hollander (Pride & Prejudice, The Night Manager, Mission Impossible – Rogue Nation); and Nina Sosanya (Love Actually, W1A, Last Tango in Halifax). Parents will have as much fun as the kids trying to place the voices when they watch !
RELEASE INFORMATION
Title: The Highway Rat
Release Date: 5th February 2018
Certificate: U
Genre: Family/Animation/Short
Runtime: 25 minutes
Format: DVD
DVD SPECIAL FEATURES
- Artwork Gallery
- Live performance by author Julia Donaldson & illustrator Axel Scheffler
- Behind the Scenes
Disclosure : We received a review copy of the dvd.
I missed this over chriChris but my 5 year old daughter loves the gruffalo and the gruffalo child films so I think she would really enjoy this xx
ReplyDeleteWe loved this at Christmas - all the Julia Donaldson ones are great!
ReplyDeleteWe saw it after we came back from Italy. I think this is not the best Julia Donaldson's book, and we didn't like the animation as much as we loved The Gruffalo/Gruffalo's child and The Stickman. I'll probably still buy when it's cheaper.
ReplyDeleteReally enjoyed watching this on tv over christmas
ReplyDeleteStarting to get closer to Christmas so like to watch all the Julia Donaldson movies
ReplyDeleteAhhh we have to get Halloween out of the way first ! ;-)
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