Why you can trust GamesRadar+ Our experts review games, movies and tech over countless hours, so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about our reviews policy.

Look hard enough and you can usually find some subversive subtext in anything deemed a `cult' kids' series. But squeaky clean Thomas The Tank Engine has always resisted scrutiny (unless The Fat Controller is a bondage freak). And while Thomas's first chug into cinemas keeps this cleanliness, the script is so bizarrely messy that you have to wonder if writer/ director Britt Allcroft was firing on all neurons.

The action is split between the island of Sodor (the trains' home) and the real-world Shining Time Station. Some bad diesel trains arrive in Sodor, Peter Fonda's grumpy (his special lady-train won't work), Mr Conductor (Alec Baldwin) loses his teleporting dust and, um, there's something about a magic railroad.