A cute kiddie space adventure, but it's no "WALL-E."

Visit the Space Chimps carousel at Yahoo! Kids Movies for a game, clips and fun downloadables.

The nation's space program is in jeopardy after an expensive rover unexpectedly goes off-course through a worm-hole too dangerous for astronauts to navigate. Mission control concocts a last-ditch plan to send chimps on the retrieval mission. Since the first chimp in space, Ham, is long dead, the powers that be select his grandson, wise-cracking circus performer Ham III (voiced by Andy Samberg) to join trained chimp crew members Titan (Patrick Warburton) and Luna (Cheryl Hines). Things get a bit tricky when they eventually find the rover on a pastel-colored planet where a tyrant named Zartog (Jeff Daniels) is using it to enslave his fellow aliens.

With Pixar creating thoughtful, memorable animated films like "WALL-E" that even childless adults love, it's hard for a regular old cartoon comedy to compete. But once your initial surprise at the Care Bears-level animation wears off, you may find that it's easy to enjoy "Space Chimp's" silly jokes. The references to "The Right Stuff," "2001: A Space Odyssey," and "Apollo 13" are obvious but still clever.

Bottom line? The combination of space exploration and talking animals should make this appealing for the 7-and-under set. Not every animated movie has to be a sophisticated masterpiece, and sometimes a goofball chimp and his buddies are good for laughs.

Common Sense Note

Parents need to know that this animated chimp comedy is straightforward and age-appropriate for the young kids it's targeted at. There's some mild peril on an alien planet (an alien tyrant terrorizes his fearful followers by threatening to permanently freeze them), but other than that, there's nothing that even the youngest viewers can't handle.

Families can talk about why Ham doesn't take anything seriously at first. Is it difficult to live up to accomplished relatives? Kids: How does teamwork save the day? What else do the chimps learn in this movie? Families can also discuss whether the high standards set by Pixar's Oscar-winning movies have made other animated films less enjoyable. Do you expect more from animated movies now? Why or why not?

Rating: G Studio: Twentieth Century Fox Directed By: Kirk De Micco Cast: Patrick Warburton, Cheryl Hines, Andy Samberg Running Time: 81 minutes Release Date: 07/18/2008 Genre: Family and Kids

Reviewed by Sandie Angulo Chen

See more about Space Chimps at Common Sense Media.