Animation house Laika debuted its sprawling stop-motion epic “Wildwood” at the London Film Festival, marking the premiere of the Oregon studio’s most technically ambitious feature to date. Directed and produced by Laika Chief Executive Officer Travis Knight, the fantasy adventure is scheduled for theatrical release by Fathom Entertainment on Wednesday, Oct. 23.
Adapted by screenwriter Chris Butler from the 2011 novel by The Decemberists frontman Colin Meloy and illustrator Carson Ellis, the PG-13 film runs two hours and 12 minutes. The story centers on Prue McKeel, a Portland teenager voiced by Peyton Elizabeth Lee, whose infant brother Mac is snatched away by a flock of crows. Alongside her awkward classmate Curtis Mehlberg, voiced by Jacob Tremblay, Prue ventures across the Willamette River into the forbidden “Impassable Wilderness” to rescue the toddler.
Once inside the enchanted forest, the two youngsters are separated and thrust into a conflict involving talking beasts, royal factions, and a grief-stricken dowager governess named Alexandra, voiced by Carey Mulligan. The ensemble voice cast also includes Angela Bassett as an avian general, Mahershala Ali as a bandit commander, Tom Waits as a loyal coyote soldier, and Maya Erskine and Jake Johnson as Prue’s parents, alongside appearances by Charlie Day, Awkwafina, and Richard E. Grant.
Years in the making
The film spent 16 years in development at the studio before entering physical production in 2021, Deadline reported. Over a shoot lasting 1,155 days, animators hand-molded 728 miniature trees, deployed more than 715 miles of brass armature wire, and utilized 142,000 separate 3D-printed facial models, according to IndieWire.
To capture the massive scale, Knight enlisted six-time Academy Award-nominated cinematographer Caleb Deschanel, marking his first animated project. The production also partnered with visual effects company Wētā FX to integrate computer-generated enhancements into 670 of the movie’s 2,804 shots, augmenting miniature backdrops, large crowds, and complex battle sequences, IndieWire noted.
Critical reception
Initial critical reactions underscored the movie’s towering visual accomplishments while offering differing takes on its story structure. TheWrap praised the release as an astonishing achievement in tactile cinema, writing that the production infused unmistakable human artistry and soul into each handcrafted frame.
Deadline described the picture as a stunning fantasy adventure that matches emotional character arcs with groundbreaking camera work, noting that Deschanel gave the stop-motion sets the visual weight of live-action cinematography. The Guardian called the film an exuberant and pleasingly traditional quest story that affectionately skewers modern Portland culture, though it questioned whether the antagonist’s motivations were fully clear.
IndieWire offered a more reserved perspective, writing that while the production serves as an undeniable triumph of physical animation craft, the dense narrative can feel tropey and slightly less magical than earlier studio landmarks such as “Coraline” or “Kubo and the Two Strings.”
Following its London world premiere, “Wildwood” is scheduled to hold its North American premiere as the opening selection of the AFI Fest in Hollywood later this month before launching nationwide on Oct. 23.
