Run, rabbits, run... morality, fear and war in the warren
DEPENDING on your age when you first saw it, Watership Down was either the scariest or most thought-provoking animation you have ever seen. Filmed in 1978, this gripping tale of a colony of rabbits searching for a new home – based on Richard Adams’s 1972 book – has now been given the much larger canvas of a four-hour TV adaptation this Christmas.
With spectacular new animation techniques, the rabbits of Watership Down are brought to vivid life and are set to charm and alarm audiences once again. Yes, there are moments of threat, danger and sadness but these are kept to a minimum, at least in the first two hours.
At Watership Down’s central London launch, film actor James McAvoy, who voices Hazel, tells me he has an abiding love for the story and was desperate to take part. But he also has mixed feelings about it.
“From the deep love and terror that watching the 1978 animation put inside my bones and then from reading the novel later in life when it blew me away all over again, I was just so excited by the opportunity to try to bring Watership Down to a new generation. It’s on such a huge scale as has never been done before. I think it’s a story you can relive in any decade.”
At the launch, he is besieged by a legion of film fans, the legacy of his role in The X Men, but his new character couldn’t be a greater departure.
“Hazel is quite ordinary when we first meet him. He’s quite middle of the road but he has this exceptional brother, Fiver, who is incredible and highly sensitive, to the extent he has visions of the future.
“When Fiver says he has a really bad feeling about something and that they’re not safe to stay at their warren any more, Hazel trusts his brother implicitly. They then set off on this adventure to find a new home, with Hazel at the forefront.”
I suggest there must be very little you can do to prepare for the role. They are rabbits after all.
“No, not really! I suppose, at least emotionally and verbally, the rabbits are pretty anthropomorphised. Although
I did think of a couple of things which, I guess, informed my performance in some way.
“For example, the rate at which a rabbit’s heart beats is incredibly fast – to the extent that they can have heart attacks just from being over-excited or panicked. They have this thing where they can freeze if they are overstimulated, such as when they’re in the headlights of a car. I was able to use that a little.”
Actress Gemma Arterton (Their
Finest, Quantum Of Solace) was similarly traumatised by the original film adaptation. She told me at the launch: “I remember seeing the 1978 animation when I was very young – and being petrified by it. Having revisited the story as an adult, it’s so pertinent, especially for these days and these times.
“Also the team behind this are people that I’ve known and people that I’ve worked with so, although it’s a huge project, it felt like a family. I thought it would be brilliant to be involved in the new, contemporary take on Watership Down and bring it to a younger audience.”
She plays Clover, one of the hutch rabbits – unlike the other bunnies who live in the wild and are searching for a new place to live.
“Clover’s quite different,” she says. “Even visually she looks quite different to the other rabbits. She’s cute and fluffy. She’s never been out into the wild. She meets Fiver and Hazel when they free her so she can join them on their expedition.
“Clover’s quite naïve at first as she’s been very protected all of her life but she has a desire to escape and see the world.