A Close Shave

This article is about the animated film. For the band, see Close Shave. For the saying, see close call.

Wallace and Gromit: A Close Shave
Original USA VHS artwork cover
Directed by	Nick Park
Written by	Bob Baker Nick Park
Produced by	Carla Shelley Michael Rose
Starring	Peter Sallis Anne Reid
Cinematography	Dave Alex Riddett
Edited by	Helen Garrard
Music by	Julian Nott
Production companies	Aardman Animations Wallace and Gromit Ltd. BBC Bristol BBC Children's International
Distributed by	BBC Worldwide
Release date	24 December 1995 (1995-12-24)
Running time	30 minutes
Country	United Kingdom
Budget	£1.3 million

Wallace and Gromit: A Close Shave is a 1995 British stop-motion animated short film co-written and directed by Nick Park and produced by Aardman Animations with Wallace and Gromit Ltd., BBC Bristol and BBC Children's International. It is the third film featuring Wallace and Gromit, following A Grand Day Out (1989) and The Wrong Trousers (1993). A Close Shave won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film. A Close Shave saw the first appearance of Shaun, who became the main character of the Shaun the Sheep spin-off series.

Plot

Wallace and his dog friend, Gromit, operate a window cleaning business. Wallace falls for a wool shopkeeper, Wendolene Ramsbottom. Her sinister dog, Preston, rustles a herd of sheep to supply the shop. After a lost sheep wanders into the house, Wallace places him in his Knit-o-Matic, which shears sheep and knits the wool into jumpers. Wallace names the sheep Shaun.

Later, Preston steals the Knit-o-Matic blueprints. When Gromit investigates, Preston captures him and frames him for the sheep rustling. Gromit is then arrested and imprisoned, while Wallace's house is inundated with sheep. Later that night, Wallace and the herd of sheep break Gromit out of jail and hide out in the fields. Wendolene and Preston arrive in the lorry to round up the sheep. When Wendolene demands Preston to stop the rustling, he throws her in the lorry with the herd of sheep and drives away, intent on turning them into his famous dog food.

Wallace and Gromit give chase on their motorbike to save Wendolene and the herd of sheep. When Gromit's sidecar detaches, he activates it into aeroplane mode as he falls down a cliff and resumes the chase in mid-air. Meanwhile, back on the road, Wallace saves Wendolene and the herd of sheep, but Preston slams on the brakes and the entire crowd is thrown back into the lorry, being transported to Preston's factory, where Preston has built an enormous Knit-o-Matic for himself. The captives are loaded into the wash basin, but Shaun escapes as he activates neon signs to reveal the factory's location to Gromit, who attacks Preston. Shaun sucks Preston into the Knit-o-Matic, removing his fur. Suddenly, Wendolene reveals that Preston is a robo-dog created by her inventor father.

When the Knit-o-Matic dresses Preston in a sweater made of his fur, he inadvertently hits the controls, and as the group become poised to fall into his mincing machine, Shaun bravely crushes Preston inside. Afterwards, Gromit is exonerated and Wallace rebuilds Preston as a harmless remote-controlled dog. But Wallace is let down when Wendolene leaves and tells him that she is allergic to cheese. When he tries to cheer himself up with some cheese, he finds that Shaun has eaten it all.

Cast

• Peter Sallis as Wallace
• Anne Reid as Wendolene Ramsbottom

Reception

On Rotten Tomatoes, A Close Shave has a perfect score of 100% based on 19 reviews, with an average rating of 8.6/10.

External links

• Official website
• A Close Shave at IMDb