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Mads Mikkelsen is cast against type to enjoyable effect in this Wes Anderson-ish tale of a broken family with a dark secret. The one-time Bond villain plays mustachioed, socially inept wank-addict Elias, brother of equally awkward college professor Gabriel (David Dencik). Together they travel to a remote, barely populated Danish island in search of the truth about their parentage. When they find three further brothers living in squalor in a dilapidated mansion among a menagerie of farm animals, things take a turn for the even-more-bonkers as Elias and Gabriel are absorbed into the house’s strange, hermitic rituals.
‘Men & Chicken’ is a fun film but rarely a funny one; clever comic touches abound but are undermined by some base slapstick that sees characters repeatedly beating each other with stuffed animals. Even so, there’s warmth and heart beneath the film’s grotesque exterior, with the tic-prone duo at its centre proving difficult to dislike.