Film: Paws of Fury: The legend of Hank
Cast (voices): Michael Cera, Samuel L. Jackson, Ricky Gervais, Kylie Kuioka, Mel Brooks, George Takei, Gabriel Iglesias, Djimon Hounsou, Aasif Mandvi, Cathy Shim,
Director: Rob Minkoff, Chris Bailey, Mark Koetsier
Rating: 2/5
Runtime: 97 minutes

In Paramount’s latest kiddie flick, a hapless canine hound Hank (Michael Cera) is recruited to protect a village of hostile cats, Kakamucho from being destroyed by the evil feline Ika Chu (Ricky Gervais), in this animated reimagining of Mel Brooks 1974 classic 'Blazing Saddles' which also had the late Richard Pryor in its writing credits. Hank gets a reluctant teacher Jimbo (Samuel L. Jackson), a samurai who’s seen better days, to train him to assume the role of town samurai and team up with the cat villagers to save the day. The animated characters here are voiced by leading lights of Hollywood including Samuel L. Jackson, Michelle Yeoh, Michael Cera, and Ricky Gervais. Even Mel Brooks shows up voicing a Shogun proclaiming, “It’s good to be the Shogun!”

Notwithstanding that, the self-referencing dialogues even cue in training montage sequences and indicate the overall runtime. Creativity appears to have lost its way somewhere in the middle here. All indications that this is a silly childish film are visible in the antics, the plotting, and the dialogue. For kids the lure will certainly be the strong resemblance to the Kung-fu Panda franchise while adults might just be a mite entertained by gags themed around pop-culture. Vulgar toilet humour adds ribaldry to the narrative and are bound to score some laughs at least. The animation attempts to marry the aesthetic of the Western with that of the classic martial arts movie but it doesn’t feel like a forever thing.