Spongebob Squarepants

The Magic Roundabout, Laura's Star, Son Of Mask and now Spongebob - either the film industry has been taken over by eight-year-olds or it's half-term.

For certain, though, the pick of the kids' flicks is this rather weird US animation, which features the eponymous sponge, his dopey starfish sidekick Patrick, and a quest to rescue Neptune's crown.

From small beginnings as a TV cartoon, beloved of Britney Spears, Spongebob is now a full-blown craze in America, with attendant controversy as the far Right claim Spongebob's relationship with Patrick has homoerotic undertones (academic, really, as sponges tend to be either hermaphrodite or asexual).

Though its finer points are largely incomprehensible to anyone over nine (excepting Britney) it's all good, breezy, fun. It has a great rock soundtrack, the children will love it, and it certainly beats weeping about the awful things they've done to the Magic Roundabout.

Richard Godwin On general release