A One Mann’s Movies review of “Wildwood”. (2026, 5*, 12A).
WOW! Just WOW! With a huge great capital “W“. Wildwood is one I missed seeing at the London Film Festival as it was on too early on a Sunday for me to get into London in time (thanks Southern Rail). But I just caught up with it and I was completely blown away.
This is a film that you simply MUST get out to see at the cinema on the big screen. And if this doesn’t walk off with the Oscar for Best Animation next March, I will eat my ivy-covered hat. It is not just the animated movie of the year. It is the animated movie of the decade and – unless and until Laika come out with their next epic – perhaps the greatest animated movie ever made.
One Mann’s Movies Rating:
Plot:
When her baby brother is kidnapped by a large flock of crows, Prue (voiced by
Peyton Elizabeth Lee) hotfoots it to a local forest where a wondrous world of mystery and peril awaits.
Certification:
UK: 12A; US: PG-13. (From the BBFC website: “moderate violence, injury detail, threat, language, upsetting scenes”. For the avoidance of doubt, this is NOT a film for young or sensitive children.)
Talent:
Starring (the voice talents of): Peyton Elizabeth Lee, Jacob Tremblay, Carey Mulligan, Mahershala Ali, Angela Bassett, Tantoo Cardinal, Marc Evan Jackson, Richard E. Grant, Jake Johnson, Maya Erskine, Charlie Day, Tom Waits, Len Cariou, Awkwafina, Jemaine Clement, Amandla Stenberg, Ólafur Darri Ólafsson, Blythe Danner, Rob Delaney.
Directed by: Travis Knight.
Written by: Chris Butler.
Running Time: 2h 12m.
Review:
Positives:
- I won’t start with the animation here. I’ll start with the story. For I kept thinking to myself, would I be as hugely impressed with this film if this was Peyton Elizabeth Lee, Jacob Tremblay, Carey Mulligan, et al. up there acting on the screen in ‘real life’. And the answer, I think, would be “yes”. For this is an epic and expansive tale, deeply and darkly engrained with fairy-tale myth including all of the gruesome and darkly disturbing aspects of that genre that the Brother’s Grimm imbued in their stories.
- We really get to meet and relate to Pru’s family: the father (Jake Johnson, “a grown man with a figurine collection”) is constantly brainwashing their toddler Mac (Arthur Knight) not to go into “The Impossible Wilderness” – the woods over the railway bridge in Portland Oregon, where they live. It’s clear that Pru also had the same treatment when she was a child. Dad and their Mum (Maya Erskine), seem massively over-protective of Mac, never letting Pru take him outside. (Of course, there IS a good reason for this over-protectiveness: we just don’t know it yet.) But Pru is a rebellious teen and naturally takes Mac on a chaotic and outrageously dangerous carriage-ride through the Portland streets. We also meet Curtis (Jacob Tremblay) who is younger than Pru but clearly has a crush on her. While Pru is working hard to be a sophisticated young lady (she downs an expresso at the coffee shop, which was a lovely touch), Curtis is still the other side of that line (drinking Hot Cocoa with marshmallows and all the trimmings).
- Above all, this is not some light and fluffy Disney tale and hence I don’t think this is remotely suitable for all but the hardiest of under-8s. We start the film, for example, with a naked young boy standing, sobbing in the rain, on the upstairs balcony handrail of his parents mansion before (with his mother screaming for him not to) he plunges to his death on the flagstones below. And this is just one aspect of the grief, death and dismemberment that are to come. The film builds to the most astonishing battle scene, reminiscent of Lord of the Rings: Return of the King: an epic struggle between the forces of good and evil. And just when you think your emotion is all spent, the finale is one of the most riveting and magical one-on-one battles that I have experienced at the cinema.
- Amidst all of the death and destruction, there are also really feelgood moments. Hugs and reunions and happy endings, including a nice kiss between Niamh (Amandla Stenberg) and her lesbian girlfriend, just to annoy the MAGA cult, which has to be good!
- Which leads us to the animation. The behind the scenes clips (of which there are some in a the end-titles) illustrate the extraordinary amount of work that the Laika Studios team put into their work, painstakingly animating the 3D maquettes of the characters 24 times every second to get the desired effect. A total of 142,000 replacement faces were engineered for the 236 handcrafted puppets to capture the range of emotions. Even Septima the rat (Awkwafina) was created as a teeny tiny fully working puppet with “screws so small my old eyes can’t even see them” as a Laika modeller described them. The action chase sequences – for example, one with coyotes chasing Pru through the forest; another with a Star Wars-style chase on the back of an eagle (which some theme park should turn into a ride) – are jaw-droppingly dynamic and thrilling. Just staggering works of art.
- As above, there were 236 handcrafted puppets created. But the battle scene has some 3000 participants. So – and the end titles confirms this – there was a lot of digital trickery also employed, with puppetry in the immediate foreground – to get the absolutely stunning effects on screen. But – and the director Travis Knight – has made this clear, there was no AI used to generate these effects: just good old fashioned hard work.
- The backgrounds are also worthy of mention. All of the detail embodied into the sets and the backdrops used are phenomenal. I’m not sure you can use the term “production design” for an animation, but Pru’s teenage bedroom is a work of art in terms of the diverse set of ‘stuff’ on the walls.
- The script is also full of genuinely moments and funny lines that made the film smash the 6-laughs test for me:
- Pru describes Portland as a “weird place” just as a unicycling Darth Vader playing fire-shooting bagpipes rides past!
- “Die!” exclaims Curtis. “I’m sorry?” replies Pru, shocked. “One dice is a die” he explains.
- “Birds… they think they’re above everyone”.
- “Is this how you always are?” Pru is asked. “I don’t know… you’ll have to ask everyone else” she replies.
- As Pru starts off in a cab, the cabbie asks “So, you follow football?”
- “They talk to a tree? Hippies!”
- Septima the rat: “It’s not fleas.. it’s siriasis.”
- “Don’t touch that… it’s mommy’s sacrificial dagger!”
- “Bandits… with their terrible folk songs.”
- The music by Dario Marianelli is utterly epic and worth a listen to outside of the film. It contains a fantastic militaristic marching theme as the coyote army marches to battle. There are also some great songs by The Decemberists including “The Better Part of Bravery” (listen here) which feels like an Oscar-winning song to me, and there is a great song that the Bandits sing in jail called “Bandit Kind” (that I can’t see is released in the soundtrack material to date).
Negatives:
- Nope – I’m out. Wildwood is a flawless film.
Monkeys
Stay for the end credits for a monkey: some behind the scene shots of them animating characters in the movie. There is nothing right at the end of the end-credits though. You’re welcome.
Summary Thoughts:
Regular readers of One Mann’s Movies will know that I am NOT normally a great fan of animated movies, and particularly of stop-motion animated movies. However, I was bowled over by this film and I am still thinking about it 24 hours later. This is one that has rocketed from nowhere into my top 5 of the year… and given the quality movies out at the moment, that is really saying something.
16 years in the making….. you should REALLY find the time to spend 2 hours with it at your local cinema. This comes with a massive great “RECOMMENDED” on it.
Where to watch?
Trailer:
The trailer for the film is here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtr5JL1zkiM.
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