'The Wild': A Crass Menagerie

More corn than pop: Samson the lion and Nigel the koala cavort for lame laughs as zoo animals gone wild in a tame Disney flick. (Disney Enterprises)

"The Wild" brings to mind the obnoxious character in those cellphone commercials who keeps asking: "Can you hear me now? Can you hear me now?" In this case, however, Walt Disney's computer-animated flick seems to be perpetually asking: "Are you laughing now? Are you laughing now?"

The answer is a resounding no, thanks to a group of fuzzy but uninvolving zoo animals possessed by an adult humor inappropriate for their characters, not to mention the presumably young audiences watching them.

Since Robin Williams -- as the voice of Genie -- turned "Aladdin" into a nonstop quipfest in 1992, adult in-joking in animated movies has evolved from radical new idea to corporate requirement. "The Wild," which seems to be channeling Williams (or worse, a bad Williams imitator), is testament to this increasing banality.

But first, an introduction to the movie's hilarious inner circle. Samson the lion (voiced by Kiefer Sutherland) has just regaled his cub, Ryan (Greg Cipes), with another tale of his brave exploits in the wild, before he was captured and placed in the New York Zoo. Feeling inadequate because he cannot imitate his father's deep roar, Ryan slips into a large storage container that appears bound for the real wilderness. He changes his mind but it's too late -- he's on his way.

When Samson hears Ryan's cries, he recruits his closest zoo pals to give chase, including Benny the squirrel (James Belushi), a koala bear named Nigel (Eddie Izzard), a giraffe called Bridget (Janeane Garofalo) and Larry the anaconda (Richard Kind). Their rescue mission takes them on a wild goose chase through New York City and, when Ryan is loaded onto an ocean liner, across the seas to a distant, volcanic island.

(No, you are not reading the review for "Madagascar." This is another animated movie in which zoo animals escape to the actual wilderness and retrieve their dormant instincts.)

The real card of the bunch is Bridget, a quippy longneck who seems to have watched a bit too much Lisa Kudrow.

"Don't stare at my spots, Benny," she tells the squirrel. "My eyes are up here." (Gee, hope the kids don't get that quasi-sexual reference.) And when the circle of friends' quest takes them into a confrontation with two alligators under the sewers (both gators are New York wiseacres, of course), Bridget makes a joke about them having acid reflux. Of course, a giraffe would know about that.

When Samson and company reach the island, they encounter a herd of wildebeests that worship a stuffed koala (a merchandising item from Samson's zoo) that literally has fallen into their midst. The wildebeests also have a collective obsession for precision dancing, for no apparent reason other than the opportunity for gags about choreography. (If your child doesn't have a postmodern appreciation for backstage Broadway humor, you can explain that one, too.)

Adult humor in kiddie films is not only welcome but, for many adult viewers, essential. But less is always more, and it's best when it's appropriate. When the animals race along in a vehicle and Bridget's chops flap in the wind as she tries to speak, that's genuinely funny for kids and adults. And it's believable: Of course, a giraffe might encounter such a thing. And when Samson and company find themselves stuck in a tugboat and headed for almost certain collision with a big ship, they panic because no one knows how to steer a ship. (Of course, by this movie's pretzel logic, if Bridget is sophisticated enough to riff about acid reflux, she ought to be able to steer a boat.)

The too-cool-for-school humor carries on incessantly, relentlessly, as if the four credited scriptwriters were paid by the gag. There's a clutch of chameleons who change color and trade one-liners, some rat-a-tat business about being double agents on a mission, and those wildebeests continue to obsess about floor routines, and just to maintain the overall drone-ability, "The Wild" seems like a sampling of other, better Disney films. Its father-and-friends-searching-for-a-lost-son theme is a repeddling of "Finding Nemo." Samson has a circus flashback memory that evokes "Pinocchio." And there are more references to "Lion King" than "Lion King" itself. These plugs feel more like in-house promotion than -- shall we say? -- dewy-eyed recall.

One thing's for certain: "The Wild" is unlikely to get referenced in a future Disney film. After all, how do you pay tribute to your own repetition? That would be so meta-Mickey and the choreography would come out so wrong.

The Wild (85 minutes; area theaters) is rated G and contains a joke or two about flatulence.