A Stork's Journey
Orphaned at birth and raised by storks, teenage sparrow Richard believes he is one of them. But when time comes to migrate to Africa, his stork family is forced to reveal his true identity and leave him behind in the forest, since he is not a migratory bird and would not survive the journey. Determined to prove he is a stork after all, Richard ventures south on his own. But only with the help of Olga, an eccentric owl with an imaginary friend and Kiki, a narcissistic, disco-singing parakeet, does he stand a chance to reach his goal and learn to accept who he really is.
CinemaSerf@Geronimo1967
Sparrow “Richard” has been brought up by a family of storks firmly believing that he is one of them, just a bit different. When his family plan to migrate, though, they don’t intend on taking him with them and so the poor wee critter awakens one morning to find mum, dad and brother “Max” have set off and left him behind. Desolate, he sets off after them towards Africa. It’s going to be a tough challenge on his own, but luckily he has his scatty friend “Olga/Oleg” - an owl with a pretend friend, and the self-adoring parakeet “Kiki” who thinks he’s really Donna Summer. Their journey is riddled with dangers but also with opportunities to meet new friends and do some self-discovering along the way. Can he catch up with his family though? Well no, this isn’t really very original nor is there an whole heap of jeopardy as the film progresses, but there are still some fun characters and the disco-bird has a few good lines as it builds to a denouement with a fearsome honey badger. It’s a story about not judging a book by it’s cover and though a bit long and maybe just a bit prone to some (negative) male stereotypes, it’s still quite an enjoyable animation that moves along fine.