Skip to content 
Wildwood It will be screened in theaters on October 23rd.
There’s something incredible about the delivery of stop-motion animated films when executed to the standards Laika sets for himself, and wonder is certainly the name of Wildwood’s game. Adapted from the first novel in Colin Meloy and Carson Ellis’s Wildwood Chronicles, Wildwood sees director Travis Knight and his masters at Laika turn this into a stunningly beautiful and surprisingly dark fantasy adventure. This adventure boasts exciting action, fascinating and enchanting natural environments, and stories about forest creatures and jobs… That’s all before the characters leave Portland and travel to Wildwood!
Wildwood is the most impressive of its range. As the new record holder for the longest stop-motion animated film of all time, Knight has the luxury of building the mythology of Meloy and Ellis’s novels on screen. As 13-year-old Prue McKill (Peyton Elizabeth Lee) and her classmate Curtis (Jacob Tremblay) take on a mission to the magical forest world of Wildwood to rescue Prue’s kidnapped younger brother Mac, the complex web of society, race, and systems that undergird the setting is endlessly fascinating enough to keep you on track in your appreciation of just how wonderful it all is. Laika’s films have always pushed the boundaries of what is possible in stop-motion animation, and the incredible artistry on display in Wildwood shows them trying again. From intricate, realistic renderings of Portland to various areas of a vast, mysterious forest, Wildwood pays meticulous attention to detail.
Long stretches of the film achieve such immersion that, most effectively, it’s easy to forget that Wildwood is a stop-motion film. This is an even more impressive sensation when you consider the variety of fantasy traps Wildwood deploys.
The confrontation between nature-driven magic and anthropomorphic characters Prue and Curtis will feel familiar to any fan of portal fantasy like Spirited Away, Labyrinth, or The Chronicles of Narnia (not to mention Laika’s Coraline). But Knight confidently leans into the storytelling economy that those archetypes afford him. The “just get on with it” style of approach chosen to detail Wildwood’s history leaves the moments when the film winds through exposition feeling pretty inoffensive, especially in light of how fully realized the world is by the end of the film. Through it all, the stakes of the story feel very high, thanks to the fast-paced conflict that begins as soon as Prue and Curtis cross the wasteland. The losses feel real, setbacks have consequences and people die in these movies. And with some frequency it does. At times, it’s surprising how far Knight is willing to push the limits of what on the surface may seem like kid-friendly play. Of course, nothing comes close to the R-rated Phil Tippett director’s hellish Nightmare Fuel. food goodBut make no mistake. Wildwood has earned a PG-13 rating or better.
But that doesn’t stop character motivations from being Wildwood’s occasional stumbling block. As fantastical and well-conceived as the world of Wildwood is, the main character, Prue, sometimes feels lost in the chaos. Prue is a very modern 13-year-old girl who fights against her granola mom and dad (Maya Erskine and Jake Johnson) and takes full responsibility for the loss of her little brother, giving the character a lot of weight to carry as she requires more and more bravery and bravery. Peyton Elizabeth Lee’s performance is lively and dynamic enough to make Prue likeable, but the script doesn’t leave much room to define her in anything more specific than the wrongs she’s trying to right. This may be partly intended to allow younger audiences to project themselves into her own adventures, but Prue ends up feeling less memorable than the world she adventures into.
Curtis, a tabletop RPG enthusiast who remains stuck on hot chocolate even after his peers have moved on to coffee, plays the expected “zero to hero” arc, and Jacob Tremblay handles the character’s comedic timing well. Wildwood’s story distances Curtis from Prue for much of the film, and the pace tends to slow down when we check back in with him and the heroic bandits he encounters in enemy territory. The record-breaking 131-minute runtime more than justifies itself from a purely visual standpoint, but plot detours like this sometimes make Wildwood feel a little long.
Strengthening her power in Wildwood is South Wood’s governess, Alexandra (Carey Mulligan). Her grief from the film’s shocking and horrifying opening scenes forces her to make equally dark choices as the story progresses. Alexandra’s relationship with her grief is far more interesting and believable than her ploys to quell it, but Mulligan’s quivering, sharp performance is a consistent highlight. Some effort was made to draw parallels between Alexandra and Prue’s parents, which could have made Alexandra a more powerful antagonist, but this connection never seemed to be properly rooted in the early scenes enough to be satisfying for later consideration. But in Alexandra’s grief, Knight has the opportunity to create some of Wildwood’s most striking images, and these gothic touches provide a welcome contrast to the bright, rich life that makes up much of the film’s visual identity.
What the main player wants is more than complemented by Wildwood’s excellent cast of supporting magical creatures and hero rosters. Mahershala Ali and Amandla Stenberg? Bullies! Richard E. Grant? A king owl named Owl Rex! Tom wait? Coyote soldier full of rage! Charlie Day? Cowardly renegade Coyote soldier! From people as big as Angela Bassett’s giant eagle general to people as small as Awkwafina’s burly rat Septima, the voice casting is a key aspect of Wildwood’s character. The color each character adds to the mix, especially the way the animal characters’ more basic instincts peek into their personalities, does as much to create a sense of place as the sun-dappled valleys or ivy-covered ruins that Prue and Curtis traverse.
The action in Wildwood unfolds at a rapid pace as Prue and Curtis attempt to outwit Alexandra’s forces. Alexandra’s murder of a crow leads to the premature kidnapping of her younger brother Mac, followed by a chase that hints at some deranged camera work and once the real world is in the rearview mirror, Knight pulls in every nook and cranny of the carefully filled frame to add a surprising twist to the fight or increase the risk of being caught or killed. Knight also has a pretty good eye for when to hold the camera in a more solid coverage style and when to take it off the chain. All that excitement is very effectively supported by composer Dario Marianelli’s score. It’s a lively orchestral foundation that alternates between folk string arrangements and more contemporary guitar sounds depending on the setting.