I finally got the Blu-Ray for Laika's film, Missing Link and watched it the other day. I have waited this long to see the movie because, like I mentioned before, the ads for the film didn't get me excited to see it. So, I waited. Actually finding a Blu Ray of this movie was surprisingly difficult to come by. I found tons of DVDs but no blu-ray. Even Amazon seemed to be sold out of the Blu-ray.
What is there to say about the animation? The stop motion is great. I had to constantly remind myself it was stop motion and not CG because it felt like a CG movie. I guess that is attributed with Laika using alot more CG in this film than say it's previous movies. It's such a strange evolution for the studio. Laika seemed so proud of sticking with this "outdated" art of story telling that using CG was out of the question. Now they are changing their tune, saying that CG has allowed them to tell bigger and more grander stories that would not have been possible with just stopmotion...with that said, I am afraid Laika will eventually "see the error of their ways" and become another special effects studio, which would be unfortunate.
Enough with my rant. The stop motion is great. The costumes and sets, again are all top notch. I was a little put off by the character designs again. The eyes felt too close on the horse, seagull, etc. It was also really weird for the Loch Ness monster. What I originally thought was its mouth, turned out to be its face. That whole scene I had to suspend belief. The characters also had a squared block look to their lower half. It just had no organic look but more of they puppet designers just put fabric right over the top of the armature.
Regarding the story...both myself and my wife fell asleep. It was rather boring. I was right in my original prediction that this movie wasn't a new story. It is your standard destination film. It's almost the same plot as Kubo, but as Kubo was more entertaining. The movie trailer essentially did spoil the whole film. Overall, it didn't have any heart felt moments. The humor, that was so over-hyped, fell flat for me (I chuckled once). It was more subtle adult humor than laugh out load funny. There was nothing visually stunning or striking. Nothing that we, as the audience, haven't seen before (and seen better). Sure you could argue that we have not seen it before in stopmotion, but so what? Sure it's a great achievement for the medium, but it's just bragging about finally being able to catch up to your competitors who crossed that line a decade ago...
All in all, it was OK. It's mind numbing TV that will keep kids distracted for an hour or so if that's what you need. As far as when compared to Laika's other feature films, I would say this is last in place. I will say it again that I think one of Laika's pitfalls is their scripts. The stories just are not innovative enough. Coraline worked as well as it did because it was based on a talented story teller. I don't think Chris Butler has what Laika needs to succeed. All his writings are too similar to each other, with a shoe horned in moral, and a subtle narrative of today's politics.
However, maybe with multiple re-watching I will grow to appreciate it. I certainly have grown into the other Laika films. Coraline is still my number one choice. Boxtrolls, ParaNorman and Kubo I like all equally. Least, I cannot place one over another at this time.
Anyways, I am a little disappointed I didn't watch this on the big screen in 3D, but the advertisement for this movie really did hurt it.
