We Bought A Zoo

Spanks - 5

Director - Cameron Crowe

Writers - Aline Brosh McKenna and Cameron Crowe

Starring - Matt Damon, Scarlett Johansson, Thomas Haden Church, Colin Ford and Maggie Elizabeth Jones

Release Date - 23 December 2011

MPAA Rating - PG

We Bought A Zoo is very loosely based on the book of the same name by the owner of the Dartmoor Zoological Park in England Benjamin Mee. Mee bought the struggling zoo with his entire family in 2006. The film takes place in Southern California and the Benjamin Mee played by Matt Damon quits his job a few months after his wife dies and wants to move to start over. He finds the perfect house that he wants to buy, but then is told that the property is a zoo that is being run by the state. Mee is a writer and has no idea how to work with animals and run the zoo.

The movie follows a lot of the traditional Hollywood formula, but it is done well. A good part of the movie is the struggle between Benjamin and his son who wanted to say with his friends in the city. The film is more about the family while the book is about the animals and the zoo.

We Built A Zoo is a good movie to take the whole family. It has some good laughs and it has some heartfelt moments scattered throughout also. It is a holiday movie worth seeing.