So yesterday, I took myself to the movies and saw Missing Link, the new film from Laika.
If you’re unaware, Laika is a studio that specializes in stop-motion epics that are full of heart and laughs and they generally always make me cry (in a good way), so there’s that. You’ve probably heard of them, they’re the minds behind Coraline, The Boxtrolls, ParaNorman, and Kubo and the Two Strings.
(ParaNorman, by the by, is one of my all-time favorite movies and you can definitely expect a post about it around Halloween because y’all.)
While I feel like I saw advertising for Kubo EVERYWHERE prior to its release, I honestly had no idea Missing Link was even a thing until about a month ago, maybe. I truly didn’t know what to expect, except that it would have amazing visuals and hopefully other good things as well.
I was not entirely disappointed!
THE PLOT
The movie starts by following renowned classy adventurer Sir Lionel Frost (Hugh Jackman) and his less-than-enthusiastic valet Mr. Lint (David Walliams) on an epic quest: to get photographic evidence of none other than the Loch Ness Monster. It seems far-fetched at first, but after a unique move by Frost to broadcast bagpipes underwater, the monster appears! It takes some doing to get the creature posed (poor Mr. Lint is tasked with holding on to the rope), and once the picture is taken, Nessie grabs Mr. Lint in her mouth and dives underwater with him.
“Huh. A carnivore.” Frost says before diving in to rescue his poor valet. Frost does save him, but Nessie whacks their boat in retaliation, destroying the camera and Frost’s proof all in one fell swoop. Mr. Lint quits shortly after, proclaiming “I’m a human being, I can’t take this anymore, you’re INSANE, no wonder everyone leaves you!” Ouch. So, Frost is alone again, and it’s here that he stumbles across a letter written to him about undeniable proof of Bigfoot himself. Filled with new energy, Frost crashes the party of the “League of Adventurers” or whatever to announce his plans to get proof of Bigfoot so they’ll finally accept him into the society. Lord Piggot-Dunceby (Stephen Fry), the head of the society and all around Not Nice Person, strikes a wager with Frost: if he brings back proof, he’ll be let into the society and respected. If he doesn’t, he never bothers them again.
Dunceby is convinced that Frost will fail, but not enough to not take some precautions of his own–he hires someone to kill Frost so any evidence he may or may not find will still never come to light and he’ll never have to deal with Frost again.
Frost, meanwhile, is determined and heads to the address specified in the letter. What he finds, however, is Bigfoot, the missing link himself (Zach Galifianakis). He’s mostly self-educated since he scares everyone off, and wrote to Frost because he hopes Frost will take him to the Himalayas to be with the Yetis, his cousins. He’s the only one of his kind, and he’s lonely, so he figures if he can be with his cousins, he won’t be so lonely anymore.
In exchange, Bigfoot promises to give Frost whatever proof he needs for the society. The deal is struck, and the bizarre duo head off on their adventure. Along the way, they must deal with Dunceby’s hitman, Willard Stenk (Timothy Olyphant), Frost’s old flame Adelina Fortnight (Zoe Saldana), and the hard truth that maybe seeking out family in the wrong people is something many of us are all too good at.
THE REVIEW
I admittedly went into this with very high expectations because, again, I love Laika.
What I got was a very good, very beautiful movie. It’s not my favorite Laika film (nothing beats ParaNorman, nothinggggggg) by any means, but it’s a darn good movie and a really fun one to watch.
I feel like this film, more than some others from Laika, had a lot more “kid humor” in it. Potty humor especially abounds, which is, well, a choice. It’s not necessary for the film (especially when they have really clever jokes about chickens…more on that later) as there are plenty of other ways to establish Mr. Link’s naivety, but I digress.
I feel like that element is really what takes me out of the story more than anything else. There’s also the point that this is a very short film, running about 85 minutes in total, and there’s a lot they have to cram in plot-wise. I refuse to complain about the runtime, however, because it’s stop-motion and the dedication to even get 85 minutes is astonishing to me. So like. Yeah.
Plus like…I’m not the target audience for this film. I may love Laika with all my heart, but this is still a kids’ movie, and kids think that stuff is hilarious. So fine.
All that aside, this is a great movie. It’s so charming and lovable and filled with really interesting political parallels. Just…we’ll get there.
So what is it that makes this movie such a delight? Let’s follow in the big footsteps of Laika’s new family adventure and figure that out.
…that was a stretch for a metaphor, I admit. MOVING ON.
Spoiler warning now in effect!!
THE MUSIC
The music, like the movie as a whole, is charming.
There are a couple musical moments that definitely stood out: “Westward Ho” is a fun track that plays during the montage of Frost traveling to America to find the sender of the letter. “Forest Primeval” is probably my favorite track, and plays when Frost first sees Mr. Link and chases him through the forest. It’s fun and mystical and since it plays before we know his personality, it helps paint the mystery around Mr. Link as Frost desperately tries to catch him. “Bar Brawl” is fun and ridiculous, just like the scene it accompanies. It starts out slow and otherwise unassuming, and then once the fighting kicks up and guys are punching each other for no reason, the instruments really get going and it’s just ridiculous.
Overall, while the music is good, it doesn’t really take center stage at any point during the film, and it doesn’t really need to. It’s good, but it doesn’t take over.
Also, the end credits song “Do-Dilly-Do (A Friend Like You)” is ADORABLE. Please listen to it if you need to feel happy, it should do the trick. And it’s been stuck in my head all day and I can’t even complain about it.
Also, fun fact, the composer is Carter Burwell, who also did the music for the Twilight series, Three Billboards, and A Knight’s Tale. So. The more you know.
THE CHARACTERS
Since characters in media mean a lot to me and I won’t get invested if I don’t care about them *cough*ALITABATTLEANGEL*cough*, a big reason Laika is so dear to my heart is that they create such good characters. But why?
Despite their incredibly stylized appearances, Laika characters feel like real people. None of the characters in any of their movies are perfect–they’re all flawed in different ways, and their journey in the film usually ties into confronting those flaws and how they affect the other people in their lives. Coraline was so convinced her mother didn’t love her that she ended up traveling to an alternate world where her Other Mother loved her a little too much. Norman was so afraid of and sick of being bullied for his unique power with ghosts that he ignored his destiny so long he almost destroyed the world. Kubo was a scared little kid who just wanted a normal family that he didn’t stop to see the found family he’d created (yeah and then the twist is that they were actually his parents all along, which…ehhhhhh anyway). I would discuss The Boxtrolls, but I haven’t actually seen it since it was in theaters and I don’t remember enough of it to comment. This “dealing with our flaws” thing is something we all have to do at some point, so it’s refreshing to see it have to happen to these cartoon characters in their fantastical worlds, too.
This whole “confronting flaws that affect other people in my life” trope is probably the most prevalent in Missing Link. Lionel Frost is, despite being the guy we follow the entire film while the other characters only come in later, obnoxious. He just is. He’s full of himself, convinced he can do no wrong, and he’s incredibly selfish. He plays it off by being suave and “adventure-savvy,” but he doesn’t realize how much his selfishness affects others. He is only able to find a real happy ending when he starts actually thinking of and caring for others, even if it costs him his precious reputation. Even then, it’s hinted that he’s still not totally learned his lesson, but he’s getting there: Mr. Link is wondering what he’s going to do now that his plan for a home has fallen through, and Frost says “well I’m in the market for a new valet!” And Adelina has to elbow him to remind him to say “a new partner.”
Despite this being probably the most like a typical kids’ film Laika has ever made, it’s the first film to follow an adult protagonist compared to a kid. While Frost’s problems are not kid problems, his journey is still a valuable lesson to kids about making sure you put effort into relationships with people who want you for exactly who you are, not for who you’re not.
Frost’s journey is, of course, mirrored with Mr. Link’s/Susan’s.
(One of my favorite scenes in the film is when Frost is asking Mr. Link to choose his own name, maybe based off of someone who really touched his heart and his life in a positive way. Link goes off about this one prospector who came and didn’t run off scared the second they saw him, and how kind they were. Frost enthusiastically declares that yes! That prospector’s name should be his name! What was the name? And Link smiles and says “Susan.” Frost is initially like “but wait that’s a girl’s name…you know what? It suits you. Susan it is.” Which like??? LOOK AT LAIKA SMASHING GENDERING AROUND NAMES. YOU GO, LAIKA. And for the rest of the review, Mr. Link is now Susan, because that’s his name.)
Susan is just as alone as Frost is, but unlike Frost, Susan realizes this. He doesn’t want to be alone anymore, and called in Frost specifically so that he could find others like him, his kind, his family. Susan is awkward, being self-taught with language, so he doesn’t understand sarcasm or specific sayings. For example, when they’re trying to break into Adelina’s house, Frost hands Susan a grappling hook attached to a rope so that they can climb over the wall. Frost tells him to “throw it over,” and Susan does just that: he throws the hook and the rope in its entirety over the wall. Frost, annoyed, holds out his bag with the rest of his tools and says “oh great, well why don’t you just throw this over the wall, too?” And Susan does, of course. Because he was told to.
While Frost has been educated in “polite society” and understands all of this, Susan does not, and much of the character’s charm and humor comes from this. Susan is like a child in many ways, just wanting to belong and not understanding why people do the things they do.
Frost initially separates himself as much as possible from Susan, not wanting to be associated with him beyond bringing back proof to Dunceby, but Adelina is the one who points out how similar and utterly alone the two characters are. This realization being spelled out for both Frost and the audience is why the ending of the film, where the two characters choose to stay together and be their own family, is so heartwarming and satisfying.
Adelina as a character is just…she’s a spitfire. She’s likable instantly because she doesn’t swoon over Frost like he expects, she’s not afraid to be angry and fight, but she’s also not afraid to be gentle and emotional when it’s called for. She’s a fully rounded-out female character, which is still a rarity in today’s media, as I’ve discussed in both my Alita: Battle Angel review and my Captain Marvel review.
While it’s established that Adelina and Frost have a romantic history, it doesn’t become the sole reason Adelina joins their adventure. She’s been cooped up at home since her husband’s death, and she wants to get out. She flirts with Frost as he gradually becomes a better person, but ultimately, she doesn’t choose to stay with him. She says he’s a great man, now, but she deserves greater. It’s so refreshing to see these two characters acknowledge a past flame between them that clearly caused them both some pain, heal through that, and then ultimately move on. Frost may have wanted her to stay, but he doesn’t ask her to. He lets her go because, again, he’s learning to not be so selfish anymore.
The villains are also one of my favorite parts of any Laika film. Like the heroes, they’re not perfect characters, and they always have some reason behind why they do what they do. Our main villain is Lord Piggot-Dunceby, the mastermind behind the plan to thwart Frost’s expedition and the leader of the Society for Great Men or whatever. Both he and his assistant guy very clearly state that they don’t like Frost, he’s weird, and they aren’t afraid to stoop to new lows to get rid of him. Dunceby complains that all these young people are trying to change the world that he knows, and he doesn’t like it. Electricity. Suffrage. All ridiculous things that he didn’t grow up with, so he doesn’t understand them and doesn’t like them, doesn’t want to learn to understand or like them, so he doesn’t think they’re necessary. In a way, he’s just as selfish as Frost, and in him, we see what happens to someone who never learns to outgrow that selfishness.
The other constant villain is the hitman, Stenk. Stenk is a mean little weasel of a man who resorts to whatever means necessary to get what he wants. Be this in the form of sneaking around to listen in on Frost’s plans, threatening Adelina to get Frost to give up, inciting a mob mentality on the ship so they attack Susan (who, it’s established early on, doesn’t actually like fighting and wishes people weren’t so scared of him), the list goes on and on. Like Dunceby, Stenk believes that things should be done the way they always have been done, and like Frost, he wants fame attached to his name. Stenk initially wants to kill off Frost so he can take credit for the Bigfoot discovery, and it’s that notion that makes Frost start the bar fight with him. If Dunceby is the ultimate example of Frost’s selfishness, Stenk is the ultimate example of Frost’s journey for power and fame. Stenk, like Frost, has no real family or friends and is ultimately alone. He’s convinced that having his name be known and being famous will fix all his problems, but his death at the end of the film ultimately affects…no one. He dies alone, and as we’ll discuss a little later, he chooses to. Stenk and Dunceby are important foils for Frost, because by the end of the movie, Frost sees how easy it is to become them, and he realizes that he doesn’t want to.
Also Emma Thompson makes an appearance as a Yeti elder once they reach the Himalayas and she’s great. We’ll get to the Yetis in a moment.
THE ART
Like all Laika films, Missing Link is beautiful to watch. Someone on tumblr mentioned that it’s probably Laika’s prettiest film to date, and I would definitely agree. While every Laika film does a great job at visual world-building, they’ve absolutely upped the ante with every film, and Missing Link is definitely a crowning achievement. They built different sets to show the bustling streets of London, the forests and towns of early North America, the ocean during a storm, the beautiful, lush scenery of India, and the towering mountains of the Himalayas. Every shot of scenery is done with the utmost care and you can absolutely tell. There’s even a shot during the end credits where they show the workers building the India set as the elephant puppet is controlled and walking around–you’re able to get just a sense of how much work goes into these movies, even in just a short, seconds-long clip, and it’s just astounding.
For the actual character puppets, Laika uses 3D printers to create every single facial expression the characters use, and they swap out each face on the puppet for each frame as needed. I was able to see some of the different printed faces used in Coraline at the Cartoon Art Museum in San Francisco, and wow. I highly recommend looking up behind the scenes stuff for Laika films, because it just makes watching the movies a whole new experience and you appreciate everything so much more.
The colors used in the film are bright and cheerful, especially when Frost first sets out on his Bigfoot expedition. The character designs are stylized and fun, especially Susan himself, who is just the embodiment of the word “lovable.”
I can’t truly do the visuals of the film justice through words, you really have to see it to experience it all and fully grasp what I mean. It’s a very pretty movie. It really is, but calling it that just doesn’t do it justice.
THE TWIST/THE END
While Missing Link does have a twist of sorts, it’s not really on the same narrative-changing scale as say, ParaNorman.
Our bedraggled travelers have finally reached their destination, populated by Yetis, Susan’s own kind! They’re greeted by a Yeti Elder, who asks why they have come. Frost and the Elder actually have an interesting back-and-forth, where Frost promises they are not there to destroy anything the Yetis have built. Susan says he just wants to be with his family.
The Elder looks at Susan and says “ah…yes…our…cousin. The redneck.” She takes the three outside to a hidden valley in the snow-covered mountains, which she says has remained untouched and pure and always should. Our protagonists swear they’re not here to change that, but the Elder doesn’t believe them. (A great funny moment is when Frost says “we found it! Shangri-La!” And the Elder says “it has many names. We call it *unintelligible roaring noise*. It means “Keep Out, We Hate You.”)
She has them thrown into “The Inescapable Pit of Misery and Disappointment,” and boy, you can just tell how disappointed Susan is at being thrown away to rot by those who should love and accept him because they’re family.
We expect the Yetis to be different, to be welcoming to Susan, whom we’ve come to love and adore over the course of the film…but the Yetis are exact mirrors of the Society of Cool Guys back in London that Frost is obsessed with. Adelina points out that both Frost and Susan have been so busy desperately trying to prove themselves to people who don’t even want them, they don’t notice how alike they both are. She calls “the Great Lionel Frost” a myth, just like the monsters he chases, because he isn’t a great man. He isn’t even a good one.
Something about this strikes a chord in Frost, and he tells Susan to get up, because he’s going to fulfill his end of the bargain: he’s going to take Susan to where he belongs.
*cue EVERYONE CRYING but mostly me, probably*
The group manages to escape the Pit and evade the Yetis (while the Elder yells “quick! The people we don’t want here are escaping!!”) only to be stopped on the ice bridge by none other than Dunceby and Stenk (and the assistant guy whose name I completely forgot). Dunceby, determined to make sure Frost’s discovery never sees the light of day so he can’t outshine him, breaks the ice bridge, yelling out what would have once been Frost’s greatest nightmare and probably still is Dunceby’s: “no one will remember your name!”
It’s not Frost’s greatest fear anymore, though. His greatest fear now is losing the ones he’s come to care so much about, so they run. Dunceby, so caught up in his fury and obsession, doesn’t realize what he’s done until it’s too late, and he falls as the bridge breaks.
The whole thing is falling apart, now, as the characters desperately try to outrun it. The assistant guy is unable to and also ends up falling to his death. Then it’s just Frost, Adelina, and Susan, all tied together with a rope and hanging on for dear life. Stenk is safe, and is all set to drop the heroes to their doom. Frost says that he doesn’t have to, Dunceby is gone, now! But Stenk says that it isn’t about the paycheck anymore, he just genuinely hates Frost at this point and wants him gone, especially by his hand.
In the ensuing confrontation, our heroes manage to work together to safely reach the top of the cliff, while Stenk, so determined to off Frost, also falls into the rocks below.
Normally, in Laika films, the villains are developed in such a way that we want to see them be redeemed–they’re fully-formed characters just as much as the protagonists are, so there has to be a chance, right?
The difference here is that even if there is a chance for these three characters, they don’t want to change. They’re so caught up in their hatred and fear of Frost changing things and overshadowing them that their deaths serve as a sort of metaphor: they let their negativity rule their lives so much that it overpowered them and caused their ultimate demise. While Frost serves as a reminder that it’s so, so easy to become like those characters, it’s also just as easy to not become like them.
There’s a fascinating scene earlier in the film where Dunceby learns that Frost has evaded Stenk yet again and still lives. Dunceby throws a literal temper tantrum, in public, in front of all these people, and then proclaims that Frost’s existence is the “destruction of civilized society!!”
…Really?
It’s fitting, then, that he causes his own death by destroying something beautiful–an ice bridge that leads to Shangri-La itself.
While the assistant guy seems a little unsure of some of Dunceby’s actions, he ultimately stands by him and supports Dunceby’s decision to send a literal hitman after the guy. He dies trying to escape the results of Dunceby’s actions, and he’s unable to. While the assistant guy didn’t call any of the shots on his own, he certainly didn’t make any effort to stop Dunceby, and it caught up with him later.
Stenk is offered a chance by Frost. Frost says that Dunceby is gone, this doesn’t matter anymore! But Stenk is so obsessed with the principal of the thing, he puts his revenge ahead of anything else, his belief that Frost is still the bad guy…and it costs him dearly.
Now I don’t know how intentional any kind of political metaphor is in this movie, but I’m just saying…it’s interesting that all the villains work for a “Society of Great and Awesome Men” who believe that “men shape the world!” (“But I’ve learned that the world shapes us!” Frost says in response to this at the end) and that any kind of opposition to this way of life is a threat to everything they hold dear. They’re all old white guys. I’m just saying.
Dunceby even yells at Frost “you’ve aligned yourself with apes and women!” As if that’s an insult. Both the audience and Frost, by this point, have learned that both Susan and Adelina are so much more than that. But Dunceby refuses to see that because it goes against what he believes and it threatens his power.
There’s so much more we can talk about–how easily Stenk tries to stir up a mob on the ship by pointing at Susan carrying Adelina (he just rescued her) and yelling “look! A monster! And he’s got a defenseless girl!” Susan responds to this by saying “monster?” While Adelina says “DEFENSELESS??”
Or how Dunceby is introduced as a character by telling some long, drawn-out tale about his conquests and by waving a gun around.
Or how Dunceby tells Frost that the Society is renowned for traveling the world and “conquering and rescuing the savages” they come across.
Or how easily all the guys in the bar started fighting once just one person starts fighting, but Susan makes a face and doesn’t want to–who’s supposed to be the civilized one, again?
Or how Frost & Co. made a point of respecting Gamu the elder and asking for her help to find Shangri-La, whereas Dunceby & Co. made a point of threatening her, and when that didn’t work, threatening her baby grandson so they could get information out of her.
I’M JUST. SAYING.
FAVORITE MOMENT
I absolutely adored that entire opening sequence with the Loch Ness monster, it was just so fun and quirky. But I also totally loved the entire “dinner with Gamu” scene and all the jokes about the chicken (the chicken that we don’t talk about, of course). While my favorite moments are probably the funny ones because I think they’re executed so well, I also just enjoyed (of course) the visuals for the movie as a whole.
“OOF” MOMENT
Pretty much anything that was like, potty humor. It’s just not my cup of tea, and while I don’t think it ruined the movie by any means, it did distract at times. A lot of it was framed around Susan’s ignorance and general “not knowing how things work” and all that, which like, at least it makes sense, and one or two jokes would have been fine and still fit the character and narrative, but I just felt like there was too much of it. Again, though, I’m not the target audience, and I get it. I think it’s unfortunate, but I get it.
SHOULD YOU TAKE YOURSELF TO SEE THIS MOVIE?
Yes.
Look, my bias for Laika aside, this is a very good movie. It’s charming, it’s witty, it’s uplifting, and if you enjoy possibly unintentional but definitely can be pointed out political commentary that ends in a satisfying way, this movie is for you.
I think it’s so important to support studios like Laika. They put out consistently good films, and they work damn hard on them. There is unbelievable love and care put into every inch of their movies, and it’s not just a movie when they’re done with it: it’s a piece of art.
It’s not my favorite Laika film, it’s not the best movie I’ve ever scene, but it’s damn good and just a lot of fun. And again, we want to support studios like Laika and all the work they do.
Actually pretty much any studio putting out good animated films and isn’t Disney.
Nothing against Disney, just…well, okay, kind of something against Disney. They run the world and maybe like they shouldn’t.
Animated movies don’t get nearly the love and attention that they should because they’re animated, and it’s viewed as just a kids’ medium that can’t carry the emotional weight other films do. Studios like Laika prove that that simply isn’t the case. Animation can be just as breathtaking as live-action, just as powerful, and just as emotional.
Studios like Laika and Cartoon Saloon (The Secret of Kells, The Song of the Sea, The Breadwinner) are proving that animation is a great medium for great stories, and I think we should all support them in that.
Overall, I give Missing Link…
4/5 SASQUATCHES!!!
Look, they’re happy to see you!
TRAILERS TO WATCH OUT FOR:
Pretty much everything was a repeat and also showed before Dumbo, with one exception…
They’re making an animated movie of The Addams Family and it looks like it might actually be really, really good.
Other than that, same old, same old.
So that about does it for this review!
If you love Laika like I do, if you want to take your kids to a movie that won’t make you want to die a little inside, if you love a good story with good characters, if you just need an evening to relax and escape to another world where everything turns out happy, if you love found family stories, I highly recommend you take yourself to the movies and see Missing Link.
…we won’t get into how a bunch of stop-motion puppets have more facial expressions than a certain character in Dumbo…I swear……
………….but they totally do.
ADMIT PLAYER ONE 