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E.B. White's classic tale gets a Babe-like makeover in Charlotte's
Web, a delightful and well-made film that is sure to become a
family classic. Directed by Gary Winick (13 Going on 30), the new
version eschews the musical numbers of the 1973 cartoon and mixes
CGI with live-action animals. Dakota Fanning brings the right
amount of chutzpah to Fern, the young farm girl who rescues a
runt, Wilbur, from death and visits him every day at her Uncle
Homer's farm. But it's Wilbur's friendship with Charlotte the
spider (voiced by Julia Roberts) that ultimately saves him from
the "smoke house" (a kid-friendly alternative term to the
slaughterhouse), for Charlotte's talent for weaving praiseworthy
words about Wilbur into her web turns the Zuckerman farm into a
tourist attraction.
The more tragic elements of the book are
handled sensitively by Winick, working from a script by Susannah
Grant (Erin Brockovich), and Roberts' soothing, maternal voice
(who knew it would work so well?) makes it all go down easy. It
turns out to be just one of many perfect celebrity voice-casting
choices, for the farm animals, voiced by an all-star cast
including Oprah Winfrey (the goose), Robert Redford (the horse),
Steve Buscemi (Templeton the rat), and John Cleese (the sheep),
lend plenty of sharp humor. But it's two corn-hungry crows, voiced
by Thomas Haden Church (Sideways) and OutKast's Andre "3000"
Benjamin who steal the show. (Ages 4 and older) -- Ellen A. Kim
Credits:
Actors: Dakota Fanning, Julia Roberts, Oprah Winfrey, Steve
Buscemi, John Cleese
Directors: Gary Winick
Writers: E.B. White, Earl Hamner Jr., Karey Kirkpatrick, Susannah
Grant
Producers: Bernard Williams, Edgar M. Bronfman, Jordan Kerner
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, NTSC, Full Screen
Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround), English (Dolby
Digital 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 5.1)
Subtitles: English, Spanish
Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only)
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