Featuring the voices of Kiefer Sutherland, Janeane Garofalo, William Shatner, and James Belushi. Rated G.

For childless film buffs, The Wild is significant mainly as the latest example of parallel evolution in Hollywood. Though the process of development seems too long and fraught with lawyers to permit much compensable plagiarism, there are times when competing studios will release curiously similar movies.

Hence, Volcano and Dante's Peak; Deep Impact and Armageddon; A Bug's Life and Antz. Delays with one project spared us simultaneous biographies of Alexander the Great, but we do have The Wild, which shares nothing with Madagascar aside from being a computer-graphics cartoon about zoo animals being transplanted from New York to Africa, which causes anxiety to the star attraction, a lion with masculinity issues.

There's not much reason to check out either version, but parents of wee tots may appreciate the subtle differences. For example, this one has Janeane Garofalo. On the level of sheer nationalism, I was pleased to recognize the voices of Canucks Kiefer Sutherland as the hero lion and William Shatner as the villain, a demented wildebeest with a mystical-political jihad to become carnivorous.

Unlike most celebrities who dabble in voice acting, Sutherland and Shatner have wonderfully deep pipes, capable of strong and dark emotions-so much so that The Wild's denouement shifts uneasily from rote slapstick into near horror, as the leads finally and literally grapple with their psychological identities as predator and prey. An early action sequence revolves around ice curling, with colour commentary from Don "Grapes" Cherry. And Shatner's Toronto company, C.O.R.E., contributes excellent special effects. Whereas Madagascar went for a stylized, cartoony look, The Wild verges on photorealism, from incredible hair textures to independently animated tree leaves to cityscapes of stupefying detail.

As admirable as The Wild may be in terms of production, the bottom line is that it isn't particularly funny. I like The Wild's main story better than that of Madagascar, but the latter had a subplot involving penguins with a military fetish. Not only are penguins hot right now, these ones were so outlandish and perfectly realized that they could (and probably will) spin off into their own series. The Wild just has Eddie Izzard as a megalomaniac koala whose bumbling and arrogance quickly goes past quirky into enraging and dangerous. You cannot really call a Disney film about talking animals successful when you're rooting to see a primary sidekick being killed and eaten as violently as possible.