stop-motion animated
Stop-motion (also known as stop frame animation) is an animated filmmaking and special effects technique in which objects are physically manipulated in small increments between individually photographed frames so that they will appear to exhib ...
short film
A short film is a film with a low running time. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) defines a short film as "an original motion picture that has a running time of not more than 40 minutes including all credits". Other film o ...
produced by
Aardman Animations
Aardman Animations Limited, known simply as Aardman, is a British animation studio based in Bristol, England, United Kingdom. It is known for films and television series made using stop motion and clay animation techniques, particularly those fe ...
. Directed by
Nick Park
Nicholas Wulstan Park (born 6 December 1958) is an English filmmaker and animator who created '' Wallace & Gromit'', '' Creature Comforts'', '' Chicken Run'', '' Shaun the Sheep'', and '' Early Man''. Park has been nominated for an Academy ...
and written by Park and Bob Baker, it is the third installment in the ''
Wallace & Gromit
''Wallace & Gromit'' is a British claymation comedy franchise created by Nick Park and produced by Aardman Animations. The series centres on Wallace, a good-natured, eccentric, cheese-loving bachelor inventor, and Gromit, his loyal and intell ...
The Wrong Trousers
''The Wrong Trousers'' is a 1993 British stop-motion animated short film produced by Aardman Animations. The film was directed by Nick Park and co-written by Park, Bob Baker, and Brian Sibley. It is the second installment in the '' Wallace & ...
'' (1993). In the film, Wallace (
Peter Sallis
Peter John Sallis (1 February 1921 – 2 June 2017) was an English actor. He was the original voice of Wallace in the Academy Award-winning '' Wallace & Gromit'' films and played Norman "Cleggy" Clegg in ''Last of the Summer Wine'' from its 1 ...
) and Gromit foil a
sheep rustling
Cattle raiding is the act of stealing live cattle, often several or many at once. In Australia, such stealing is often referred to as duffing, and the perpetrator as a duffer.Baker, Sidney John (1945) ''The Australian language : an examination o ...
operation operated by a sinister dog, Preston.
Anne Reid
Anne Reid (born 28 May 1935) is an English stage, film and television actress, known for her roles as Valerie Barlow in the soap opera ''Coronation Street'' (1961–1971); Jean in the sitcom '' dinnerladies'' (1998–2000); and her role as C ...
also lends her voice to the film as Wendoline Ramsbottom.
''A Close Shave'' was acclaimed and won the
Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film
The Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film is an award given by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) as part of the annual Academy Awards, or Oscars, since the 5th Academy Awards (with different names), covering the year ...
at the
68th Academy Awards
The 68th Academy Awards ceremony, organized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), honored the best films of 1995 in the United States and took place on March 25, 1996, at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles beg ...
. A spin-off television series based on the Shaun character, ''
Shaun the Sheep
''Shaun the Sheep'' is a British stop-motion animated silent children's television series which is produced by Aardman Animations. A spin-off in the '' Wallace & Gromit'' franchise, the series focuses on the adventures of Shaun, the eponymou ...
'', premiered in 2007.
Plot
Wallace and his dog, Gromit, operate a window cleaning business. Wallace falls for the wool shopkeeper Wendolene Ramsbottom. Her sinister dog, Preston, rustles sheep to supply the shop. After a lost sheep wanders into the house, Wallace places him in his Knit-o-Matic, which shears sheep and knits the wool into jumpers. Wallace names the sheep
Shaun Shaun is an Anglicized spelling of the Irish name Seán. Alternative spellings include Shawn, Sean, and Shawne.
Along with spelling variants Shawn and Shaun, the name was among the top 1,000 names for American boys by 1950 and, with all spelli ...
.
Preston steals the Knit-o-Matic blueprints. When Gromit investigates, Preston captures him and frames him for the sheep rustling. Gromit is arrested and imprisoned, while Wallace's house is inundated with sheep. Wallace and the sheep save Gromit and hide out in the fields. Wendolene and Preston arrive in the lorry to round up the sheep. When Wendolene demands Preston stop the rustling, he locks her in the lorry with the sheep and drives away, intent on turning them into dog food.
Wallace and Gromit give chase on their motorcycle. When Gromit's sidecar detaches, he activates its aeroplane mode and resumes the chase from the air. Wallace becomes trapped in the lorry and he, Wendolene, and the sheep are transported to Preston's dog food factory, where Preston has built an enormous Knit-o-Matic. The captives are loaded into the wash basin, but Shaun escapes. Shaun activates neon signs to reveal the factory's location to Gromit, who attacks Preston. Shaun sucks Preston into the Knit-o-Matic, removing his fur. Wendolene reveals that Preston is a robot created by her deceased inventor father, and his behaviour is a result of him malfunctioning.
When the Knit-o-Matic dresses Preston in a sweater made of his fur, he inadvertently hits the controls, and the group become poised to fall into the mincing machine. Shaun pushes Preston into the machine, crushing him. Gromit is exonerated and Wallace rebuilds Preston as a harmless remote-controlled dog. Afterwards, Wallace is saddened when Wendolene leaves and tells him that she is allergic to cheese. When he tries to cheer himself up with some cheese, he finds that Shaun has eaten it all.
Production
Peter Lord
Peter Duncan Fraser Lord CBE (born 4 November 1953) is a British animator, director, producer and co-founder of the Academy Award-winning Aardman Animations studio, an animation firm best known for its clay-animated films and shorts, particu ...
, the co-founder of Aardman, had Park simplify the script to keep the film to 30 minutes. Lord said it once contained "the best scene we ever had to cut", a love scene based on ''
Brief Encounter
''Brief Encounter'' is a 1945 British Romance film#Romantic drama, romantic drama film directed by David Lean from a screenplay by Noël Coward, based on his 1936 one-act play ''Still Life (play), Still Life''. The film stars Celia Johnson and ...
'' between Wallace and Wendolene set in
Crewe railway station
Crewe railway station serves the railway town of Crewe, in Cheshire, England. It opened in 1837 and is one of the most historically significant railway stations in the world. A spin-off television series based on the Shaun character, ''
Shaun the Sheep
''Shaun the Sheep'' is a British stop-motion animated silent children's television series which is produced by Aardman Animations. A spin-off in the '' Wallace & Gromit'' franchise, the series focuses on the adventures of Shaun, the eponymou ...
'', premiered in 2007.
Cast
*
Peter Sallis
Peter John Sallis (1 February 1921 – 2 June 2017) was an English actor. He was the original voice of Wallace in the Academy Award-winning '' Wallace & Gromit'' films and played Norman "Cleggy" Clegg in ''Last of the Summer Wine'' from its 1 ...
as Wallace
*
Anne Reid
Anne Reid (born 28 May 1935) is an English stage, film and television actress, known for her roles as Valerie Barlow in the soap opera ''Coronation Street'' (1961–1971); Jean in the sitcom '' dinnerladies'' (1998–2000); and her role as C ...
as Wendolene Ramsbottom
Reception
On
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...
, ''A Close Shave'' has a perfect score of 100% based on 19 reviews, with an average rating of 8.6/10.