The Wild Robot - A Lovely and Heartwarming Animated Movie Based on Best Selling Novel

This movie already had its early screening last weekend, but due to limited number of seats available in the studios, my wife and I decided to wait it up. Finally the film was released on Friday and we saw it yesterday in one of our favorite cinemas not far from our home. OK, let's get to it now.

Brief Story Line

A robot specifically designed for assisting people was somehow crashed in an island without any humans. The robot who was identified as Rozzum-7134 (voiced by Lupita Nyong'o - A Quite Place: Day One, Us etc) tried her best to look for anyone who need her assistance. After days of unsuccessful effort to convince all animals, the robot nicknamed "Roz" by the sly fox Fink (Pedro Pascal - The Bubble, Wonder Woman 1984 etc), decided to take care of a baby goose. As advised by an opossum named Pinktail (Catherine O'hara - Argylle, Home Alone etc), Roz agreed she would ensure the goose was able to swim and fly. 

Obviously the self-declared assignment was not so easy, especially since the goose Brightbill (Kit Connor - Heartstopper TV series etc) grew up under the care of a robot and a fox. Not to mention he was looked down by other geese. But as they spent more time together, the three formed an unexpected bond and had to face a lot challenges.

So how would the story conclude? You could find out in this movie.

End of Brief Story Line

When I read the brief synopsis of the movie, I already thought that it would be good with a nice story. What I did not expect though, was to have both our hearts melt due to its wonderful and charming story that left us both in tears through the beautiful journey of this robot finding family and friends in the most unexpected circumstances. We found ourselves emotionally drained from seeing Roz enduring all the things she experienced. 

From the early part of the movie, we already saw that the animation was amazing and as I continue watching, I became more in awe of the quality as a lot of the nature sceneries looked realistic (particularly the water), combined with the animals' movement and behavior. Obviously the best was the voice acting. Their characterization was just great adding emotional depth to them. All of the voice actors were brilliant to our opinion. Not just the main characters but also the support such as Bill Nighy (Role Play, Underworld movies etc) as one of the geese leader Longneck, Mark Hamill (Star Wars, Child's Play etc) as the bear Thorn, Matt Berry (What We Do in the Shadows TV series etc) as the paddler, Ving Rhames (The Garfield Movie, Mission: Impossible movies etc) as the falcon Thunderbolt, and there was also a brief appearance of Stephanie Hsu (The Fall Guy, American Born Chinese TV series etc) as Voltra. 

During the closing credits, I saw that the film was based on the novel of same title written by Peter Brown in 2016. It was highly regarded and got a lot of nomination for awards so it was not unusual to be adapted into a movie. And looks like they made a great choice cause the film was universally acclaimed by critics and audience. It was a success commercially and I read they were considering making a sequence. The movie was written and directed by Chris Sanders who was experienced in directing animated movies like Lilo & Stitch, How to Train Your Dragon and few others. 

Overall this was one of the movies that left a lasting impression to both of us due to its lovely story, wonderful animation, awesome voice acting and amazing background music that totally added the strong emotional feel. The plot was not complicated and the fun & exciting moments at certain time should please the young children. I thought this was one of those movies that could be enjoyed by whole family. From what I read, this was the final movie fully animated within Dreamworks (the production company that brought us those Shrek, Kungfu Panda, Madagascar and many other hit movies) as they would source to outside parties in the future.

With duration of 102 minutes, the movie had plenty of touching moments. Oh there was a brief humorous post end credit scene in case you wish to wait till the very end. So if you are in need of a movie to see with your family, then look no more as you would be entertained by this. But even if you want to see it by yourself, the story & animation should be enjoyable. For me and my wife, we were so delighted to have gotten the chance to see it and would recommend that you give this a try. Just follow her advice to bring lots of tissues.

Mike's movie moments rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars