Watership Down - Movie Review

It amazes me that even in this day and age there are people out there that say animation is just for kids. I guess they haven't watched Castlevania, Sausage Party, Rick and Morty, Bojack Horseman, Grave of the Fireflies, Harley Quinn, Akira, Primal... I could go on and on. I guess to them animation is just Disney, with films such as Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, The Little Mermaid, Beauty and Beast, and Peter Pan. They're stuck in this old era of animated films and haven't realized that animation is no longer (and never was just) for kids. Plus they don't realize there were some hidden darker elements in those stories. However, there was an animated film released in 1978 that traumatized children, a film with blood and gore and some dark themes and moments. In 2016 it was shown on Easter Sunday in the UK and it once more shocked people into silence. That film is Watership Down.

Watership Down is the story adapt from a book of the same name by Richard Adams. It begins with Hazel, a rabbit who after hearing apocalyptic prophecies from his younger brother, Fiver, decides to leave his home with some of his fellow rabbits for a new, safer life. As they travel they face a number of dangers until they final reach the place Fiver foresaw as their new home. But the dangers are not over yet as the discovery of another massive warren of rabbits puts them all in danger. They must survive the dangers of humans, predators, and other, less friendly rabbits in order to keep their home and their lives.

Now you might think a story about rabbits is going to be sweet and cuddle. Nope... Absolutely not this one. He didn't want to make a story for children, but a story for anyone who wants to experience it for themselves and when I went through the story it never felt like I was being talked down to. Even some incredible fictional works like The Lord of the Rings have had some padding of sorts like this. George R. R. Martin, the man behind Game of Thrones/ A Story of Ice and Fire, has commented that Tolkien should have left Gandalf dead instead of resurrecting him and while I love Gandalf I can understand his comment because that's a powerful moment and him coming back kind of ruins an epic sacrifice. Also, watching the Lord of the Rings films now I can see a few instances of a "safety net," like how Frodo keeps getting stabbed and it never kills him. That's not to say I don't like Lord of the Rings now, I'll always love them with all my heart and appreciate their effects on cinema and literature. But having gone through the book and the 1978 movie of Watership Down, I see that Adams wanted to make something really strong and impactful.

I'm not saying that everything in Watership Down is gloom and doom. The story has plenty of lighthearted moments, but they're mixed in very well with the dark stuff like a proper story should. I felt the stakes of the rabbits losing any of their friends because not only were they cute, little rabbits, but they had difficult goals in mind and big consequences should they fail. It felt like a epic journey with ups and downs to it. Saying that though I feel that the movie feels pretty condensed with it comes to story. The book had a lot more to it and a lot of characters and side elements were left out. It was condensed very well in my opinion and kept the tone of the book, but I would have liked a little more time to the film in order to make the story a little more smoothly. Even so, I was glad to see some happy moments, like Hazel and his group finally reaching Watership Down and their interactions with a gull named Kehaar.

Going deeper into it, Watership Down is kind of a survival/ war story where we replace humans with rabbits. Richard Adams did fight in World War II and has admitted that some of the characters in his story are based around some of the people he met during his time in service. Their homes, or warrens, have somewhat of a military structure to them with officers and a commander keeping everything in order. We can go further with this with the rabbits crossing the lands to find a new home in a similar danger as real soldiers crossing land and watching out for any threats. They're always scared, no matter where they are, because danger for them is always about. That there is the real fear that Watership Down gives off, not just those moments of absolute terror that at times made me pale, but have that ever present danger keeping me on my toes. Adams presents the lives of animals as their eyes and how most humans don't really care about them or see them as something to just tread on or over, similar to the moment I'll be talking about very soon.

Richard Adams has admitted as well that he never intended to throw in any deeper meanings to his story, but I either call bullcrap or that he unintentionally did so because there's a lot of meanings you can get out of Watership Down, whether its from the book or the movie. I'm personally going with the latter because he is similar to Tolkien in many ways, giving us a very entertaining story on its own that we can derive more from. I will say though there's a lot of use of mythology (that the rabbits have) used to create courage among them, with religious figures such as El-ahrairah, the prince of rabbits who tricks other animals in order to survive, as well as Frith, the God-figure that rabbits believe created world and all life, and Black Rabbit of Inlé, a grim reaper type to all rabbits. Some of the living characters, the ones we follow, throughout the story perform deed that will make them legends themselves to their people, leaving powerful legacies behind that inspire the next generations of rabbits.

Now as an adult I have seen some scary stuff throughout life and other films, so the movie wasn't as scary as I was expecting and it probably would have been more effective on me when I was younger. But even so I did get chills from some horrifying imagery. For instance we find out that the warren that Hazel, Fiver, and the rest used to live at was buried by construction work from humans and see the tunnels get filled in. To add onto that we see that the workers pumped gas into the burrows as well, suffocating the remaining rabbits with dirt and poison. It's all shown to us and just thinking about that scene makes me shiver. The humans in the film, as well as most humans in real life, don't really care about the wild animals unless they bother us. And when that happens... most often we stomp them out. The thought of that is just... it makes me horrified of myself. We also see rabbits being straggled and choking on their own blood, animals tear each other apart with claws and teeth, and horrifying visions of dangers to come from Fiver.

This leads me to the art style and animation of the film. When I first started watching the film I said to myself, "Wow, these guys are giving Disney a run for their money." After finishing the film I can't really say that for the character animations, but absolutely for the backgrounds. They look stunning and incredible to view, like a bunch of professional painters making scenes for an art exhibit. As for the characters, they're pretty close to what Disney levels of animation for that time period or a bit earlier. They do stick out a little in the background, but they look so much like realistic rabbits that I just absolutely cared for them. Saying that though most of the rabbits were hard to distinguish from one another because most of them looked the same. Some, like Bigwig, I could always recognize because of the odd ruff of fur on his head, Fiver was smaller and scrawnier than the other rabbits, and General Woundwort... he's impossible to get wrong with his terrifying appearance. But most of the others looked too similar and I didn't get to know them that well.

Another reason why I decided to watch this film is John Hurt. I love John Hurt, he was an incredible actor in films when he was alive. Alien, Hellboy, V for Vendetta, he was just epic! And in Watership Down he voices the main character, Hazel, and puts on a great performance. All the actors were great in the film, putting on strong performances with lots of emotion and feeling. However, while I thought the audio and the acting was great, there was a similar problem with the character designs in that they all sounded similar to one another. Maybe it was because most of them were British or I didn't get to know the characters as much so they all felt the same. I'm kind of caught in the middle on this subject because again I liked the performances, but I'm also in conflict because most sounded very similar to one another.

Watership Down, while animated, is not for little kiddies. There is some horrifying moments throughout the film and some deeper moments throughout it and if you throw your kid in front of this movie without checking it out first you're a terrible parent. It's not all dark and evil, it's got some bright moments as well, but overall anybody younger who is going to watch this film should be given a warning. Saying that, the film shouldn't be feared for those dark moments, but embraced because it's excellent example of "The Hero's Journey," with trials and conflicts and the meetings of new friends and enemies. It's a film you'll remember not just for how scary it can get, but how much it tells a great, impacting story.

Tentative Score: 7.75/10

Definitive Score: 7.5/10

So just as I finished writing this I found out that beyond the CGI Netflix version of Watership Down there was was TV shows based on the book. Maybe one day... But not today.