DVD Movie Review: Kubo and the Two Strings (Lights, Camera, Action!)

Kubo and the Two Strings (UK Rating: PG)

Young Kubo has a difficult start to his life. While still in swaddling, his grandfather, "The Moon King," tears his left eye from his head and takes his father from him. While fleeing for their lives, the pair is run down while crossing the seas and left shipwrecked. Despite all this, mother and son manage to escape and build a life together on this quaint island. A few years later and Kubo, as a young boy, has become the provider for the duo. His mother's memories and sanity are slowly drifting away, but brave Kubo looks after her, travelling to the small nearby village and telling the stories his mother told him - using a little origami and a little magic to put on amazing scenes before rushing back before dark to care for his mother, and always before dark. His mother's warnings of her evil sisters coming to get him and take his other eye constantly haunt his steps.

Compared to the dark works that have come before, this is very much a grand fantasy adventure. Kubo makes a great trek across the world with his companions, taking on big dangers and hunting down the artefacts from his father's life. His companions are certainly unique: an overbearing monkey with attitude and a former disciple of Kubo's father, and a giant beetle/human samurai with amnesia. Kubo doesn't have to rely on his companions, though; he isn't exactly a defenceless little boy, as he inherited some of his mother's magic, and when playing her Shamisen (a three-string guitar-like instrument from Japan) he can control paper, bringing little origami creations to life in fantastical ways. This makes for some visually spectacular moments; in particular, Kubo's retelling of his father's adventures using a little origami samurai version of his father is great. Watching the little origami samurai cutting various origami creatures to pieces, its sword slashing through them and spraying red confetti in a stylish flourish, is a joy to behold.

The stop-motion style is something rarely seen anymore and it looks absolutely phenomenal. LAIKA has done something completely new with this latest movie; it's definitely its most ambitious yet, creating a huge action film in stop motion - the scale of this movie is crazy. The extra features on the disc give a glimpse behind the curtain and show just how some of the sets and creations come about. It's mind blowing. The centrepieces are, of course, the big "boss battles," with some frankly amazing practical effects. The "Garden of Eyes" mashes up Lovecraft and the Sarlacc pit as LAIKA combines animatronics and hypnotic light tricks for a uniquely chilling creature, and then takes puppets to the extreme with a titanic skeletal guardian, a puppet so huge it required a team to make its tiny movements and only a handful of frames a day taken. What makes this movie special, though, aren't just the big set pieces, it's also the dedication to every little detail. The filmmakers spent a great amount of time learning all about Japanese culture and bringing in cultural experts to make everything feel so very authentic and it's this care and dedication that really shines through in the quality of the end product.

9/10

Exceptional - Gold Award

Kubo and the Two Strings is a visually stunning and fantastically grand adventure. The word epic is thrown around far too much these days, but it is more than justified here. It is a truly epic undertaking by LAIKA and certainly its best movie to date. While not as dark as some of its past works, this is still hard hitting and full of emotion. An amazing movie that kids and parents alike will adore and hopefully the one that will finally bring LAIKA its long overdue Academy Award!