I have recently taken up reading more. It takes me away from scrolling on my phone, and to be honest, it has made me feel a whole lot better about myself. One of the books I read was George Orwell’s immortal Animal Farm. Written in 1945, it was an allegory of Stalinism set on a farm where the animals take over, but it just shows that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. It was interesting to see that Andy Serkis, the man who brought life to Gollum and the Planet of the Apes movies, was bringing the story back for a new generation. Yet this animated feature looks like Animal Farm only in name and in basic plot because it has been sanitised for a multiplex audience and all political ideas removed for a sickeningly cute movie that relies on fart jokes.

Escaping being taken to the slaughter house, the animals on a farm decide to run the place themselves, with Snowball, a pig, taking charge, and setting up rules that would bring equality to all the animals, Yet, Neopleon, an fellow pig, thinks that the whole idea is removing the best life for himself and his fellow creatures and once he has banished Snowball, the power he has goes to his head and the farm start a slow desent into anarcy among the other animals.

If you know anything about Orwell’s book, you will know that this was written at the end of World War II and captures a time when the world could have been taken over by Communism and was a satire of how power can change people for the worse. In fact, as I was reading it, it became increasingly obvious that it was relevant to events happening in the world today. Having Serkis and writer Nicholas Stoller, whose past writing credits include The Muppets and Bros, take the book for a new adaptation, you would have thought it could be a chance to introduce the ideas to a fresh audience in the hope of seeing that what is going on now is just like things were back in 1945.

Instead, what we get is a skeleton frame of the original story, removing any of the satire and strength of the ideas, and replacing them with characters that feel forced, cute chicks, slapstick, and, worse of all, an ending that is so moralising it would make Disney feel sick.

The animation looks cheap and is as far removed from something that Pixar or Disney would produce, with the humans looking like they were rejects from the original Toy Story. The animals do not have redeemable features to really tell them apart, so when watching the pigs, for example, you wonder which one is which. There is a mild attempt to modernise the tale, and it includes a warning about consumerism, but, to be quite frank, this makes life even more confusing. Who is the film aimed at? It has the basics for a kids’ Saturday matinee piece, but then tries to shoehorn in subject matter that kids would care about and wouldn’t mind the dangers of buying the latest gadgets.

It has a very impressive voice cast, but only Woody Harrelson as the workhorse Boxer seems to be the one who works. Seth Rogen, so good in The Invite, is totally miscast as Napoleon, and you wait for the moment he suggests the pigs should go off and smoke some weed. Glenn Close tries to go wicked queen as the businesswoman Frieda Pilkington, although her animated character looks like a skeleton, and while it was nice to see Kathleen Turner’s name on the credits, the sultry deep tones of her voice have sadly gone.

Animal Farm is a disaster. A family film that doesn’t feel right for a family, that removes everything that made the book so great, and an ending that is wrong in all the wrong ways. The poster tells us it’s a cautionary tale. The caution is to stay away. George Orwell isn’t just turning in his grave; he’s banging to let him out!

1 out of 5

Director: Andy Serkis

Starring: Seth Rogen, Gaten Matarazzo, Glenn Close, Steve Buscemi, Woody Harrelson, Kathleen Turner, Andy Serkis, Laverne Cox, Kieran Culkin, Jim Parsons, Iman Vellani

Written by: Nicholas Stoller and (based on the book) George Orwell

Running Time: 95 mins

Cert: PG

Release date: 24th July 2026