A Matter of Loaf and Death
Year: 2008
Rating: PG
Length: 29 minutes / 0.48 hours
One of the weird things about claymation is that there’s this fine line between rough early works and super-refined later films. For Wallace & Gromit, the quality of shorts like A Grand Day Out (1989) shows potential, and the next two shorts of The Wrong Trousers (1993) and A Close Shave (1995) refined the feel of the universe while still having that organic, handmade aesthetic. After having released the full-length Curse of the Were-Rabbit (2005), the next short of A Matter of Loaf and Death (2008) actually felt too polished.
Stylistically, A Matter of Loaf and Death is perhaps the most consistent of the shorts. Whether CGI helped or if the processes to make stop-motion films have improved over time, it’s difficult to tell. Whatever the reason, so much of this short feels too clean—there aren’t the errant fingerprints or other artifacts that reveal the handmade nature of the film. It’s a little weird that this is a fault here, but it just doesn’t feel like an authentic claymation movie.
It doesn’t help that maybe my bias stems from having watched the original shorts so many times that I have them memorized. There’s nostalgia there. This one being so recent means I haven’t had time to re-watch it constantly and really appreciate it. That’s the problem, though: I don’t particularly feel there was any gag or bit in this film that stands out as something I’d want to see again. A Grand Day Out had the construction sequence, The Wrong Trousers had both the heist and the train chase, and A Close Shave had the climactic fight against the evil dog. This? It has an OK love story for Gromit and that’s about it.
A forgettable and too clean Wallace & Gromit short, I give A Matter of Loaf and Death 3.5 stars out of 5.
1/2
