A secret agent ruffles feathers in the espionage world when he is accidentally transformed into a pigeon in this entertaining family adventure
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Disney acquisition of Fox reportedly held up for a year this big new animated family adventure for Christmas: an amiable quasi-bodyswap romp that has in any case been long in development. It was originally inspired by an award-winning animated short back in 2009 from screenwriter and animator Lucas Martell called Pigeon: Impossible, about a pigeon that has apparently got hold of the US president’s “nuclear football”. Now this has evolved into a completely new film by screenwriters Cindy David, Lloyd Copeland and Lloyd Taylor and for which story artist Troy Quane and animator Nick Bruno are jointly making their feature directorial debut.
Will Smith voices Lance Sterling, a supercool spy sporting a tux, a trimmed goatee and an absurdly over-inflated upper body; he’s a suave figure who is an athlete, sophisticate and general warrior in America’s cause. Lance’s underling-slash-helpmeet is the dorky young scientist and tech whiz Walter Beckett (voiced by Tom Holland) who is there to supply the gadgets and generally be the Q to Lance’s Bond. Walter, like the enlightened millennial that he is, is an advocate of non-violent weaponry. He has invented a device that embraces the enemy in a disarming hug, and also a kind of party-popper kitten that explodes in a shower of wondrous sparkles, causing enemies to dissolve into an awestruck disarmed state of gentleness at the loveliness of what they are witnessing.