The Red Turtle - Movie Review

The Red Turtle was a co-production between Wild Bunch and Studio Ghibli, my favorite animation studio of all time, so naturally I was interested in seeing this film. I could have seen it at AFI Fest, but all of the showings were either at the exact same time that La La Land was showing, or the exact same time that Patterson was showing, so unfortunately I missed it because those two films were a higher priority for me. It took forever to get here for some reason, despite the fact that it was nominated for Best Animated Feature at the Oscars this year. This is a film about a castaway who washes up on the shore of a deserted island and attempts to survive. At least that's the first act. He makes rafts, he tries to get out of there, he seems to be very handy. You don't know really anything about him at all beyond the fact that he was in a small boat, and he washed up on the island, and now he's just there. What is he going to do? How is he going to survive? As he makes these rafts and tries to escape, some unseen force keeps halting him from doing that, keeps destroying the raft from underneath him, and eventually he learns that a very large red turtle is the culprit, and I'm not going to get into much else beyond that. Some very interesting twists and turns happen after that, and the entire film, for the most part, is completely free of dialogue. There's a few times where somebody goes, hey, and tries to figure out if, you know, there's anybody else on this island, but there's no dialogue in this movie. It's entirely told through visual storytelling, which is something that I love. I don't think enough directors working today utilize visual storytelling. Spielberg does it quite a bit. Kubrick did it quite a bit. Directors who are able to communicate exactly what they want to to the audience with no one saying anything, entirely through the emotion on the characters' faces or through the way shots are edited together, and that's one of the things I absolutely adore about The Red Turtle. This movie is nothing but visual storytelling. You're meant to feel every emotion this guy is feeling just through the way his face looks and through the way the shots are constructed, and this is a beautiful looking movie, especially the backgrounds. There's an incredible looking bamboo forest that really stands out. The color green in this movie just explodes. I mean, this is a visually stunning film. It is at times, though, a little hard to get invested in because it entirely relies on that visual storytelling, and we're so used to seeing films where you are learning things about characters, you're feeling their emotions, you're getting into their lives, and you have interesting dialogue along the way, but in this film you don't have that at all. Gratefully, it's only 80 minutes long, and I think if it was any longer than that, it would have outstayed its welcome because there are moments in this movie where you feel like you're watching an elongated short film that's extremely well directed and gorgeously animated and has some very interesting subtext to say about life and the process of life, just explored in a very unique and different way, and that's one of the things I do also love about this movie is its exploration of the ups and downs of life, what can come with life, the hardships of it, the trials and the tribulations, all in a very short time and told entirely through visual storytelling, so you're able to feel a lot of emotion just from that, which is really something to be praised. I don't think it's as good as some of the other films in the animated category, like Kubo and the Two Strings, Moana, Zootopia, and I don't think it's as good as Your Name, which was my favorite animation of last year, which wasn't even nominated. I also think The Boy and the Beast is a better animated film than The Red Turtle. The Red Turtle is a gorgeous movie, beautifully animated, with a lot of really cool things to say in a very different way, with no real answers. It's a very ambiguous film that's in a way almost a love letter to nature. Even the nature with a capital N, that's a direct quote, is what he was trying to tribute in this movie. The feel of that euphoria you get when you truly see something beautiful in nature, and the way it can affect you, and the way it affects your life, and I think it's a gorgeous movie. I do think that from a substance standpoint, the film is a little weak though. I'm going to give The Red Turtle a B. Guys, thank you so much as always for watching. This week is going to be insane with reviews. I have a lot of really cool things coming to you. Some very early reviews I'm excited about that I can't wait to bring to you. I also have my X-Men Origins Wolverine hilariosity coming tomorrow with my buddy The Flick Pick. Look forward to that. You guys are the best. Thank you so much as always for watching. What did you think of that Oscars Best Picture Confusion? That was insanity. I had an Oscar party last night. We went nuts. We just went nuts. I have never seen that in my life. That was crazy. What were your guys' thoughts on that? What's your favorite animated film of last year? Thank you so much guys for watching, and if you like this, you can click right here and get Stuckmanized.