Missing Link will wow, impress and entertain ages 7 and up

We look forward to every film that Laika puts out. It’s ironic that as a youth stop-motion animation scared me, but now it’s an art form that I’ll go out of my way to view. It’s even more ironic that our 9 year-old loves the medium also. He was all in from the moment he saw the trailer for Missing Link. I was in also, but much like when we saw Kubo and the Two Strings, we had to check our reviewer hat at the door.

First off, as a technical exercise in film-making, Missing Link is masterful. The film employs stop-motion animation, 3-D printing, puppets and more. From a movie wonk perspective the film is stunning, but movie geeks are looking for these things. Impress me, I say to myself as I see a film from Laika-and they never fail to do so.  Missing Link raises the animation bar from its already high standard from Kubo.

Did you ever see Wallace and Gromit, The Wrong Trousers? There’s a sequence in there where Wallace is chasing the penguin while riding a train set. When I first saw that I was amazed. There is so much movement in each shot, coupled with entertainment and laughs for an almost silent film that it (still) blows me away.

There are multiple scenes in Missing Link that gave me that same feeling. Early in the film our explorer, Sir Lionel Frost, voiced by Hugh Jackman, crosses a shallow pond to meet the mysterious author of a note that was sent to him. When Frost’s foot enters the pond, as well as, a couple other water/ice scenes were jaw dropping. I know it’s a scale model clay figure, but they feel human and make us care about them.

So, the film was a technical marvel, we kind of expect that from Laika. I took two 9 year-olds to see the film, did they like it?  One of them had never seen a stop-motion film before and was a bit confused. They both enjoyed the film, as much as a 9 year-old can, but they weren’t doing cartwheels as they left the theater.

On the other hand, I was reeling in its moments, the obvious humor, the very dry humor (courtesy of Zach Galifiankis as Mr. Link), the dry/icy puns put forth by Emma Thompson and more. As an adult, who loves great movies, this was a great time at the cinema that will be repeated many times at home. We also took a 7 year-old to the theater and he laughed the loudest. Perhaps most surpsingly, he laughed at the dry part of the film, which promptly led us to go home and watch some episodes of Mr. Bean or Monty Python.

Personally, this is the best Laika film. It’s wildly entertaining, varied and has a cohesive, linear story that checks off all of the stop-motion dots. It’s a gorgeous time at the cinema for fans of Laika, stop-motion movies. For those outside of those camps it’s still entertaining. For example, our neighbor saw the film and thought it was ‘cute’, while his 9 year-old daughter thought that it was entertaining. We’ll invite the two of them over to watch Kubo or Wallace and Gromit later.

Missing Link is art, yet it’s approachable art for elementary school ages and up that like entertaining films. The curve ball happens because Laika has produced something so different to what most audiences have seen. It’s not different as in ‘challenging’, it’s just a form of animation that they may not be used to seeing. Case in point, Missing Link is leagues above the most recent PG rated film that they saw, which was computer animated. This is heart, soul and fun, but some younger audiences might not see it over the clay skin that they’re wearing.