Wolfy – The Incredible Secret (2015)
Directors: Gregoire Tollatoroff, Eric Omand
English voices: various unknowns
Studio: Canal+ /Random Media/Cinedigm RM4606 [3/17/15]
Video: 16:9 color
Audio: English DD 5.1
Length: 80 minutes
Rating: ****
This film – a French-Belgian effort – won the Cesar Award for Best Animated Film, the highest film honor in France, and deserves it. It is most enjoyable generally simple-looking hand drawings, and it does keep its secrets until the very end, making a fine family film with a good message.
Wolfy is a wolf, or it least he thinks he is, although he has given up the carnivoress character of wolves. His best friend is Tom the rabbit. Wolfy thought he was an orphan, but learns from a crow (who turns into a gypsy fortune-teller) that his mother is still alive. So the two friends set off in a big red sports car that suddenly appears to fine her in Wolfenberg – the Land of Wolves.
The arrival seems at first shaded with problems, and they eventually learn they have come in the middle of the Carne Festival, which is an annual gathering of the world’s best-known carnivores, and they both may end up as the main dishes. There’s a lot of palaver with the main ruling wolf and his back-scratcher, a cute red fox. Wolfy is made to think that he has been accepted as the successor to the ruling wolf when actually he is being fooled and both him and Tom may be eaten. In the end a big secret about his birth if revealed and all the bad guys get theirs.
The English voices are all terrific, and the one for Tom the rabbit is hilarious, sounding just a bit like Billy Crystal. The music is also appropriate, and this will be a special kick for the non-meat-eaters in the audience.
—John Sunier
