One of the most human stories of the year barely has any humans in it and, in fact, focuses entirely on a robot, a fox, and a baby goose. “The Wild Robot” is a simple story about overcoming weaknesses and growing beyond basic instincts (or programming).
If the movie’s title sounds familiar to you (or your kid), that’s probably because it’s based on a popular 2016 book of the same name written by Peter Brown.
Lupita Nyong'o stars as Roz, a robot who finds herself washed up on an island devoid of civilization. The film doesn’t immediately provide any clues about the wider setting or who made Roz. She simply scours the island searching for a person to serve. Her basic programming requires her to accomplish tasks.
The animals on the island don’t want anything to do with Roz, either attacking or running away from her. Unable to understand the creatures of the island, Roz soon puts herself into “learning mode” and figures out how to speak with the animals.
This doesn’t seem to help matters as they’re all still terrified of her, believing the robot will kill them. But everything changes for Roz when she falls down a cliff and smashes into a goose nest, killing everything inside, except for a single egg.
A fox named Fink (Pedro Pascal) steals the egg for supper, but Roz gets it back from him, saving the canine from a porcupine in the process. Immediately after being rescued, the egg hatches into a gosling (of the non-Ryan variety) that will come to be named Brightbill. Boone Storme plays Brightbill as a baby, while Kit Connor voices the runt of the nest when he gets older.
When Roz tries to continue her mission, an opossum named Pinktail (Catherine O'Hara) soon informs the robot that she’s become a mother to the gosling. And Roz’s next task is to teach the baby how to eat, how to swim, and how to fly before the other geese migrate come fall. Fink, passing himself off as a goose expert, helps Roz. And together, they set out to raise Brightbill and get him ready to leave before winter arrives.
“The Wild Robot” is one of those rare movies that offers equal but different lessons and treasures to kids and adults who watch it. Children will be enamoured by the silly jokes, the many animal companions Roz encounters, and a fast-paced story that teaches them how to turn their weaknesses into strengths. And adults (especially parents) will find timeless lessons about the sacrifices of raising a child who must one day be set loose to find their own place in the world.
Roz has so much to learn about motherhood, and the movie takes great pains to teach its audience there’s no one right way to do it. In fact, more often than not, mothers are making it up as they go.
The emotional impacts of “The Wild Robot” are so much more powerful than any of its trailers can prepare audiences for. In truth, the author of this review may have cried no less than five times while watching the film. So, pack tissues. Yes, even you tough souls who thought you were immune to movie tears before “Inside Out” proved otherwise.
The themes of this film remain poingnant from the opening sequence to the closing credits because Director Chris Sanders knew how to keep them simple, focussed, and grounded. Everyone who watches “The Wild Robot” can come away connecting with something, whether its an urge to help others, even if they’ve hurt you in the past or learning to say important things to loved ones because you never know when it’ll be too late.
Death is a constant visitor to “The Wild Robot,” and it’s never a horrifying entity. Sometimes it arrives in dark humor and other times it’s a realistic lesson that life isn’t special because it lasts forever. It’s a gift because there’s a beginning and an end, for animals and robots alike.
Audiences who are familiar with Hayao Miyazaki movies like “Nausicaa” and “Princess Mononoke” will find the famed director’s influences scattered throughout “The Wild Robot.” The humbling power of nature is to be respected.
Dreamworks does a great job bringing this artwork to life, not by offering audiences a cartoon that tries to emulate our world, but by welcoming viewers as spectators onto an island where nature works a bit differently. This is a place of saturated colors and simple shapes. Sure, the water looks great. But the real proof of this film’s superior artwork lies in the gradual changing of Roz’s body the longer she spends in nature. Scratch marks on her armor, moss growing after she powers down for long periods of time, and even the replacement of a metallic limb with a wooden prosthetic.
With an entertainment landscape that clings so desperately to established IP and an endless cycle of reboots and callbacks, it’s brilliantly refreshing to see a gem like “The Wild Robot” come to fruition. This is an original story with heartfelt characters and messages that’ll move audiences. They just have to sit down and listen first, not with their minds, but with their hearts. Like Roz did.
