Animations co-produced through Belgium include Oscar-nominated movies like Belleville Rendez-vous and The Secret of Kells.

The House of Magic is a sweet and harmless exercise in physical fun and its busy-ness should keep children under seven well entertained.

But the pity for wider audiences is that it doesn’t live up to the promise of the first ten minutes when a thrown-out ginger cat called Thunder appears to use up his first nine lines at a rate of one per minute.

Next thing, he’s inside a magician’s house that’s home to Jack rabbit and Maggie mouse.

As Thunder struggles to survive his latest run of bad-luck, the camera moves in ways that are nigh-on impossible to recreate in live action films.

Unfortunately, humans soon drain the life out of the picture compared with Gil Kenan’s Monster House (2006).

Their voices are so-so, the humour non-existent and the storyline predictable.

It’s also unfortunate that after The Muppets (2011) and current releases Mrs Brown’s Boys D’Movie and Earth To Echo, this is yet another film about developers.

If, of course, the film’s hero – Thunder – can’t stop them first.

Jack rabbit’s unnatural fit for a cat flap inexplicably curtails his contribution to the climax when the line ‘I’m a bit too stout in the girth to make it through’ is as close as we get to humour.

Similarly, the magician (Doug Stone) is not only old but hospitalised, too, paving the way for his nasty nephew (Grant George) to realise the property’s value.

Now working with a co-director, Jeremy Degruson, Ben Stassen has previously directed Fly Me To The Moon (2008) and A Turtle’s Tale (2010).

This is his most ambitious film to date, but the script lets it down.