At the risk of sounding hyperbolic, there’s something about the purity of great animated storytelling that can shatter your heart and then make it whole again. (Think .) Latvian director Gints Zilbalodis’ captivating second feature, , is that kind of marvel, a vividly experiential white-knuckle survival adventure that takes place in a world on the brink of ruin.
Told entirely without dialogue, this tale of a cat that evolves from self-preservation to solidarity with a motley crew of other species is something quite special. Acquired out of for North America by Sideshow and Janus Films, is of a piece with Zilbalodis’ lauded 2019 debut ; both are essentially silent movies and both owe a debt to the painterly canvases of animation master Hayao Miyazaki. The new work drops characters designed in classic cartoon style into ravishing photo-realistic environments, at times recalling the woodsy landscapes of Danish artist Peder Mørk Mønsted.
Images of nature shimmer with light and color, though a shadow of danger is never far away. The cat at the center of the story is a skinny gray feline of indeterminate gender that looks to be somewhere between kittenhood and full maturity. It’s clever and resilient but also skittish, a small creature in a big scary forest, bizarrely dotted with large-scale cat sculptures, including one giant kitty that towers above the treetops.
Scaffolding indicates that it’s a work left unfinished, one of many signs throughout the film that human li.
