Bird Island is a happy place inhabited by flightless birds with the exception of Red (Jason Sudeikis) who has bouts of bad temper which lead him to being sent to anger management classes. One day a boat arrives at the island with a group of pigs from nearby Piggy Island who claim they are friendly explorers. The birds welcome them with open arms but the pigs slowly start to take over the island. Seemingly, the only one who is able to notice what the pigs are doing is Red and it is up to him, along with his two friends Bomb (Danny McBride) and Chuck (Josh Gad) to try and stop the pigs.

First things first, this is a kids movie, it’s not aimed at adults so the plays on the pop culture references, toilet humour and barely veiled sex references are a bit amiss here as they will go over kids heads but in saying that the movie will keep your kids entertained for the ninety plus minutes it runs but there were a few moments for me where it all just felt like constant noise and manic animation so I must be showing my ago.

First time directors Clay Kaytis and Fergal Reilly have previously worked as animators on movies such as Frozen, Tangled, The Smurfs and Hotel Transylvania so in terms of the animation is spot on and it’s by far the strong point of the film. The bird characters all have their own strengths and skills and get the opportunity to have their moment in the sun.

There’s some great voice acting thanks to the quality of the actors involved but advertising Sean Penn is a bit of a cheat (you’ll see what I mean) so it’s still a cash grab movie aimed at your children. In that sense it pulls it off, there’s just not a lot of depth in the story but that won’t stop it making huge amounts of money and leading to the inevitable sequel which is sure to follow.

DJ Speaks Rating: 4.5 Out Of 10