There may be no single movie studio I have championed more than the small Kilkenny, Ireland-based animation hub Cartoon Saloon (still an awful name). Since their debut feature The Secret of Kells in 2009, they’ve become one of the last great beacons of traditional animation in the western world, and one of the most uniquely compelling in their artistry. Initially supplementing their income through illustration, advertising work, and a few childrens’ T.V. series, they’ve since produced Song of the Sea (one of my favourite films of the last decade) in 2014, and The Breadwinner in 2017, as well as a number of shorts. All three of their features (and one short, the beautiful Late Afternoon) have been critical darlings and nominated for Oscars. They have a flawless track record, and one that continues with their latest film, Wolfwalkers, so far the best movie of 2020.
It is the third and final installment in an unofficial trilogy spearheaded by studio co-founder Tomm Moore exploring facets of Irish folklore. Wolfwalkers’ subject of choice are the Faoladh, Irelands’ werewolves of medieval legend that were transformed humans, with a body left behind when in wolf-form. This movie however, which Moore co-directed with Ross Stewart, is set some centuries later during the Cromwellian occupation of Ireland; in Kilkenny in fact, where an English girl called Robyn Goodfellowe (Honor Kneafsey) who idolizes her hunter father (Sean Bean, in essentially a reprisal of Ned Stark) meets a zealous young wolfwalker Mebh Mac TÃre (Eva Whittaker), desperate to defend her forest and her wolves against the English scourge.
You’d be right if you detect the DNA of Princess Mononoke in that premise. Cartoon Saloon has always had a notable Studio Ghibli influence present in their work, and since Ghibli’s closure has better followed in their footsteps than any other animation studio. Like Mononoke, Wolfwalkers is a film about man vs. nature with a hefty emphasis on the ills of deforestation. But Wolfwalkers comes with even more specific and cogent thematic weight attached linked to the context it is set to. Wolves are extinct in Ireland. They were exterminated from the isle during the Cromwellian conquest and the last ones died out by the late eighteenth century. This is depicted in-film through the campaign waged against them by the Lord Protector (unspecified, but likely Oliver Cromwell himself, voiced by Simon McBurney) who equates “taming” the wolves with “taming” Ireland. Thus, hunting the wolves is illustrated as an act conducive to cultural genocide. The wolves themselves are romanticized, mythologized all through the film, a lament to this lost part of Irish heritage; and the wolfwalkers in their earthy pagan designs, bounty of natural colours, and exuberant looseness, in contrast to the rigidity, grayness, and homogeneity of the English aesthetics, are avatars of a long-past, freed Ireland.
Freedom is a central notion of the film, both narratively and visually. The English-controlled Kilkenny is designed to resemble a prison, the labour Robyn is tasked with is of a monotonous industrial variety, and she even feels trapped in her own home. Outside the town in the woods though, there are no rules and no limitations, reflected in the much more free-wheeling and elaborate landscapes and the richer, brighter palette schemes. At the heart of the film is an allegorical connection between England and Ireland through the budding friendship of Robyn and Mebh, with perhaps even a lesson on reconciliation, applicable in an age where wounds still run deep and the U.K. continues to have a poor relationship with the Republic.
The relevant symbolism is not lost either in the era of Greta Thunberg that Robyn and Mebh are both young girls fighting ignorant adults for environmental preservation. But they’re a lot more than just metaphors for the films’ various themes. Both are fiercely compelling and enjoyable characters who share a wonderful curiosity and nuanced relationships with their parents -the conspicuous absence of Mebh’s wolfwalker mother (Maria Doyle Kennedy) while her body lies in wait drives much of the films’ underlying drama. Their own relationship is quite endearing as well, as it takes many different forms over the hour and a half run-time. Robyns’ hollow life engenders a great deal of sympathy, and the adventure that accompanies her journey to escape it is plotted with astonishing care. The script by Will Collins allows for her immense humanity to shine through, even in moments where it’s not necessarily expected. Mebh undergoes a great deal of emotional development as well, and the movie is emotional, with a couple moments as tender as any great Pixar beat. It all amounts to a story that is a perfect fable in and of itself, striking that balance of mythic and modern beautifully.
But of course it is the animation that is the core of the movies’ power. Maintaining that strictly two-dimensional storybook style that characterized The Secret of Kells and Song of the Sea, Wolfwalkers looks just as glorious if not more so, as it plumbs the limitless potential of its’ art. Moore, Stewart, and their team continue to create truly breathtaking images as they experiment with perspective, linework, depth of field, and subjectivity. They move outside their comfort zone with new techniques and a series of sequences animated to a primal, fluid sketch-work aesthetic inspired by The Tale of the Princess Kaguya. Yet still present is the exquisite lushness, the visual thematic architecture (such as how the urban unnaturalness of Kilkenny tends to loom over the world outside), and Moore’s seeming obsession with circular patterns, down to the characters themselves. And it is all utterly mesmerizing. The style of Cartoon Saloons’ work never fails to enchant, it is so sharp and unique, so fundamentally lovely and appealing, and Wolfwalkers represents its’ fullest maturation yet. And as usual, the music is fittingly complimentary, with a score by Bruno Coulias and the folk band KÃla, as well as a couple great songs, one by Norwegian singer Aurora -last heard in Frozen II.
Wolfwalkers has a revisionist attitude towards its’ chosen chapter of Irish history, in what can only be described as a family-friendly version of Inglorious Basterds. It comes with just as much catharsis, but a more meaningful intent, as it not only creates a portrait of what could have been, but in its’ echoes to our current reality bolsters hope for the future. It’s a movie that leaves you in high spirits where it would earlier ferment great tension.
Wolfwalkers is a stunning film in every respect, a diamond in the rough that reminds you of the unparalleled beauty and craft in traditional animation -sorely all but extinct in the current cinematic landscape. Yet it is perhaps greater for its’ rarity, blowing out of the water every animated film since Into the Spider-Verse in both its’ visuals and storytelling. And it seems to confirm that Cartoon Saloon is the best at what they do, in product if not in frequency. I’m incredibly excited to see Nora Twomeys’ My Father’s Dragon (due to come out on Netflix next year), and whatever Tomm Moore and the rest do next now that they’ve completed their folklore triptych in the most satisfying way.
For now though, I’m content to bask in Wolfwalkers, the most joyous movie experience I’ve had in a year that’s provided little joy, and wait eagerly for my next chance to watch it!
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