Horton Hears a Who: A-

In Horton Hears a Who, the story is simple. Horton (Jim Carrey) is an elephant in the Jungle of Nool. One day, as he's heading out for a morning swim, a small speck floats by (how the speck came to be there opens the film, in a gorgeously animated sequence), and Horton, well, hears a Who calling for help on the speck. Actually, he hears a small squeak, but it's enough for him - a compassionate, imaginative creature - to realize there must be a whole city on that tiny mote and that they need to be saved. Thus, 87 minutes must follow as we watch the elephant struggle to bring the speck (placed securely on a purple dandelion flower-thing) to a safe place atop a faraway mountain. There are only a few small problems, and they reside with the Sour Kangaroo (Carol Burnett) and her posse of oddly surbanite-esque close-minded followers, who believe that believing in a speck with life is tantamount to anarachy, and so plot to thwart Horton at every turn.

The moral's benign. Because, obviously, Horton succeeds in saving Who-ville (A town which would later pop up in an earlier live-action adaptation of a Dr. Suess classic, How the Grinch Stole Christmas, with far less pizazz.) But the fact that he does so, and proves to the entire jungle that "a person's a person, no matter how small," powers this animated gem, giving it a healthy dose of winning schmaltz to go with its ADD-influenced, self-effacing, sly wit. But just who are the engines powering the characteristics that so power Horton to success? Why the cast and crew, of course! Directors Jimmy Hayward & Steve Martino seem, on paper, far more capable of making a good movie than writers Ken Daurio & Cinco Paul; after all, the former pair have either had a hand in great Pixar films (Finding Nemo) or comedy masterpieces (Monty Python and the Quest for the Holy Grail), while the latter couple has to their name the screenplay to Bubble Boy. Eww. But no matter the reason, however odd it sounds, the quartet blend seamlessly, working in equal measure to create a fizzy spring treat.

The characters are crazy. When you get right down to it, stripping away the pretty-awesome, reverentially-Suess-y animation, you've got a hellzapoppin comedy starring Steve Carrell, as the Who-ville mayor, and Jim Carrey. The evidence to this is there staring you in the face the entire running-time: the patented-Carrey mannerisms (e.g. vocal impersonations, crazy physical ticks even a personified elephant would rarely want to attempt), the wacky second-bananas (Katie, voice intermittently by Joey King, is a whole spectacle by herself), the screwball plot. And as such a comedy, Horton would have succeeded just fine. But as an animated film (courtesy of animation house Blue Sky, the group behind the Ice Age flicks), it's even better. Why? Perhaps because the characters are so crazy, and their voice actors take their tics and personalities so sincerely over-the-top, hitting every punchline. Or maybe it's the script, which pops and crackles with a modern sensibility about reviving a beloved-classic to any audience, age or gender. Or maybe it's a mixture of both being tossed into one frame and slathered with gorgeous CGI.

The result? Divine. It sounds cliche, and inevitably you'll realize it is, but seeing Horton Hears a Who, you'll laugh, you'll be moved, and you'll wonder how on earth a studio that isn't Pixar could make a flick that's wholly animated wholly not-suck. It isn't on the same level of Finding Nemo and The Incredibles, in terms of cohesive storytelling vision (because, let's face it, the structure here is slender no matter how you beef it up with subplots). But Horton has a charming sense of its own self-deprecation (used most hilariously in service of spoofing its own multi-media format), several punchlines any comedy would die to have, and two or three (or four) performances from two or three (or four) great actors that elevate a moral fable into a great romp, and a perfect heir to the Suess throne. Now when can we expect their take on Oh, the Places You'll Go!?