'The Pirates: Band of Misfits' to screen July 10 at Canalfront Park

Cinema by the Canal continues its summer series of outdoor film screenings for all ages with “The Pirates: Band of Misfits” Wednesday, July 10, at Lewes Canalfront Park. This year’s expanded four-part series of summer films is sponsored by the Rehoboth Beach Film Society, Friends of Lewes Canalfront Park and Citizens Bank.

Brought to the screen by Aardman Animation, the British stop-motion maestros behind "Wallace & Gromit" and "Chicken Run," "The Pirates: Band of Misfits" is loaded with quick gags, wordplay and silly slapstick. The buccaneers in "The Pirates: Band of Misfits" may be far more ragtag than swashbuckling, but the film displays loads of witty and zany fun.

This animated tale features a buffoon-like bearded captain voiced by Hugh Grant who is determined, with the help of his not-so-stellar crew of pirates, to win the coveted Pirate of The Year Award. After years of humiliation and failed attempts to win the treasured award, the pirate captain and his oddball crew decide to take on the cream of the pirating crop - Black Bellamy (Jeremy Piven), Peg Leg Hastings and Cutlass Liz (Selma Hayek) - in a race to pillage the most booty.

They soon cross paths with scientist Charles Darwin, who persuades the captain that the crew's prized parrot, Polly, could be the answer to the untold riches they are searching for. Their adventure takes them to Victorian London where they meet the notorious pirate-hating Queen Victoria.

It soon unfolds that the queen has an evil hidden agenda of her own, and although it takes some swordfighting with Queen Victoria to get to that realization, the pirate captain must choose between basking in the glory of being crowned Pirate of the Year, or staying faithful to his trusted crew.

The film will begin at dusk - 8:15 - 8:30 p.m. - at Canalfront Park, 211 Front St. in Lewes. Admission is free. Bring chairs or blankets. For more information, go to www.rehobothfilm.com or call 302-645-9095.