Inspired by a six-minute 2009 short by Lucas Martell called “Pigeon: Impossible” that bears little resemblance to this animation film, this is an international adventure story equipped with very little of the narrative care that goes into most of Disney’s own animated ventures.

Antic and frantic, this is very much a one-joke affair, which is fine for a short but insufficient for a 101-minute feature. The joke, which is funny for a couple of minutes, is that Lance Sterling (Will Smith), top American secret agent, is inadvertently turned into a blue pigeon by young science genius Walter (Tom Holland), whose attempts at creating an invisibility potion have gone a bit astray.

Very proud of his physical attributes, most notably his bulging shoulders and chest, which his long spindly legs hardly seem like quite enough to support, Lance insists that his colleague “unbird” him at once, but Walter hasn’t quite gotten control of that yet. There’s a mad dash through Washington, D.C., whereupon it’s off to exciting interludes at a Mexican resort, a secret weapons lab in the North Sea and then Venice, where Lance meets a great many more pigeons. Under the circumstances, maybe he would have been happier just staying there instead of heading home again.

What’s striking about the script by Brad Copeland and Lloyd Taylor, from a screen story by Cindy Davis, is how unmotivated the whole story is. Numerous excuses are invented for big action sequences all over the world, but it never feels like there’s a reason to where the characters are going or what they’re doing once they arrive. There’s a supervillain of sorts, a terrorist named Killian (Ben Mendelsohn) who’s into weaponized drones, but he and all the rest of the bad guys could not be more generic.

Technically, the film boasts of ace production values. Visually, while there is glitter and rainbow weaponry at disposal, the frames lack bright colors.

The voices lent by the excellent cast are energetic and engaging, and the background score does elevate the viewing experience, but that does not help much. (SD-Agencies)