PUSS IN BOOTS: THE LAST WISH
Cert 12A In cinemas now
AFTER a lean few years for family animation, kids and accompanying adults will lap up a second solo adventure for Shrek’s ginger Zorro.
Once again, the film serves up pacy action scenes and clever riffs on storybook lore.
And its greatest asset is still Antonio Banderas who is pitch-perfect voicing the cute kitty with an unlikely, seductive Latin purr.
This time, Puss must forgo the senoritas and the milk-fuelled swashbuckling due to an accident at work. After defeating a rampaging troll, a falling church bell cuts short his showboating. When he comes round, the village doctor informs him he has just exhausted eight of his nine lives.
“My prescription?” the doc says. “No more adventures for you. You need to retire.”
So our once-carefree hero ditches his floppy hat and boots to wander naked into Mama Lana’s Cat Rescue for a life of tasteless cat biscuits and smelly litter trays.
But he’s back on his paws after learning of a magical meteorite that could restore his nine lives and his mojo.
Forming a triple act with a clingy dog called Perrito (Harvey Guillen) and old flame Kitty Softpaws (Salma Hayek Pinault), Puss sets out to find the mystical Wishing Star.
The quest will see them battle a fearsome wolf (Wagner Moura), cockney gangsters Goldilocks (Florence Pugh) and the Three Bears (Ray Winstone, Olivia Colman and Samson Kayo), and the now-massive Jack Horner (John Mulaney).
That’s a lot of villains and none have the manic energy of Zach Galifianakis’s Humpty Dumpty from Puss’s previous adventure.
But the animation is gorgeous, the action is zippy and, when it comes to voice acting, Banderas is the cat’s pyjamas.