Soul, Pixar’s latest release now available on Disney+, is a good film. It shows Joe Gardner (Jamie Foxx), a music teacher whose long-awaited dreams of being a jazz pianist are inconveniently delayed by his death. With the help of an “Unborn Soul” (Tina Fey), Joe makes a perilous journey back to his comatose body, touching upon profound existential questions on the meaning of life in a way only Pixar could.
Exquisitely animated sequences where Joe stops to reflect upon the small everyday experiences of life make Soul, in many ways, the movie people needed in 2020. It, alongside Pixar’s other 2020 release Onward, was inevitably nominated for the Oscars for Best Animated Feature, and Soul’s high-profile popularity and track record of other wins mean it's likely to cinch the small golden statue. However, this would be a mistake.
This is not because of Soul’s own faults, like an emotionally dishonest ending, or some pacing issues in the middle. But rather than a worthier contender is nominated this year; the breathtakingly beautiful Irish animated adventure Wolfwalkers. Glancing at binary aggregative like Rotten Tomatoes, Wolfwalkers has a 99% approval rating from critics and 100% from audiences, beating out any other 2020 animated feature including Soul (albeit not by much). And such praise is justified, as Wolfwalkers is a stunning achievement whose bold and gripping story is expressed through a luscious animated style. Wolfwalkers should beat Pixar at the Oscars on its own merits, but also on what a victory would mean.
Wolfwalkers follows the 17th-century English tomboy Robyn (Honor Kneafsey), whose moved to and been locked within the walls of the Irish town of Kilkenny, recently occupied by the authoritarian Lord Protector (Simon McBurney). Robyn was brought alongside her beefy but kindly father Bill Goodfellowe (Sean Bean), a huntsman conscripted by the Lord Protector to exterminate the mystical wolfpacks roaming Kilkenney’s outside forest and attacking its woodcutters.
However, the rebellious Robyn disobeys her assigned duties as a scullery maid to join her father’s hunt, and gets lost in the woods before encountering the supernatural “wolfwalker” Mebh (Eva Whittaker). Mebh is a gleeful, free-spirited rascal, able to transform into a wolf whilst asleep, whom quickly bonds with Robyn despite their opposing environments.
The irresistible draw of Wolfwalkers is its gorgeous animation, with clean and detailed 2D animation combined with water-colored backdrops, resulting in a film both luxuriously vibrant on any frame but also bursting with energy when in motion. Many 3D animated features aim for realism, with Toy Story 4 (2019) particularly lauded for its intricate algorithmic lighting and fur. But Wolfwalkers embraces a modulated ‘cartoon’ style and emulates a Celtic storybook come to life, its distinctive designs and autumnal colors drawing viewers into its cozy, imaginative world.
The animation is melded into the storytelling. The hard stone lines of Kilkenney emphasize the town’s oppressive structures, while the outside forest is curved and organic like the bouncy mane of Mebh’s red hair. Some of Wolfwalker’s most impressive moments is when the format itself seems to break down, as sequences of emotional intensity – such as Robyn running through the woods or the Lord Protector preparing an execution – make character’s sketch-lines start to appear or their drawings become bolder as if the swelling feelings of the scenes push against the film’s animations very borders.
Such animated splendor serves Wolfwalker’s moving story about balancing industrial “order” and natural “freedom.” Robyn is far from the first rebellious daughter in animation, but her relationship with Bill is sold strongly, with Sean Bean bringing a regional warmth to a single father agonizing over his daughter’s safety, even if it means making her conform against her nature. Mebh and Robyn also forge a joyous and primal bond, with resounding freedom against the desire of outside forces to “tame” and control. Setting Wolfwalkers during the English occupation of Ireland under Oliver Cromwell’s commonwealth invites readings of colonization, with enough exciting magic and sincere emotional characters to make Wolfwalkers engaging for all ages.
Wolfwalkers is the third and final installment of co-director Tomm Moore’s thematic “Irish Folklore Triologym” including The Secret of the Kells (2009) and Song of the Sea (2014). Moore also co-founded the animated studio which produced these works, Cartoon Saloon, based in the Kilkenney of Wolfwalkers 400 years later. This independent Irish studio has consistently set itself apart from other animated outputs with luscious traditional hand-drawn animation combined with rich cultural stories. Every single feature Cartoon Salon has created – including The Breadwinner (2017) – has been nominated for the Oscar’s Best Animated Feature. And every single time, they’ve been beaten by Pixar and Disney.
In some ways this is unsurprising. The films which beat Cartoon Saloon – Up (2009), Big Hero 6 (2014), and Coco (2017) – were all respectable entries that a juggernaut like Disney can finance marketing and campaigns for more effectively than a small Irish studio. They were far more successful than Cartoon Saloon’s film, including with Disney’s attachment of big-name actors for the voices, with Soul featuring Jamie Foxx and Tina Fey. Pixar carries a recognition of quality animation, becoming a brand onto themselves, which the Academy automatically awards. Pixar has won 12 of the 15 times they’ve been eligible. There’s a reason it’s nicknamed the “Pixar Award.”
This isn’t saying that Pixar does not deserve their awards and acclaim. Rather, that Pixar is often designated as the “good animation” by the Academy, which undermined and overlook the rest of the medium. The category itself is relatively new, having only been established in 2002 given the boom of animated studios that could compete with Disney. Dreamwork’s Shrek (2001), whose behind-the-scenes production and subtextual story are entirely about this rivalry with Disney, won the first Animated Oscar.
In some ways, a separate category enables the Academy to spotlight more animated films than would otherwise be nominated, and bestow prestige upon the industry. However, the category also sequesters animated films into a distinct division that rarely rewards outsider nominations. Other Oscar categories at least pretend to be open to anything. For animated films, however, the winner is often simply the most “popular” film, with the unspoken implication being that Academy voters don’t bother watching nominations outside the mainstream.
Soul doesn’t require any more attention, having been a heavily promoted and successful film from an already acclaimed studio. Wolfwalkers is an underdog film, whose win would signal the non-Hollywood studios and distinct animated styles the medium is capable of. The Oscars do not matter as arbiters of the year’s “best” films. No awards can do that. What they can do is focus attention, and through rewarding innovative films like Wolfwalkers it sends a signal to general audiences and to the industry.
Animation can do anything. Unlike the corporeal limits of live-action, animation has positively limitless potential that can represent anything its creators imagine. Wolfwalkers in itself isn’t a complete reimagining of animated potential, having roots in Celtic fables and Princess Mononoke. Nor does it reframe animation as not only “being for kids,” since it’s still proudly a family film. But Wolfwalkers is still a unique product that blazes its out trail through the forest.
A win for Wolfwalkers would also be a tangible victory for traditional hand-drawn animation in an increasingly 3D world. Hayao Miyazaki’s masterpiece Spirited Away (2001) is the only animated feature to win the Animated Oscar, and even it had its English dub distributed by Disney. Studio Ghibli, one of the last torch-carrier of 2D animation, also recently released the 3D animated film Earwig and the Witch. 2D animation is costly and time-consuming, and it's little wonder that it's dwindling amongst the high demands and low expectations placed upon animated features. But an Oscar win for Wolfwalkers just might ignite sustained interest in this type of film and, much like Robyn in the forest, save such imaginative and magical worlds from going extinct.
Wolfwalkers is available now on Apple TV+.