Barnyard is a freaking anomaly. It's almost indescribable how strange this movie gets with the number of odd decisions taken. From the obvious biological mistake of male cows having utters to having the humans look like the worst possible things you could imagine. The animation has aged like milk, the color palette is either obnoxiously bright or blindingly dark, and, yea, the farm animals look really ugly and their expressions are hard to read at times.
But the weirdest thing about this movie is that the story isn't really that bad. Otis is a surprisingly fleshed out character with a character arc with wants and needs. His need to become a better leader like his stoic (adoptive?) father and being pulled by the want of remaining a party animal. But the movie manages to undermine its own story's potential by having mood whiplashes like a slap in the face with a fish at a funeral. The comedy is hit-or-miss, the animation feels frantic at times, and the voice acting ranges wildly from good (Sam Elliot is a god amongst men) to irritating (Otis, as three-dimensional he can be, is let down by Kevin James' annoying performance and inability to take things seriously).
Barnyard's own Story raises the movie out of mediocrity, but because everything else is sloppy, it only raises the film into just okay territory.
5/10 (could've been 6/10 if not for the male cow utters)
But the weirdest thing about this movie is that the story isn't really that bad. Otis is a surprisingly fleshed out character with a character arc with wants and needs. His need to become a better leader like his stoic (adoptive?) father and being pulled by the want of remaining a party animal. But the movie manages to undermine its own story's potential by having mood whiplashes like a slap in the face with a fish at a funeral. The comedy is hit-or-miss, the animation feels frantic at times, and the voice acting ranges wildly from good (Sam Elliot is a god amongst men) to irritating (Otis, as three-dimensional he can be, is let down by Kevin James' annoying performance and inability to take things seriously).
Barnyard's own Story raises the movie out of mediocrity, but because everything else is sloppy, it only raises the film into just okay territory.
5/10 (could've been 6/10 if not for the male cow utters)