Forgotten Island

October 23 – 29

Fri Oct 23 – 3:30 & 7 pm
Sat Oct 24 – 1:30 & 7 pm
Sun Oct 25 – 1:30 & 7 pm
Mon Oct 26 – 7 pm
Tues Oct 27 – 7 pm
Wed Oct 28 – 3:30 pm Afternoon show ONLY
Thurs Oct 29 – 1:30 & 7 pm

Animated Adventure / Kid & Family
Rated PG — 1 hr 49 min

Dreamworks Animation’s latest celebrates Filipino folklore with dazzling wit and imagination. The voice cast for this tale of friendship, heritage and growing up includes H.E.R., Dave Franco, Liza Soberano, Jenny Slate, Manny Jacinto, Dolly de Leon and Jo Koy. There’s so much going on thematically and visually in DreamWorks Animation’s new effort that audiences may have a hard time keeping up with it. But that’s all to the good for this rare example of original animated storytelling in a sea of IP and sequels. Utilizing elements of Filipino culture in its wildly imaginative storyline about two friends transported to a mythical land, Forgotten Island marks another winner for directors-screenwriters Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado, who previously punched above their weight with 2022’s Puss in Boots: The Last Wish.

Set in the Philippines in the 1990s, the story revolves around schoolgirls Jo (Kailey Crawford and singer-songwriter H.E.R. as the younger and older versions), a mischievous troublemaker who regales her class with extravagantly bloody and horrific folkloric stories passed down from her beloved grandmother Lola (Dolly de Leon, Triangle of Sadness), and the more serious-minded Raissa (Kayla Teruel and Liza Soberano), who dreams of becoming a scientist.

The script is genuinely funny, but what makes Forgotten Island so successful as a comedy is that the writing and animation are in lock-step. This film is overflowing with visual creativity; rules for character design and physics exist solely to be broken over and over again in delightfully ridiculous ways. In truth, there’s far too much here to process in one viewing, but the point isn’t to absorb every single moment – it’s to be swept up in the manic energy they create in unison.

Following the stylistic experimentation of Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, DreamWorks continues moving away from the polished uniformity that once dominated major studio animation. Forgotten Island is bursting with colour and texture, shifting between painterly 3D animation, flashes of anime influence, comic-book framing and exaggerated visual flourishes that allow words and sounds to become part of the environment itself.

It sounds busy – and occasionally it is – but rarely does it feel undisciplined. Crawford and Mercado integrate those different influences into a remarkably cohesive whole. The animation changes because the storytelling demands it, rather than because the filmmakers simply want to demonstrate another visual trick.

At a time when so much family entertainment seems engineered around recognisable properties and easily marketable familiarity, Forgotten Island feels thrillingly personal. Crawford and Mercado have taken the universal anxiety of watching a formative friendship enter uncertain territory and filtered it through Filipino mythology, irreverent humour and some of the most expressive animation DreamWorks has produced.

The movie is so imaginative, energetic, and sincere that it should be fun for just about everyone. But the ideal audience might be preteen and young teen viewers who haven’t considered what lies ahead for their friendship and could benefit from a story that acknowledges how devastating that kind of change can be, but also how mundane and survivable it is.