Channel:
BBC/ Amazon Prime
Running
Time: 30 minutes
Date:
1993
 |
| Britain's only hope. |
Premise:
Wallace is a man, and Gromit is a beagle. But you knew that already. Apart from
the beagle bit, perhaps, because I always just classified Gromit as 'dog'. This
is the Oscar-winning instalment two of the Wallace and Gromit series, following
the Oscar-nominated A Grand Day Out
(1989). There is no prior knowledge needed to enjoy this one, however, with
only the spaceship models on the wall serving as a visual reminder of
continuity. They live in Wigan, but essentially it's generic Lancashire, or,
for those of you from south of say, Lancashire, it's 'The North'. Running up large debts, Wallace is forced to
take in a lodger, at the same time Gromit gets some Techno-Trousers for his
birthday, allowing automated walkies and vacuum-feet for walking up walls. The
lodger is a sinister penguin, who drives a wedge between Gromit and Wallace -
commandeering Gromit's cosy bedroom, sycophantically fetching Wallace's
slippers and newspaper, and leaving his music on till the late hours,
disturbing Gromit's sleep. Gromit leaves home, tearfully.
 |
| Trousers - not yet the wrong ones. |
The second act sees the melodrama turn to
crime-thriller, as you probably already know, but if you don't, I'll just say
'diamond heist', 'modified helmet' (lol) and 'train chase', and you know
enough. Of course, the most wonderful aspect of this film is that it was shot
using stop-motion animation, which involves 24 separate frames being shot for
each second of animation. An interesting comparison is that of Paw Patrol,
where this ratio is reversed, and it takes one second of cerebral activity to
create 24 episodes.
Before the franchise really took off, this
is a reminder of the more humble origins of the duo - the convoluted inventions
of Wallace extend no further than the bed-tipping machine, utilised in a
perfect rule-of-three across the course of the story, whilst the final line is
a perfect come-down from the chaos of the train chase: "Ooh, I
do like a bit
of Gorgonzola" - a resolution as perfect
as "I think
this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship" or
HYPERLINK "https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_WkyalPOEI" "Tomorrow is another day!"
 |
| The eponymous trousers: reprise. |
Background: The
story of The Wrong Trousers is really
the story of Nick Park, the creator of the duo and director of this film. He
spent seven years bringing Wallace and Gromit to the small screen in their
first adventure; A Grand Day Out was
only beaten by Creature Comforts to
the Best Animated Short Academy Award, which was another Nick Park creation,
and from the same studios: Aardman Animations.
The difference between the first and second offerings are stark: A Grand Day Out is noticeably rougher
around the edges - fingerprints on clay, jumpier animation - but no worse off
for it. But The Wrong Trousers has
the mark of a big studio, higher production values, and a bigger staff.
 |
| The original, and clearly wrong, Wallace and Gromit. |
If you are familiar with the stories that
Courtney Cox and Jennifer Aniston were originally going to play each others'
roles in Friends, as were John Le
Mesurier and Arthur Lowe in Dad's Army,
then you'll not be shocked to hear that Wallace and Gromit similarly evolved
from a rather different conception. Wallace might have been called Jerry, and
had a moustache; Gromit might have been a cat, and even when he became a dog,
he might have been voiced. Even the smallest factors altered integral parts of
the W&G aesthetic, as Park describes: "When Peter Sallis, who voices Wallace, said "No
cheeeese, Gromit" for the first time, I realised how wide and toothy I was
going to have to make Wallace's mouth."
For the iconic train chase, Park explains
the methodology, in a quotation worth repeating in full:
"The train chase is something I'd never
seen done before in stopframe animation. None of us knew how to do it – or even
if it could work. In Tom and Jerry chases, you used to get the background
whizzing by and repeating itself, so we tried the same. We built a 20ft long living
room wall, 2ft high, and fixed the camera to the train, and filmed on a long
shutter speed so the background looked blurry. It was quite a feat."
 |
| Something to do with shutter speeds makes this frame very clever. |
Quite a feat indeed, Mr Park. There is an interview with
Aardman's co-founder David Sproxton where he explains this in a bit more detail
- I don't understand a lot of it, but, as with everything W&G related, it
is wonderful to hear passionate people talk passionately about how they make
wonderful things.
It is held in such high esteem that it is
one of only three films made in 1993 to get a 100% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes,
and came 18th in the BFI list of the best British TV programmes ever. Ever. Above The World At War, for heaven's sake.
Entertainment: It is tempting (and accurate) to class The Wrong Trousers as the zenith of the
Wallace and Gromit series; although the train chase is the headline-grabber,
other aspects of the story fly under the radar: Gromit's stalking of Feathers
McGraw is pitched perfectly with terrific shadow work, and music by Julian Nott
(more of which anon).
The comedy is also spectacular, and
largely comes about not through Peter Sallis's tour de force as the only
speaking actor, but in Gromit's eyebrow work, and his occasional forlorn looks
to the camera. The dismissive look he gives Wallace after he asks, innocently
enough, 'how were the Techno-Trousers?', is worth an acting Oscar in itself,
and working with teenagers for a living, I know all about dismissive eyebrows.
The fourth wall breaking, which could jar, is nice and subtle, and makes the
audience see everything through his eyes to an extent.
 |
| Eyebrows: Underrated. Unless you're a teenaged girl, in which case they are overrated. |
It is, perhaps, a little bit unfair to
make comparisons with mass-market, mass-production television, but I'm going to
anyway. The appeal of television such as W&G is the fact that you can see
the fingerprints on the plasticine, literally and metaphorically. A number of
people put their heart and soul into this work, a lot of the time not even
knowing how or whether it would work. A classic example of a group of people
working for the love of their craft rather than for money or prestige, but
ending up with a stonking great pile of both anyway.
 |
| Nick Park with animator Steve Box: tiny men with normal-sized bow ties. |
Ratings:
Sex:
The first two episodes of W&G are short on romance, which is possibly why
they work a little better than the subsequent two. Although it's nice to see
that Gromit isn't entirely disinterested in the charming Fluffles in A Matter of Loaf and Death, it's a bit
weird, and I don't think anyone's favourite part of A Close Shave was Wendoline. So, aside from Wallace's spotty boxer
shorts, nothing to see here. (1/10)
Music: A
massive triumph. The theme is one of the most uplifting sounds in existence, and the fact that my two-year old sings it is a massive bonus. You can access the full suite here,
and the main theme is familiar to everyone, but the train chase is
a masterpiece from start to finish.
Julian Nott returns to add to his work from A Grand Day Out, and it seems a bit of a shame that he is not more
of a household name. He shouldn't be short of a few bob, though, having penned
the massively successful Peppa Pig theme, too. (10/10)
Plausibility:
Part of the reason W&G resonate so much with viewers is their ordinariness,
rather than their extraordinariness. Cheese, tea, knitting, tinkering: these
are some of the most 'British' signifiers you can mention before you start
sounding like a Nigel Farage stream-of-consciousness (this blog is assuming
Wallace voted for Brexit, Gromit to Remain). Although the plot itself is quite
dramatic, there is a pleasingly nostalgic feel to the exterior shots -
red-brick terraces, old metal dustbins and such - and the familiarity of Peter
Sallis's voice from decades of The Last
of the Summer Wine adds a comforting reassurance. Pleasingly high levels of
verisimilitude for a show with an anthropomorphic dog and penguin. (6/10)
Education:
Tricky. Objectively, there is actually the worrying lesson that you are right
to be suspicious of shadowy strangers entering your neighbourhood, and you half
expect Wallace and Gromit to turn to the camera at the end and say "No
more 'lodgers'! They're more trouble than they're worth! Vote UKIP."
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| 'Lodgers': more trouble than they're worth. |
As for
the Rube-Goldberg machine - Wallace's alarm clock bed is taken to extreme and
unnecessary elaboration in A Close Shave
and A Matter of Loaf and Death - but
you only need to look at this guy to see that there are always people in this world
who are going to be inspired to be as silly as possible for the minimum
pay-off. (6/10)
 |
| A prototype from the Cameron government to try and prise benefits claimants from their beds. |
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