The Big Bad Fox and Other Tales...

The Big Bad Fox and Other Tales…
File:The Big Bad Fox and Other Tales.png Film poster
French	Le Grand Méchant Renard et autres contes…
Directed by	Benjamin Renner Patrick Imbert
Screenplay by	Benjamin Renner Jean Regnaud
Based on	The Big Bad Fox and A Baby to Deliver by Benjamin Renner
Produced by	Didier Brunner Vincent Tavier
Starring	Guillaume Darnault Damien Witecka Kamel Abdessadok Antoine Schoumsky Céline Ronté
Edited by	Benjamin Massoubre
Music by	Robert Marcel Lepage
Production companies	Folivari Panique! Production
Distributed by	StudioCanal
Release dates	15 June 2017 (2017-06-15) (Annecy) 21 June 2017 (2017-06-21) (France)
Running time	83 minutes
Countries	France Belgium
Language	French
Budget	$3 million
Box office	$9.6 million

The Big Bad Fox and Other Tales… (Template:Lang-fr) is a 2017 French/Belgian animated anthology comedy film directed by Benjamin Renner and Patrick Imbert, adapted from Renner's own comic books The Big Bad Fox and Un bébé à livrer. Originally conceived as half-hour TV specials, the three segments are linked together by a frame narrative.

The film premiered at the Annecy International Animated Film Festival on 15 June 2017, and was later released by StudioCanal in France on 21 June.

Plot

The film begins in an theater when a group of animals are preparing a show. The Fox, the host of the show, tells the audience they will tell three different stories. The place that most of the stories are take place is on a French farm led by the own animals. After speaking with the audience, the play begins after they tell the Fox they're ready.

A Baby to Deliver

On the farm, A Stork claims to have a broken wing and leaves a baby that he was to deliver to Avignon, with the name of Pauline, in the hands of a trio of farm animals: a Pig, a Rabbit and a Duck. These last two being immature and clumsy, therefore potentially dangerous for the baby, the Pig tries to compensate for their mistakes so that the little Pauline finds her parents, even if he refuses initially to take care of it. After several clumsy and misunderstanding events, the trio manages to leave Pauline with her family, emotionally saying goodbye to her. Once they get back to the farm, the Pig discovers the Stork was lying to the trio because he's too lazy to do his job. The Pig takes this calmly, just so he can put the stork in a catapult and ejecting him away.

The Big Bad Fox

A Fox who lives in the forest, has a failure time by trying to eat the chickens of the farm, one of them can easily protect herself in a violent way, and he always ended up eating radishes that the Pig always lefts to him. He later takes the advice of the Wolf, of stealing 3 chicken eggs, which he does in the night, and then eat them once they're fat. But the Chicks take him as their mother and he gradually gets attaches to them, to the point of deciding to protect them from the Wolf. The Fox decides to run away to the farm with the Chicks, once he fools the Wolf by eating radishes instead of the Chicks, and takes shelter on the farm by disguising himself as a Chicken. He discovers with horror that the Lead Chicken, whose eggs he stole, has sworn revenge and created a fox extermination club where she trains the other chickens for self-defense. The Fox manages to hide for some time, but he is betrayed by the behavior of his chicks who, persuaded to be foxes, bite their little friends at school and even bring him one (still alive) for dinner. The Fox tries to scold them, but the Chicks, disappointed by his fearful behavior, decide to return to the forest and make the Wolf their new mother. Discovered, the Fox is martyred by the Chickens, as he tries in vain to prevent the danger that runs the Chicks. Thrown out of the farm by explosives, while the Dog tries to convince with the Lead Chicken to help him, the Fox landed in the forest exactly in the arms of the Wolf that was about to eat the chicks. He helps them best and manages to hold the Wolf to the chicks run away. The Lead Chicken, who is the biological mother of the chicks, finally finds them, and after hearing the Wolf's plan, that he told the Fox should had done, she and a group of chickens manages to defeat the Wolf aggressively. The Lead Chicken wants the Chicks to return leaving the Fox heartbroken, but the Chicks, moved, rush to him not to see him leave. The Lead Chicken decides to go in an agreement with the Fox: The Fox continues to see the Chicks regularly and, in exchange, he helps the chickens to train themselves to self-defense against other predators.

We Must Save Christmas

In the farm, the animals prepare for the Christmas festivities. By multiplying nonsense and disasters, the Rabbit and the Duck destroy a plastic Santa, that was hang one in the barn, and they're convinced to have killed the true one. Despite the Pig's explanation, they are thinking of replacing Santa to deliver the gifts to children around the world at night. The Pig tries to stop them but is dragged along with them to the city, then to the pound where the three animals are locked up in the company of a pack of dog-dogs. The cunning and resourcefulness of the three companions, fortunately, allows them to always barely get off the hook, and after some clumsy events, the Rabbit and the Duck see again a Santa clinging to a window sill, but this time it is the real Santa Claus that is in the window sill. They manage to save him, as a reward, Santa takes the trio back in the farm. The next morning, they wake up with presents.

Epilogue

After the three stories, the end credits begin with a return to the stage of all the characters of the film come to greet as in the theater. Various characters appear during the rest of the credits, including a frog sweeper to clean up the scene during the end credits.

Voice cast

Character	French voice actor	English voice actor
Fox	Guillaume Darnault	Giles New
Pork	Damien Witecka	Justin Edwards
Bunny	Kamel Abdessadok	Adrian Edmondson
Duck	Antoine Schoumsky	Bill Bailey
Chicken	Céline Ronté	Celia Imrie
Pauline	Violette Samama	Louie-Loveday O'Brien
Alex	Jules Bienvenu	Alexander Molony
Evan	Augustin Jahn-Sani	Tallulah Conabeare
Wolf	Boris Rehlinger	Matthew Goode
Dog	Guillaume Bouchede	Phill Jupitus
Santa Claus	Jean-Loup Horwitz	Marcel McCalla
Stork	Christophe Lemoine	Phil Whelans

Reception

The film received largely positive reviews from critics. On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, it holds a 97% score based on 30 reviews, with an average rating of 7.34/10. The site's consensus states: "The Big Bad Fox and Other Tales uses its simple, classic animation style to tell a series of equally undemanding - yet utterly beguiling - stories the whole family can enjoy." Metacritic reports a 73 out of 100 rating, based on 4 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".

External links

• Folivari official site
• Panique! Production official site
• The Big Bad Fox and Other Tales... at IMDb
• The Big Bad Fox and Other Tales... at AlloCiné (in French)
• The Big Bad Fox and Other Tales... at Box Office Mojo
• The Big Bad Fox and Other Tales... at Rotten Tomatoes
• The Big Bad Fox and Other Tales... at Metacritic