Over the Hedge

It feels like I’ve already seen this movie four times, after witnessing the parade of commercials for junk Over the Hedge‘s characters are pimping. Perhaps it makes perfect sense: The entire movie is built on a scenario that involves the stealing and hoarding of junk food. A swindling raccoon named RJ (Bruce Willis) must fill the cave of a grizzly (Nick Nolte) with grocery-store goodies before he devours RJ instead. So he enlists the aid of some naive turtles and squirrels and opossums and porcupines and skunks — voiced by the likes of Garry Shandling, Steve Carell, William Shatner, Wanda Sykes, and Avril Lavigne, because these movies are nothing without their famous voices — to sack the suburbs for some treats. It’s been said of Over the Hedge, both the original comic strip and the movie, that it’s intended as satire — a jab at our unhealthy lifestyles of junk-food and TV gorging. But you can’t sincerely say something about the crassness of consumerism at the same time you’re trying to unload the store.

Now playing at select local theaters