Laika’s stop-motion fantasy Wildwood looks so smooth

Due to a scheduling mishap, I was only able to check out two movies on my second day at the Toronto International Film Festival — but I did manage to get an early look at and some fascinating details on one of my most anticipated films this year.

Even if you don’t know the name Laika, you probably know the studio’s work; it’s the animation house behind stop-motion hits like ParaNorman, The Boxtrolls, and Kubo and the Two Strings. Over the years Laika’s films have steadily gotten more impressive on both a technical and artistic level. Which brings us to the incredible-looking Wildwood, hitting theaters next month. If you’re unfamiliar, here’s a look:

Some of the crew from Laika was on stage at TIFF to talk about the making of Wildwood, in particular why this film looks more lifelike than the studio’s previous work. There are a few reasons. One has to do with the animation itself, which, as you can see in the trailer, is incredibly smooth in the new film. “We’re in the midst of the evolution of an art form,” Laika’s head of animation Brad Schiff explained. “Because we have digital cameras, we’re able to see what we’re doing; we have what we call frame-grabbers.” This lets Laika’s animators see all of the recently-shot frames as they’re animating, allowing them to track every single movement of a puppet, ensuring everything moves smoothly. “There’s no reason for stuttery animation, other than a stylistic choice,” Schiff said.

The puppets themselves are also more advanced. They utilize an internal “diaphragm” that Laika calls a breather, which the studio first experimented with on its previous film, 2019’s Missing Link. This time, all of the major puppets are outfitted with breathers, and this lets the animators make characters appear to breathe in a lifelike way, so that they seem more human in the final product.

You can see some of that in the trailer above, but I was also able to watch a handful of clips from the film, and — despite Laika stressing that they weren’t final — they looked incredible. One showed a fast and tense bike chase through a bustling version of Portland, where Wildwood takes place. There was a speed and tension to it that felt like a live-action sequence. In the movie, a young girl named Prue loses her little brother in an “impassable wilderness” that’s home to a rich fantasy world, and in the clips I saw she did everything from escape from an ornate mansion filled with guard dogs distracted by their own tails, to soar above a vast landscape while on the back of a giant bird. Wildwood looked as stylish and detailed as you’d expect from a Laika production, but what impressed me the most was how realistic it all felt in motion.

A few other details for those who love numbers: Wildwood features 233 puppets (36 are just versions of Prue), was brought to life by 49 animators, and took 231 weeks from start to finish. It’s in theaters on October 23rd.

As for the movies I was able to actually catch on day 2 of TIFF, they were both great, but also could not be more different. One is a sweetly morbid musical, the other a life-affirming family film made with traditional animation. And if you missed my previous TIFF coverage — including films like All of a Sudden and The Only Living Pickpocket in New York — you can check it out right here.

Julián comes via Irish animation studio Cartoon Saloon, best-known for the features Song of the Sea and Wolfwalkers. And it shares much in common with the studio’s previous work, telling the story of a child lost in a world of fantasy. In this case it’s seven-year-old Julián who goes to live with his grandmother in Brooklyn while his dad is on a work trip. Julián is obsessed with ocean life and anything pretty, so when he meets some kids making costumes for an upcoming mermaid parade, joining in becomes his sole focus in life. But his colorful personality often clashes with his more conservative grandmother, and when some boys bully Julián forwearing a mermaid tail, he starts to retreat into himself. Ultimately, Julián is a fairly straightforward tale about being yourself and allowing others to do the same, but it’s told with tremendous style and passion, making it a welcome addition to the studio’s catalogue. Plus, the ending is almost guaranteed to make you tear up.

A love story between an eccentric taxidermist and the man who agrees to give up his life in order to fulfill her life-long dream of stuffing a human. Oh, and also it’s a musical. Stuffed has shades of Sweeney Todd, but despite its macabre premise, it’s much more heartfelt. Barrie (Harry Melling) lives a sad life working at a sandwich factory, collecting obituaries, and caring for his aging mother. But he’s obsessed with being remembered, and when he answers an online ad promising to make him “exceptional,” he meets Araminta (Jodie Comer), whose house is filled with taxidermied animals, but who has also always wanted to take the next step. Their interests, it seems, line up: she wants to stuff a person, he wants to live forever. But as they work together on the weirdo plan, the two become close, complicating the whole killing Barry thing. Stuffed is morbid and occasionally wince-inducing, but it’s also filled with a lot of love and heart, and a not-so-surprising amount of humor.