hey everyone so today i want to talk to you about the gruffalo and also the gruffalo's child now
over christmas quite a few people did ask me to watch and review the gruffalo's child i was
kind of like really a lot of you guys apparently like it and i didn't and then i decided to watch
it this month because i found out that helena bond carter is the main narrator in this and i was like
okay i kind of have to see this and both of them are half an hour long we're both just televised
short half an hour films aimed at children and they are based on the julia donaldson books
and i thought this is going to be quite exciting now i do have to point out first of all
that i never read the books as a child nor if i read the books as an adult and so i can't
tell you whether or not they're exactly the same as the stories in the books but i can tell you
that they are absolutely fantastic they are aimed at children but they're
just sensational to watch the two stories obviously alter slightly the first one
i'm the mother squirrel who is voiced by helena tells a story to her to her children her children
squirrels about a little mouse who is walking along in the forest and he comes across three
different animals an owl a snake and a fox and obviously they want to eat him
and so this little mouse you know he pretends that he's meeting this character called the gruffalo
and he creates this really scary kind of monster character um who he's who he he it is fictitious
to the mouse and obviously that scares the snake the fox and the owl away so he doesn't get eaten
and then there's a big problem at the end where things happen that's a little bit unexpected for
the mouse and there are a few twists and turns along the way and we do get to meet the gruffalo
we get to meet this character who is essentially a figment of the mouse's imagination or is he and
it's very very adorable um and the second one before i go into specifics about casting in the
animation itself the second one is a bit of a role reversal the gruffalo tells the
child gruffalo about this big bad mouse and it's a similar concept but in role reversal um again told
by the mother squirrel and the mother squirrels telling these stories to her younger squirrels
as a sort of lesson you know these squirrels are scared of the dark so she's saying you know
if you're going to get eaten make up make up a monster basically there are little morals in there
and which is very nice i would thought one of the morals would have been don't like so it'll
turn itself upside down but really that that i thought the main model was don't like something
will happen but then that sort of counteracted itself at the end but there are loads of little
morals within it for the children what does this for me as an adult fear first of all it's
tranquility especially the opening scene once uh mother squirrel is starting to talk and tell a
story there's no dialogue for a good four or five minutes or something maybe slightly less and it's
just the mouse walking through the forest and it's all snowy and it's beautiful and it's so peaceful
and you just have to watch and observe and it's such an observational little thing and
it is really really gorgeous the script for this is great i recognize some of the lines i
think i might have heard this being read out in the 20s or something at some point yeah i know
um and it is pretty much on the whole spoken and rhyme which i know the book is i think so that is
lovely you can follow the rhyme and you can kind of guess what's saying next and some of the rhymes
are repeated a lot of the lines are repeated and that helps the kids learn and follow along with
it and they can see what's going on next just as the baby squirrels did you know mother squirrel
would say something and the baby squirrels would know instantly what comes next and they can and
they can see it and the kids watching at home can see it in sync as well so that's lovely
but my favorite thing here is the cast there are so many wonderful cast members in both of the
films which i love obviously as i've said about five times now helena voices the mother squirrel
and for that that i absolutely loved and that's the only reason i watched it but i'm pleased i did
and so for me that's what sold it to me and robbie coltrane voices the gruffalo
which was fantastic i was like ah so that was them very very lovely
james corden is the voice of the mouse it actually took the mouse a little while to speak you know
i completely forgot he was in it i did check the cast list before i watched it and i didn't bother
doing anything i didn't write down or anything so i wasn't looking at the castle throughout
it and it took the mouse a good five six seven minutes after meeting him to actually speak a lot
and i was like ah i completely forgot he was in it so that was very nice um rob ryden voiced the
snake oh that's great when i heard him speak i was like oh yeah so that was very nice and um the in
the gruffalo's child shirley henderson voices the child gruffalo um shirley henderson played moana
myrtle in harry potter and also ursula blake in um doctor who loving monsters i think it is yes in
love and monster series two so that's absolutely fantastic brilliant cast all round there wasn't
really one voice which i thought was well done and also why i love watching animations because i can
see the actors in my head in the studio with the cans on and you know acting really flamboyantly
to this because i know any good actor will remain in character physically as well as
verbally when they're doing this and i can just really see it also it's a really lovely change for
helena to be playing a really mothering character you know she is a mother herself normally she
plays these characters which are unsuitable for her children to watch you know i kind of hope her
children haven't seen sweeney todd um or obviously harry potter they probably have seen harry potter
well the oldest probably has anyway really lovely is here playing well here we're playing this
really lovely modern character and her voice is just so soothing and so soft and it's absolutely
perfect for it casting is sensational plot is great in this it's just perfect in every way
as i said genuinely didn't think i was gonna like it but i watched it and i was like wow
i absolutely love this so perfect all around yeah do you go and watch them they are sensational you
will love them i promise you please feel free to leave comments and i'll see you all next time bye