The Wild Life

Daniel Defoe might not recognize his Robinson Crusoe in The Wild Life, an animated adventure in which  anthropomorphic animals rule the uninhabited island.

Yet despite the goofy antics and aggressive attempts at 3D posturing, the sight gags and one-liners are much too tepid for all but the smallest and least discriminating children. As a well-intentioned tapir observes at one point: “Any way you look at it, this is not good.”

The mayhem begins aboard a pirate ship, where a parrot named Tuesday (voiced by David Howard) begins recounting the story — subsequently told in flashback — of how he became the trusted sidekick of Crusoe (Yuri Lowenthal) after the sailor became marooned on a lush tropical island with the bird and his diverse gang of quirky friends, including a porcupine, a billy goat and a chameleon.

As the days pass with no provisions, both human and parrot want to be rescued, but for different reasons. Tuesday wants to see the outside world, and Crusoe just wants to go home. But while they attempt to contact passing ships, the island dwellers must fend off a pair of vicious but bumbling cats who are willing to eat just about anything.

As computer-generated animation has gotten cheaper in recent years, it’s made the crowded marketplace more competitive, with the bar for quality significantly raised. In this case, the animation is adequate, but hardly as crisp or detailed as some of the more polished productions from Pixar and others.

The shipwreck sequence is rendered with a decent amount of suspense and visual flair, but it’s a fleeting highlight. Otherwise, the strategy seems to be intermittently throwing objects directly at the camera to justify the 3D presentation.

For kiddos, the film — directed by veteran animator Vincent Kesteloot — might be an introduction to the Crusoe legend, but Dafoe’s 18th century source material has been whittled down to its most simplistic terms in order to focus more on the zany creatures.

The result isn’t terrible as much as it’s merely innocuous and forgettable. The Wild Life might ultimately be a better fit on the small screen, where it could function best as an electronic babysitter.

 

Rated PG, 90 minutes.