Above: Boxtrolls!
What
marks Laika Studios as interesting to me (besides the fact that one of their
main branches is based here in Portland) is the lasting impact they’ve made,
despite only making two features: 2009’s “Coraline” and 2012’s
“ParaNorman.” They’re probably the
leading studio using stop-motion animation for features, and they employ it to
great effect, telling spooky stories that also have a lot of heart behind them.
That, and “ParaNorman” was a
legitimately excellent movie, one you should make a point to go see. And while Laika’s third effort, “The
Boxtrolls,” doesn’t quite live up to its predecessor, it is still an
entertaining ride nonetheless.
“The Boxtrolls” begins in the
Dickensian town of Cheesebridge, where the infant son of the inventor Mr.
Trubshaw (Simon Pegg) is taken away in the night by the titular Boxtrolls, a
race of underground-dwelling creatures who wear cardboard boxes as
clothes/camouflage. This inciting
incident is enough to put the vicious Archibald Snatcher (Ben Kingsley) and his
Red Hat Exterminators in charge of ridding Cheesbridge of the monsters. The baby, however, could not be in more caring
hands as the Boxtrolls are actually gentle, cowardly creatures, who scrounge
for and tinker with devices thrown out by the humans.
For a decade, the Boxtrolls raise
the boy, Eggs (Isaac Hempstead-Wright), as one of their own, over which time
Snatcher’s men drastically reduce the Boxtroll population. But everything changes when Eggs’ adoptive
father Fish (Dee Bradley Baker) is captured, inspiring Eggs to trek to the
world above to save him—and ultimately team up with the mayor’s delightfully
morbid daughter Winnie (Elle Fanning) to take down Snatcher.
This being a Laika production, it
goes without saying that the film looks amazing, but I’m gonna say it
anyway—“The Boxtrolls” looks wonderful. Every
cobblestone brick in the city, every gizmo and doodad in the trolls’ cavern, and
every line of fabric worn by the Cheesbridge upper class is lovingly detailed
by teams of animation artisans. And in
addition, the characters are molded in that exaggerated, Tim Burton-y sort of
way (which gives them each a distinct and memorable look) and the stop-motion
animation is more fluid than ever, thereby allowing the action and adventure
side of the story to really soar.
Alas, the film’s script (by Irena
Brignull and Adam Pava) doesn’t live up to the pedigree of the production
design. It’s not bad, but it’s very
basic and aims for a younger target audience than previous Laika films. Gross-out gags and slapstick ride high here,
and while they’re never groan-worthy, they’re never as funny as they’re aiming
for either. Some of the characters are
similarly milquetoast—most troublingly, Eggs’ fish-out-of-water story gets
little play until partway through the second act, making the film’s themes
(more on them later) feel underdeveloped.
Honestly, the villains feel like
they should have been the main characters here. Snatcher is a surprisingly
complex baddie: a voracious social climber who hopes that ridding Cheesbridge
of its troll infestation will earn him a place of prestige among the town’s
famed White Hat Society. And the other
Red Hats provide the movie’s biggest laughs.
Snatcher’s stooges, Mr. Pickles and Mr. Trout (Richard Ayoade and Nick
Frost) even ponder aloud the morality of their actions and their place in the
universe (like a turn-of-the-century Rosencrantz and Guildenstern) to hilarious
effect.
Central to this story are themes of
change and identity: that a person decides who they are, and that they can’t be
truly changed by new clothes or newly learned behaviors. And in that regard, “Boxtrolls” mostly
succeeds. It’s not the game-changer that
its big brother “Norman” was, but it’s still a fun, easy-going ride that’ll
keep the kids entertained and even crack up the adults, all the while looking
like nothing else out there. If you’ve
got little ones, or if you’re just a fan of animation like I am, go check it
out.
No comments:
Post a Comment