SHORT STORY (EPIC)

Ah, the little people.

In Ireland, we are well versed in cringeworthy and nakedly commercial stories about Leprechauns.

But few of us probably know any Native American mythology about The Little People of the Cherokee - spirits who were believed to have dwelled in mountain caves and reached up to the height of human knees.

A pygmy dwarf tribe also featured in Homer's 'Iliad' and is believed to have provided the inspiration for the Lilliputians in Jonathan Swift's classic 'Gulliver's Travels'.

Mary Norton's 1952 novel 'The Borrowers', about a family of little people living under the floorboards has been a favourite of TV and movie executives - with three strong television adaptations and a decent movie starring Jim Broadbent and John Goodman.

From 'Darby O'Gill' to Richard Harris in 'Gulliver's Travels' right through to 'Tinkerbell' and Peter Jackson's recent adaptation of Tolkien's 'The Hobbit', cinema has always had an interest in tales of little people struggling in a big, bad world.

Now Blue Sky Studios, the makers of the 'Ice Age' series for 20th Century Fox, have come up with another addition to the genre - the 3D animation movie 'Epic'.

Featuring the voices of Colin Farrell, Beyonce, Christoph Waltz and Chris O'Dowd, 'Epic' has at its heart a grieving and dysfunctional family.

Based on William Joyce's children's book 'The Leaf Men and The Brave Good Bugs', it begins with Amanda Seyfried's teenager MK arriving in a yellow cab at her estranged eccentric scientist dad's ramshackle home in the middle of a forest, following her mother's recent death.

Her father, Jason Sudeikis's Professor Bomba split from her mother because of his obsession with proving the existence of a tiny race of people known as the leaf men which has earned him the reputation of being a crackpot.

The leaf men, of course, exist and consist of Colin Farrell's brave warrior Ronin, Josh Hutcherson's talented rookie Nod and Beyonce's elegant Queen Tara - a Mother Nature figure who ensures all is well in the ecosystem.

But the leaf men are at war with the Boggans, led by Christoph Waltz's evil ratskin wearing Mandrake, whose goal is to rot the entire forest and planet.

Mandrake sets out to assassinate Queen Tara before she can choose an heir, on the basis that this will leave no Mother Nature figure to protect the forest.

The initially cynical MK stumbles into this world during an attempt to take Queen Tara's life and is shrunk down to size.

But can she help the leaf men defeat the Boggans? And will she be able to make it back to the human world and reconcile with her emotionally stunted father? 

'Epic' is directed by Chris Wedge who gave us the first movie of the 'Ice Age' franchise in 2002 and 'Robots' in 2005.

Like both those movies, it has the same Smart Alec vein of humour and the same dynamics of dysfunctional real and surrogate families.

And like both those features, it lacks the narrative sophistication or wit of most Disney-Pixar fare or the odd independent animation like 'How To Train Your Dragon' or 'A Monster in Paris'.

Blame a bland screenplay which is far too derivative and far too po-faced for its own good.

Neither MK nor Nod feel particularly original - their characters could have been transplanted from any other animated family film that has been doing the rounds over the past eight years - and as a result Seyfried and Hutcherson have little opportunity to shine.

As MK's dad, 'Saturday Night Live' regular Jason Sudeikis turns in such a batty and incoherent performance that it leaves you wondering how he managed to get sucked in at all.

Colin Farrell's character Ronin is devoid of any charisma, mouthing boring Eco platitudes in his Bono-like accent about how we are all part of the planet like leaves on a tree. 

Even Christoph Waltz's Mandrake makes for a rather underwhelming villain - struggling to really kick into top gear.

The battle sequences are derivative. It is as if Wedge and his animators have been gorging on a diet of the fight scenes in 'Avatar' and the climactic Death Star section of 'Star Wars'.

The animation, while competent, doesn't quite blow your socks off - especially in 3D which even 'The Croods' made better use of (and that was hardly breathtaking).

But is not all bad.

Beyonce finds the right regal tone as Queen Tara - even if her single 'Rise Up' which blares all over the closing screen credits is more than a little irritating.

Aziz Ansari's slug Mub is mildly amusing but he's not nearly as funny as Chris O'Dowd's scene stealing snail Grub, his Roscommon accent squeezing every possible drop of comedy out of Matt Ember and Tom J Astle's dull screenplay.

Epic, this ain't.

But, of course, 'Epic' isn't made for parents.

It is aimed at a generation of Happy Meal guzzlers that might just be able to swallow a tale of miniature Eco-warriors at war with evil forces of Nature in a forest.

And if the reaction of the junior film critic in my home is anything to go by, it will certainly do well with that demographic.

('Epic' opened in The Movie House in Northern Ireland and other UK and Irish cinemas on May 22. This review originally appeared on Eamonnmallie.com)