A flock of sheep try to solve the murder of their shepherd in this fun family film.
By: Craig Allan
Three and a Half Stars. See it.
Detective mysteries are a tried-and-true genre in fiction, with hero detectives like Sherlock Holmes and François Perot coming in and solving crimes with expert skill. But what if the detectives knew everything about how to solve a crime but little about the world where the crime took place? That is the problem facing the protagonists in The Sheep Detectives (SD). In this movie, the detectives are not a knowledgeable genius or a moustachioed sleuth, but a herd of sheep, trained on detective novels by their shepherd, George Hardy (Hugh Jackman). Despite its outlandish premise, SD has a lot of comedy and pulls a surprising amount of emotion out of these fluffy private investigators. The stacked voice cast is complemented by a talented live-action cast who plays this absurd material with surprising seriousness, making SD a fun mystery that succeeds by subverting the genre.
The sheep in this film are adept at solving this crime, but they have no idea how the world works. This film is what you would imagine a Sherlock Holmes novel would be if Sherlock were agoraphobic for his whole life. The sheep have the mind and resources to figure out who killed their shepherd, but they donât understand the outside world. They are perplexed by ground that isnât grass and canât understand concepts like death and God. This makes for an entertaining film because the sheep are limited by their sheltered upbringing, and the townspeople, especially the inept police officer Tim Derry (Nicholas Braun), are completely incapable of solving a crime this advanced.
The movie also plays on the nature of sheep, which makes for some really emotional moments, including the sheepâs ability to forget things. This is helped by the voice cast, which consists of stars like Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Bryan Cranston, and Patrick Stewart, among others, who manage to give a heart and soul to these hoofed heroes, giving them unique personalities that get past the fact that all the sheep are CGI-rendered. Other moments, like the shunning of a âWinter Lambâ and a pair of rams, Reggie and Ronnie (both voiced by Brett Goldstein), who love to bash things, make SD a film as cozy as wool that will have the family laughing and bleating like sheep.
The film is also supported by a great live-action cast, including Molly Gordon as Rebecca Hampstead, Georgeâs long-lost daughter; Nicholas Galitzine as Elliot Matthews, a reporter; and Emma Thompson as Lydia Harbottle, Georgeâs lawyer. The highlight of these is Braunâs aloof performance as the clueless police officer Tim. Timâs antics include hitting on Rebecca and needing to be shepherded to every piece of evidence and discovery in a delightful reversal of roles between man and sheep, much to the audience’s delight. His aloofness aptly represents the fictional small town of Denbrook, Britain, where locals hold a sparse cultural fare of just a couple of tables displaying how the movie Return to Oz (1985) was filmed nearby, a joke that got a hardy laugh from this reviewer.
The film does not work in all respects. The editing canât quite keep pace with the story, making the movie feel a little slow at times. Also, solving the mystery might go over the heads of the younger viewers due to its detailed nature. The movie also falls into the problem with mystery movies where some characters, whom I wonât name to avoid spoilers, are really just there to do one thing, or be set up as a quick red herring without any development.
Live-action movies with talking animals have gone out of style in recent years, and while SD isnât technically a live-action animal movie because all the sheep are CGI, it is still a return to form for this kind of movie. SD offers a lot more than a sheep with a magnifying glass. It is a fun mystery with a solid reveal that sheds conventions and offers some emotional heft with a lot of laughs. Donât forget to see this in theatres.
