Film service Sky Cinema is offering viewers a sneak peek at The Amazing Maurice, an upcoming animated film based on a young adult novel by Terry Pratchett, MovieWeb reports.
The company released a trailer for the movie, which is based on Pratchett’s The Amazing Maurice and His Educated Rodents. The book, a retelling of the Pied Piper of Hamelin fairy tale, was published in the U.S. by HarperCollins in 2001; in a starred review, a critic for Kirkus called it “excruciatingly funny” and “ferociously intelligent.”
The film features Hugh Laurie (House) as Maurice, a talking orange tabby cat who hatches a scheme in which he recruits a group of rats to infest a town so a boy named Keith can lure them out by playing his pipe.
Himesh Patel (Don’t Look Up) plays the boy, Keith, who falls for a girl named Malicia, portrayed by Game of Thrones star Emilia Clarke. Other cast members include David Thewlis (Wonder Woman), Hugh Bonneville (Notting Hill), David Tennant (Doctor Who), and Rob Brydon (The Trip).
The trailer offers glimpses of Pratchett’s signature humor. In one scene, Maurice leaps from a window, saying, “Don’t worry, a cat always lands on his feet!” He plummets to the ground where he lands on his head. “Ah, Maurice!” a rat exclaims. “Amazing Maurice,” the cat corrects him with a muffled, pained voice.
The Amazing Maurice is scheduled to premiere on Dec. 9.
Michael Schaub, a journalist and regular contributor to NPR, lives near Austin, Texas.
