Chicken Run - Review.

Ginger's voice is always soft. She uses body language a lot and it shows that she has determination and that she looks positive most of the time, similarly it can show that she is hopeful and caring for others. Her face can change to an annoyed look, as a result of this her brow lowers and her eyes move inwards, but she never looks threatening and her face returns to normal straight away. When Ginger gets worried about the fact that everyone is going to die if they do not escape she folds her arms when she is in the hut, looks quite serious and that she is not upset. From this we can see that the presentational devices influence the audience by making them feel that Ginger is strong and not willing to give up, they can almost feel like they are in the film. Except when she goes outside and up onto the roof of her chicken hut, she puts her head in her hands and sighs. She gets quite frustrated at one point but she softens up straight away. After she comes out of hut seventeen with a brave face she breaks down into tears; this is because she knows better than she lets on. The camera shots are mostly close ups on Ginger's face and this emphasizes the facial expression.

Although Ginger is a non-stereotypical character, by this I mean that she is not the woman that stands back and lets the men do the work but she experiences all the action. Consequently this does not mean she has not got a feminine side, on more than one occasion she sits down and cries to herself. Rocky is seen to affect her emotionally; her emotions are for him are extremely high. He makes her angry at points with his silly ideas and stupid expressions, "I'm a lone free ranger!" when he unexpectedly leaves however, Ginger is brought to her knees and maybe this is what makes her realise her feelings for him. However she still would not let anyone else know.

Mrs. Tweedy has her hands on her hips or behind her back a lot, it shows her big, black boots when she goes into the chicken farm. She rubs her hands together and she is tall and skinny, this shows that she has authority because she towers over everyone.

Her eyes roll back when Mr. Tweedy is talking to her about nothing, she is mean and horrible to everyone, she is always scowling and the animator wants a negative feeling between her and the other characters by using animosity, this shows that everyone on the farm fears her. It also links into the audience reacting in a way that shows they dislike Mrs. Tweedy. Mr. Tweedy is a long-suffering husband at the hands of Mrs. Tweedy and she does not really care about is feelings, "They're only chicken you dolt!"

At the beginning of the film when Mrs. Tweedy opens the front door, light floods into Ginger's face and shows she is scared. This use of light gives emphasis onto the facial expressions and feelings of Ginger. Mrs. Tweedy's costume and all of her characteristics are gloomy greys, blacks and browns showing the watcher that she is foul. When Ginger discovers the truth about Rocky, she walks outside to show the others of her findings. As she does so, the weather changes from sunny and warm to dark and stormy, the chickens expressions change at the same time as they realise Ginger has bad news. This is a pathetic fallacy, when the weather imitates the character feelings. The audience can also see pathetic fallacy when Ginger has her head in her hands on top of her hut; the clouds and sky are dark and this is mirroring Ginger's feelings. When the 'chicken pie' machine gets broken Ginger and Rocky are running for their lives trying to get away from the danger. This danger is shown in the setting when the audience sees a medium close up shot of both Rocky and Ginger while they run through the machine with lots of clogs chasing after them and nuts and bolts shooting across in front of them. The music is fast and loud and the lighting is red, flashing lights.

Throughout the film tension is built up around Ginger. It starts off with the dogs in the very first scene; it is a dark night and Mr. Tweedy has set his dogs on her. Heavy panting can be heard and close ups of Ginger are shown of her behind the barbed wire and the padlock on the fence to show how she is trapped; building up the fear and tension; the need to escape. From this the audience can see that Ginger is a good character because she is the character the tension is built up around her and the audience hopes that she will get through safely. However from when the audience first sees Mrs. Tweedy they can see she is evil because negative things surround her. Also at the beginning the audience sees a close up of Ginger's feet sneaking around the hut and then a medium shot of her cautiously looking round for danger. The audience always sees Mrs. Tweedy always in a low angle shot and this shows us that she is an over-ruling character. Near to the end when Mrs. Tweedy falls in the 'chicken pie' machine one can argue that Mr. Tweedy does not save Mrs. Tweedy because either he realises she got a taste of her own medicine or that her was afraid that she would blame him. At the end when all the chickens are free the sun comes up and the audience can see a medium close up of Ginger and she is pleased.

The filmmakers use anthropomorphism with the chickens, this means that they look similar to and act like humans. This helps the audience a lot because if they acted like chickens without props they would not really know what the characters were like. The filmmakers also depersonalize Mrs. Tweedy by making her dislike everyone and everything, she also has a negative feeling around her all the time, this is called animosity.

The filmmakers do not just use the character's speech and the plot to show what the characters are like; they use everything from facial expression to the movement of feet. The filmmakers use the character's looks and how they act and react. Also the settings help to see who is evil and who is good. In conclusion to this we can see that Ginger is the good character and Mrs. Tweedy is the evil character in the film.