Wildwood ~ Review

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If you wandered into the “Family Section” of a video store in the late 80s and early 90s, you would find shelves lined with a curious clutch of animated fantasy films. These films had a few distinctive hallmarks: they were 1) rated PG, 2) theatrically released, and 3) not for children. Shoutout to the millennials traumatized by viewing The Last Unicorn, The Secret of NIMH, and Ralph Bakshi’s animated Lord of the Rings (not to mention his Wizards or Fire and Ice). These were sophisticated films based on, or inspired by, fantasy literature and made in the vacuum left by Disney’s “dark age (roughly from 1970 – 1988), when the studio’s dominance over feature animation began to slip. How this happened is a discussion for another time.
Now, since these movies were mostly made outside the studio system, the filmmakers had the freedom to do whatever they wanted. The films were trippy and unique, exploring themes like war, death, grief, and the loss of innocence in ways Disney just never could. Disney tried to get in on this trend with 1985’s The Black Cauldron, and it nearly destroyed the studio. Eventually, Disney came back to prominence with the Disney Renaissance. With the rise of Pixar and DreamWorks, this little time in feature animation became a curiosity for cult film enthusiasts and nostalgic millennials wondering about that one movie which gave them nightmares.
Over the decades, studios have tried to bring back the not-so-family-friendly animated feature to little success. With the popularity of anime, this style of film is not as relevant anymore. So, imagine how happy I was that Wildwood, the latest from stop-motion studio Laika, is a worthy successor to a forgotten age of feature animation.
Prue McKeel (Peyton Elizabeth Lee) is an ordinary teenager living in Portland, Oregon. She’s sassy to her parents (Jake Johnson and Maya Erskine), but overall cares for them and her baby brother Mac. Her parents are weirdly protective of her brother and will not let him outside their home, but one day Prue defies their orders and takes Mac on a joyride through Portland, bumping into her classmate Curtis (Jacob Tremblay) in the process. However, on an old playground, a murder of crows kidnap Mac and carry him off to the Impassable Wilderness on the edge of town. Prue and Curtis chase after him, and before you can say “Narnia,” they find themselves in Wildwood – a magical realm full of talking animals. But Wildwood has seen better days, as the dowager governess Alexandra (Carey Mulligan) is marshalling her coyote forces against anyone who stands in her way, and Wildwood is on the precipice of war.
Wildwood is a dazzling film. The stop-motion animation is so fluid and stunning that my jaw was on the floor almost the entire time. The characters are extremely expressive, and it really draws you into the story. While the script by Chris Butler (based on the 2011 novel by The Decemberists lead singer Colin Meloy and illustrated by Carson Ellis) does not rise above its fantasy tropes, it tells its story well. Director Travis Knight should be commended for marshalling all the forces necessary to get the film made (it reportedly took five years for production to be completed). It’s an astounding film; the battle sequences are a breathtaking feat of filmmaking. There’s a flight sequence in the middle when Prue meets an eagle (voiced by Angela Bassett), which caused my jaw to hit the floor. The visuals alone are enough to warrant a trip to the theater, and the story, while a little generic, has a powerful depth of emotion about grief and anger.
Wildwood is a stunning feat of stop-motion and a delightful throwback to a weird piece of animation history. It can stand proudly amongst The Last Unicorn, Wizards, and The Secret of NIMH, those classic (to me anyway) animated films that were maybe not quite right for children, but ultimately perfect for them.
Three and a half out of Four Stars