In both a perpetuation and critique of economic approaches to ecology, Over the Hedge argues that nonhuman nature must separate from humans and their suburban sprawl in order to survive, avoiding consequences of economic approaches to ecology. Over the Hedge is drawn from Michael Fry and T. Lewis’s comic strip of the same name. The comic strip explores suburbia from the perspective of the animals who lived there before the land was developed, attempt to save their forest from encroaching developers, but get distracted by the comforts of suburban life, from junk food to big screen televisions. Whereas the comic strip maintains the conflict between suburbia and woodland, highlighting the ambivalence woodland animals might have toward the wonders they find there, the film confronts the conflict between suburban luxury and wilderness life, offering a resolution that validates nonhuman nature over the artificiality of humans and their suburbs, again from the perspective of the forest animals.
Over the Hedge highlights the conflict between forest and suburb from its opening forward. The film’s protagonist, RJ (Bruce Willis), a junk food-eating raccoon, steals Vincent’s (Nick Nolte), a hibernating bear’s, wagon full of junk food, awakening the bear when he opens of can of potato chips. In the altercation that follows, the wagon falls off the cliff and is hit by a car, so Vincent is angry. He has lost his food because of RJ’s carelessness, so he gives him a week to collect the food and restore his stash.
This suburban scene contrasts with the first view of the forest where another hibernating animal awakens, a turtle named Verne who senses the melting snow and awakens other hibernating animals. The sleeping host of animals has eaten all the stored food during the winter and now must gather more to survive. Verne the turtle shows them the rest of the berries and gives one to each. Instead of living off a stashed load of junk food they must fill the log to the top with food in order to survive another winter, so they begin gathering food in their forest.
The overdevelopment of suburbia, however, begins to penetrate their forest Mecca, first because RJ has overheard Verne’s goal to fill the log and will offer an alternative survival plan that will ultimately repay the bear and save his life. Verne is surprised not only by the excess but also by its implications: half of their forest has been destroyed to build this new human neighborhood.
RJ is there to counteract Verne’s dismay, however, offering an alternative survival strategy that will lead them to “the good life” of nacho cheese and sugar. In the human suburb of over-consumption, they can gather their food in a week instead of the typical 237 days. Once they have tasted the junk food RJ offers, the other animals willingly join him, leaving Verne and his antiquated but more natural plan behind.
Suburbia, however, wants nothing to do with wild creatures. Gladys Sherp (Allison Janney), the president of the homeowners’ association, is especially dedicated to keeping the suburbs free of all nonhuman life. A montage sequence shows the animals stealing human food, but when they take a vanload of pizza from Gladys, she calls a “verminator” (Thomas Haden Church), but since they all escape, the animals appoint RJ their new leader.
Verne, however, yearns for a more natural and safe life and returns the junk food, so the family can return to its normal healthy lifestyle in the forest. RJ and the other animals abandon Verne. RJ and his new family now embrace the suburban lifestyle. RJ must now replenish the bear’s stash in record time, however, so he coerces the family into a dangerous plan to gather a wagon full of junk food at a party thrown by their worst enemy, Gladys. RJ’s plan is ingenious and takes all of Gladys’s traps into account, but Gladys awakens and calls the verminator who captures all but RJ. RJ rolls away with the food, nearly condemning his forest family to death, but Vincent the bear tells RJ he has done a vicious thing: “you take the food and they take the fall,” so RJ is transformed and rescues the animals from the verminator and, with their help, fends off the bear.
Over the Hedge resolves with nature and culture bifurcated. Forest animals are better off in their forest, away from the dangers of suburbia. Glady’s verminator and the animals engage in a comic action scene that includes the capture of most of the woodland animals and their escape from both verminator and bear and ends in group harmony in a forest world separate from humans. That separation is best when animals form a community, a family that works together to fill a log, not with junk food but with nuts and berries. Unlike the comic strip, then, the film version of Over the Hedge erases ambiguity, leaving no room for interaction between suburbia and the forest beyond its hedgerow.
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