‘Little Bear’ a Gentle Tale of Sharing

Video

The Little Bear Movie. Paramount Home Entertainment. 75 minutes. Ages 3 to 6. $20. https://www.paramount.com/

This first feature-length Little Bear video has all the gentle, reassuring qualities of the books by Maurice Sendak and the Nickelodeon preschool series upon which it is based. The animation is rather stiff, but the background art of the late-autumn woods and mountains is lovely.

Here, Little Bear meets Cub, who has become separated from his parents in the wilderness, a world considerably different from Little Bear’s cozy cottage life with Mother and Father Bear. Cub is a “wild” bear--he lives the way real bears do. He has never slept on a bed or eaten with a fork. He has never played make-believe, either, or imagined going to the moon. Little Bear teaches him all that and more. Then, as he helps Cub find his parents, Little Bear finds his horizons expanded and learns that differences make the world a richer place.

Owd Bob. USA Home Entertainment. 91 minutes. $20. For the Family.

Two notable screen veterans, James Cromwell and Colm Meaney, give weight to this benign British and Canadian film about family and forgiveness.

Cromwell, who was the taciturn but good-humored sheep farmer in the movie “Babe,” could be reprising that role here, albeit with a glare rather than a twinkle. He plays bitter widower Adam, raising sheep on the Isle of Man and giving reluctant shelter to his recently orphaned American grandson.

Meaney is Keith, his closest neighbor, and the two are at odds because of Adam’s long-held grudge over an injury done to him by Keith’s father. Emotions run high when grandson David (Dylan Provencher) becomes friendly with Keith and his daughter (Jemima Rooper) and when Adam’s champion sheepdog is suspected of being a sheep-killer. The heavy-duty heartstring-tugging is bearable thanks to the cast, breathtaking scenery and a script and direction that avoid glib sentiment for quietly observed emotions.