'Chicken Run' returns after 20 years with Catalan contribution

After an interminable 23-year wait, the most-watched stop-motion animated film in history returns with a highly anticipated sequel.

'Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget,' an action and comedy film for all ages, will be released on Netflix on December 15.   

Arnau Gòdia, a Catalan who is one of the fifty people on the film's animation team, says it was a "beautiful, long and hard process" with many challenges along the way.   

"Everyone in the company had the feeling that we were doing something very serious, we had to do a good job so it would live up to expectations," he said.  

Gòdia was one of the millions who fell in love with Ginger, Rocky and Baps in 2000. "Wow! It was incredible!" he says, remembering leaving the theater after seeing it for the first time.   

The years have also passed for the characters of Chicken Run. After leaving Tweedy's Farm, Ginger has fulfilled her dream of retiring to an idyllic island. But that is not enough for her daughter Molly, who wants to see the world.   

"It is nice to see [how the characters have evolved], Ginger is in a very different place than at the end of the first movie," he says. "The movie has a great diversity of characters, so both adults and children will see themselves in it." 

'Actors with pencils' 

There are many professionals involved in large productions like this. Good coordination is essential, and that's why they are divided into departments: artistic, animation, direction, technical, animation assistants and animation.   

"Disney used to say that animators were actors with pencils," Arnau recalls. He explains that animators are given a specific scene and setting, and instructions from the director on how the character should act and feel. 

Valencian Maria Riba was also part of this animation and is one of the people responsible for bringing the puppets to life.  

She says they always had the first movie as a reference, which they watched and revised many times.  

In this mission they were not alone, they were accompanied by professionals who participated in the movie of 2000. 

Maria is grateful that "they took so long to do the sequel," because if they had done it earlier, "maybe I wouldn't have been prepared." 

As the characters and animators have grown and changed, so has the format in which 'Chicken Run: Dawn of the Nugget' can be seen, this time not in theaters, but on Netflix.