Tom & Jerry: Forbidden Compass      Director: Zhang Gang Cert: PGGenre: AnimationStarring: Eric Bauza, Ben Diskin, Janice Kawaye, AJ Beckles, Roger Craig Smith, Travis Willingham, Matthew Yang King, Vincent Tong Running Time: 1 hr 40 minsTom needs a win. For 87 years the put-upon house cat has been terrorised by his petty mouse rival, Jerry. During the 1940s and the early 1950s, the feline was frequently threatened with homelessness by the heavy-set matriarch voiced by the African-American star Lillian Randolph and often identified as Mammy Two Shoes. Tom and Jerry’s creators, William Hanna and Joseph Barbera, retired that character after protests in the US from the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, but Tom’s torment has continued. Following on from two earlier, unrelated big-screen adventures for the cartoon adversaries, The Forbidden Compass is directed by Zhang Gang and co-produced by Warner Bros and the Chinese state for a primarily Chinese audience. Warner Bros passed on the option to distribute in the US – a baffling decision given the company’s similar shelving of the well-reviewed Coyote vs Acme. Tom’s continuing precarity is flagged from the get-go: the story begins promisingly enough in a museum where Tom, now a jobsworth security guard, pursues Jerry through paintings, weapon displays and visual gags that cleverly preserve the elastic absurdity of the original cartoons. Then a magical compass opens a portal to ancient China, and the film abruptly transforms into something else entirely: a generic fantasy involving heavenly warriors, villainous rodent armies and a (this again) glowing McGuffin everyone desperately wants.The shift to glossy 3D animation will divide traditionalists, but the hypersaturated palette, exaggerated expressions and ceaseless motion are carefully calibrated for an audience primed for TikTok-paced stimulation. The headlining BDSM-adjacent duo are still sprinting headlong through walls, flattening each other with household objects and graffitiing over the laws of physics. It’s an improvement on the 2022 movie, but Tom and Jerry have become supporting players in their own film, pushed aside for an assortment of flimsily sketched newcomers who absorb most of the screen time. Who on earth goes to a Tom and Jerry film to watch – checks notes – the Celestial Master and Mega-Rat? Even Jerry deserves better. In cinemas from Friday, May 22nd