FURRY VENGEANCE (PG) Family. Brendan Fraser, Brooke Shields, Ken Jeong, Matt Prokop, Angela Kinsey, Skyler Samuels. Director: Roger Kumble.

Cute and cuddly woodland creatures including squirrels, deer, mice and groundhogs are revolting.

Revolting against the real estate developers, who are encroaching on their territory, razing acres of lush, natural habitat to make way for ecologically-unsound housing estates.

In Roger Kumble's family-oriented comedy, Mother Nature fights back tooth and claw (and hoof and feather) against the pesky human invaders.

A mischievous raccoon with digitally-enhanced facial features is the chief architect of the cartoonish chaos, calling to arms his woodland chums to teach the interlopers a painful lesson about protecting the flora and fauna.

Screenwriters Michael Carnes and Josh Gilbert tip the balance of power firmly in favour of the critters for the first half of the film then allow the humans to gain the upper hand, albeit sneakily.

However, you can't keep an army of birds and rodents down, setting up a final showdown that hammers home eco-conscious messages about recycling and caring for the environment with all of the subtlety of a big whiff of a skunk’s bottom. For older viewers – anyone whose age has reached double digits – Roger Kumble’s caper induces sleep as quickly as the Herbal Sleepy-Bye Tea, which one character glugs after a crow keeps him awake with its incessant pecking. Yawn.

Brooke Shields’s face doesn’t appear capable of registering a single emotion so she is the only person who doesn’t seem mildly nauseated by the climactic scenes of family bonding, sticky sweet with mawkish sentiment.