Laika has made two of the greatest films of all time, and two good, but underwhelming ones. Coraline is a scary masterpiece and Paranorman is so emotionally wrenching and important that in its greatness will never be understated. The Boxtrolls was more slapstick silliness but was just bizarre enough to mess with the conventional trappings that it was part of. Kubo and the Two Strings is a film that while creative as Laika has ever gotten seems to bungle its own premise by being too compromised. The route that it takes is new and heartfelt, but it’s not satisfying, unfortunately. This new route goes a little like this: by using the pre-built idea that this kids movie will automatically include a message, the film dangles a fulfilling one in front of our faces and then out of nowhere swaps it away. That’s some complex story mechanics there, but the reason it doesn’t work is because the message that we end up getting is less satisfying and meaningful than the one proposed in the beginning. Kubo is our young protagonist who can control origami paper using his own magic and a magic guitar. One night he stays out too late, in order to contact the spirit of his father, and is found by his night dominating grandfather, the Moon King and his aunts, all mystical “God” like characters attempting to take revenge on Kubo’s mother for leaving them and trying to rip out the one eye Kubo has left (they took the other one). That’s a lot of exciting setup that’s wholly original, and the film cleverly establishes the rules though a beautifully animated story that Kubo tells with paper, and a heavy helping of exposition (one of the film’s biggest problems). All of this set up pretty much works though. Kubo is an understandable character, the Moon King and the sisters are “Other Mother” from Coraline menacing, and the disparity of Kubo’s mother to protect him is emotionally satisfying. The opening moments are so overwhelmingly impressive from an animation set up, you might swear you were just watching real people. It’s beautiful. But then the first message comes in. Through a series of events Kubo must go find three pieces of mystical armour: a sword, a breastplate, and a helmet, with the help of a monkey (Charlize Theron) and a Beetle-man (Matthew McConaughey). As the trip progresses, it all seems ok. The message is obvious. A melancholy look at the way that in a modern world sometimes your family wants to hurt you and it’s important to trust adults that will always be good to you. That’s an important and relevant message having to do with trust in foster parents and the meaning of true kindness from a guardian...that the film completely cops out on. As the film twists and turns it takes the original setup that is so lush and takes it in unsatisfyingly easy routes. The emotional maturity of the material is important to consider, but the new message about the legacy of the dead seems forced into the movie, and is less grounded than the original one considering whether or not family is really good for the characters. It makes one think that the chaotic group fight that would have been all but mandatory in the climax was not possible for Laika to pull off because of budgetary or creative reasons and it’s unfortunate that this cripples the emotional throughline of the movie. All that said, Kubo is easily one of the most impressive animated films technically ever made. Stop-motion animation proves itself to do anything in this film. It’s marvelously impressive, especially one of the most thrilling of the year taking place between Monkey and one of the evil sisters. The difficulty of Kubo comes mainly in the fact that looking at all of its parts it’s a truly breathtaking film. Everything that leads to its downfall isn’t all that bad either, presenting a sense of maturity that is not often seen. The film just doesn’t really add up or feel all that good, and with all the beautiful work that went in, it really should. Kubo and the Two Strings gets a 6.5 out of 10.
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December 2017
CategoriesAuthorHello welcome to FilmAnalyst. My name is Stephen Tronicek, and I really like movies. This is a way to get my opinions out to people. Thank you for visiting. |