Postman Pat: The Movie (2014) Stephen Mangan, Jim Broadbent, Rupert Grint, David Tennant, Ronan Keating Movie Review

Postman Pat: The Movie (2014)   2/52/52/52/52/5


Postman Pat: The Movie (2014)

This Postman Doesn't Deliver

Postman Pat is still popular as ever with everyone in Greendale from the older residents such as Mrs. Goggins to the children who are friends with his own. But at the sorting office things are changing and Pat finds that a new boss has cancelled all the bonuses which is not good as Pat had planned on using the bonus to take his wife on a late honeymoon to Italy. Still wanting to make her dreams come true Pat discovers a talent show hosted, directed, produced and filmed by Simon Cowbell is coming to Greendale and the winner will not only receive a recording contract but also a holiday to Italy and so the cheerful Postman decides to enter the competition as a singing postman.

I honestly can't remember when I last watched any "Postman Pat" and to be honest when in 1981 it first aired on the BBC I was just at the age where I was growing out of this sort of thing. But you don't really need to be a huge "Postman Pat" fan to understand what the old animated series was all about and what made it work for its young audience. Unfortunately those who decided to turn "Postman Pat" into a movie seemed to think they could forget all that made the old series so right and bring Pat into a real world of sorts with him entering a TV talent show. I suppose the intention was to turn "Postman Pat: The Movie" into entertainment for those who had grown up on Pat and were now at that age where they enjoyed TV singing competitions but it was wrong because it took the original charm out of it as we watch celebrity going to Pat's head whilst a nefarious business man tries to replace Pat with a robot.

The thing is that when you ignore the mistake of the storyline the other bits actually work with some enjoyable animation work which has more than a touch of the "Tetley Tea Folk" about it and enjoyable voice work with Stephen Mangan doing a nice job as Pat. In fact the whole Simon Cowbell side of the movie with him being egotistical and mean is amusing as well. But all the work on the animation and characters is lost because the storyline is simply wrong for the character.

What this all boils down to is that "Postman Pat: The Movie" ends up misguided as it takes almost everything which made the old animation so popular and then replaces it with a contemporary storyline which feels out of place.

Tags: British TV Shows & Their Movies


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