Storks (U)

three stars

Dirs: Nicolas Stoller, Doug Sweetland

Voices: Jennifer Aniston, Andy Samberg, Ty Burrell

Runtime: 90 minutes

REMEMBER those pre-sex education times when children were led to believe that babies arrived not via childbirth but courtesy of giant birds making doorstep deliveries? Nicolas Stoller and Doug Sweetland’s handsome animated adventure takes you back to those more innocent days, before segueing delightfully into modern sarkiness.

Junior (voiced by Andy Samberg) wants to be the boss of the stork-staffed internet delivery company where he works, which means keeping to schedule, one step ahead of the drones, and definitely having nothing to do with the old business of bringing babies to expectant parents. Tulip (Katie Crown), one of the last weans to get through the old fashioned way, and baby brother-craving Nate (Anton Starkman), have other ideas, however. So begins a cross-continent quest involving a creepy pigeon, workaholic parents missing their child growing up, and Kelsey Grammar (Frasier) as a head honcho stork who will stop at nothing to get parcels through.

Storks takes an age to get going, and in those initial stages it is squawky and annoying. But once the quest part of the movie gets going, and a very cute baby enters the scene, the humour becomes as irresistible as the wean. Add to this some picture-stealing wolves led by Jordan Peele, and Storks begins to soar along a treat. So it might set the cause of sex-ed back 50 years …