Camden New Journal - Movies: Surfs Up

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The Review - AT THE MOVIES with WILLIAM HALL
Published: 9 August 2007

Cody Maverick, voiced by Shia LaBeouf, prepares to hit the BIG Z waves in Surf’s Up

Penguins in land of hop and glory

SURF’S UP
Directed by Ash Brannon, Chris Buck
Certificate PG

PENGUINS have become big business at the box office, ever since they shuffled into the limelight with the extraordinary and moving March of the Penguins back in 2005.
The hero of this ice-floe cartoon caper is a New Zealand rock hopper named Cody, the kind of little chap we last saw tap-dancing in Happy Feet.
They get around, these rock hoppers. Young Cody (voiced by Shia LaBeouf) would rather catch a wave on his ice-slab surfboard than help his mum egg-sitting or sorting fish.
Eventually a talent scout spots him, and hauls him away from the Antarctic to a South Seas island to compete in the Big Z surfing championships.
There he finds himself up against two main rivals, Chicken Joe (Jon Heder) and Tank (Diedrich Bader), before meeting his all-time hero Big Z himself and learning a thing or two about life along the way.
If we’ve heard the simple message a million times before (“Winning isn’t everything – but never give up!”) the backgrounds are a rich travelogue with the animators conjuring up massive waves and exotic beaches.
Here’s a bright and breezy offering that parents should enjoy as much as their offspring.

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