A Town Called Panic

A Town Called Panic is what it would be like if you were to play with your childhood toys right now. It's about a Horse, a Cowboy, and an Indian who live together in a house in the country, and have a loudmouthed Farmer living next door, and a Policeman down the hill. The film is a Belgium import that plays like an extended Robot Chicken episode on speed. It clocks in at one hour twelve minutes, but contains enough plot for three hours. It is exhausting to watch, because everyone talks so fast and moves so fast, and so much stuff happens in the blink of an eye. I could hardly believe the same movie contained a romance between two horses, a drunken dance sequence, and a trip to the center of the earth. Don't ask how it got there, because I don't remember.

Based on the TV show of the same name, Panic is the work of Stephane Aubier and Vincent Patar, and is animated using those plastic toys that have platforms at their base. It is so wildly imaginative and low-tech, it is revolutionary. In a toss up, I'd rather watch an analog film like this than a glossy computer animated film. There's something fun about almost knowing how they did it.

Panic doesn't have an emotional story to tell, or a story at all, and therefore doesn't compare to Pixar's work, but it's so effortlessly charming and silly, it plays as almost a homemade version of Toy Story told from Andy's perspective. It's available to watch instantly on Netflix. See it. I guarantee at least a dozen laughs.