'Band of Misfits': A jolly roger good time

It's a pirate's life: Hugh Grant leads a talented voice-acting cast in the well-written and witty 'The Pirates! Band of Misfits.' (Credit: Aardman Animations, Sony Pictures)

The buccaneers in The Pirates! Band of Misfits (* * * 1/2 out of four, PG, opens Friday) may be far more ragtag than swashbuckling, but the film is sure-footed, witty and zany fun.

Deftly written (by Gideon Defoe), this stop-motion animated tale features pirates tangling with a fiendish Queen Victoria and a double-crossing Charles Darwin. Who can resist a rollicking blend of British history and contemporary culture by Wallace & Gromit creators Aardman Animations? Especially one that works in appearances by Jane Austen and the Elephant Man and plays the Clash's London Calling as the Victorian-era pirates set sail for London?

The actors who lend their voices to the characters could not be more spot-on. Hugh Grant is hilarious as Pirate Captain, a buffoon hellbent on winning the coveted pirate-of-the-year prize.

But he is stung when he's laughed at by rivals Cutlass (Salma Hayek) and Black Bellamy (Jeremy Piven).

Dejected, he and his crew return to their ship and attempt to plunder passing vessels. But there's no booty to be had as they raid ghost ships, schoolchildren on a field trip and naked naturists. They do manage to capture Charles Darwin (Dr. Who's David Tennant), who persuades them to return with him to London after he notices that Polly, the mascot the pirates think is a big-boned parrot, is actually a dodo bird, a creature thought to be extinct.

Some of the funniest gags involve Mr. Bobo, Darwin's monkey butler, who he dubs a "manpanzee." Bobo communicates via single words on flashcards. When Darwin hatches a secret plot to take Polly, he confides in the monkey, then urges him to be quiet. The monkey obliges by holding up a card with a word written on it in tiny typeface.

The low-key lunacy and droll wit that infuse the film are a refreshing change from animated films that rely mostly on bathroom humor. It's hard not to be charmed by the absurd antics of the bumbling buccaneers. Appropriate for all ages, this delightfully daffy romp has action adventure for younger audiences, as well as enough quintessentially British wit to keep adults smiling.

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