Laika's “Wildwood” premiered at the BFI London Film Festival, and the reviews are rapturous. They're also clearly stronger than the reception for the festival's other big animated premiere, Brad Bird's “Ray Gunn,” which screened yesterday. I'm still very much looking forward to “Ray Gunn,” but right now it's “Wildwood” that has the momentum.
Here's how the critics are scoring it:
The Telegraph: 5/5
ScreenRant: 10/10
Next Best Picture: 9/10
Collider: 9/10
IGN: 8/10
Variety: Positive
The Hollywood Reporter: Positive
Screen Daily: Positive
IndieWire: B-
The Guardian: 3/5
The Telegraph didn't hold back: "I think I've just seen the most beautiful stop-motion film ever made." Collider argued that among Laika's many visually striking films over nearly two decades, Wildwood “rises above all of them,” with “some of the year's most breathtaking sequences.” The Hollywood Reporter called it a dark fable of colossal proportions and "the most ambitious stop-motion film I've ever seen."
That's high praise from a studio whose filmography includes “Coraline,” and “Kubo and the Two Strings.” Knight directed ‘Kubo,’ which is still the studio's high-water mark for a lot of people, so the claim that he's topped it is significant.
The dissenters are mild. IndieWire's B- and Bradshaw's 3/5 are lukewarm rather than pans, and they look like outliers next to everyone else.
Travis Knight is working with a script written by Chris Butler (“ParaNorman”). The film is adapted from the “Wildwood” books by Colin Meloy. The story centers on Prue McKeel, a teenager whose infant brother is kidnapped by a flock of crows, drawing her into the Impassable Wilderness — an enchanted forest hidden, as it turns out, on the outskirts of Portland, Oregon.
Knight’s animated epic will be rated PG-13, which is somewhat unusual for an animated movie and suggests that the film is being made with an older audience in mind. The rating could also limit the film’s reach, particularly among younger children, placing a commercial ceiling on it and signaling that this is not a traditionally family-oriented animated film.
That 132-minute runtime is another indicator of an animated film that seems to be straying from the typical kiddie audience with shorter attention spans. LAIKA has described the film as an expansive handcrafted adventure, with earlier reports highlighting the project’s ambitious scale, including hundreds of sets and nearly 250 practical puppets.
“Wildwood” hits theaters nationwide on October 23, 2026.
Laika's “Wildwood” premiered at the BFI London Film Festival, and the reviews are rapturous. They're also clearly stronger than the reception for the festival's other big animated premiere.