In the opening scenes of The Wild Robot , a robot washes onto the shore of a remote island, bearing marks and labels of its human manufacturers. Rozzum unit 7134, voiced by Lupita Nyong’o in an inspired performance, is a machine built to serve. One of her first phrases after being activated by a colony of beavers is an expression of this fealty: She always completes her task, just ask. Naturally, the animals in this secluded locale fear this towering metal assemblage. When presented with her eager gestures of assistance, they scramble.
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Premiering at the Toronto Film Festival, The Wild Robot is the story of how Rozzum 7134 becomes Roz and finds her place and purpose within an obscure island’s vibrant ecosystem. Chris Sanders ( Lilo & Stitch , How to Train Your Dragon ) adapted this poignant DreamWorks feature from Peter Brown’s affecting trilogy of the same name. When it hits theaters on September 27, The Wild Robot will please not only its existing fans but garner new ones as well.
Part of this tender animation’s appeal comes from its committed and absorbing voice performances. Nyong’o, whose previous voice work includes Disney’s The Jungle Book and an episode of Big Mouth , transforms in her role as a robot overcoming the rigidity of her programming for the looser, and more unexpected terrain of motherhood. Roz initially encounters the creatures on the island with a mechanical curiosity and the staticky voice to prove it. As a representative of artificial intelligence, the robot begins her journey by scanning the island for data.
In a brisk and well-done early sequence, Roz folds into herself, assuming a posture of pseudo-hibernation as she absorbs the sounds and textures of the landscape. After learning, among other things, the language of all the animals, the island vibrates with the exciting energy of understanding: Creatures bustle around the dormant robot as their chirps, squeals and roars become legible comments on the strangeness of this machine and what its presence means for the future of the island.
When Roz wakes up, the animals are still afraid of her. Doubly so now that she, like her colonial human predecessors, has learned their ways. She mopes around, feebly offering help to an uninterested constituency. Purpose comes in the form of a gosling who imprints on her. Under the small creature’s gaze, Roz is mother. In portraying the robot’s anxious trepidation and initial refusal of this responsibility, Nyong’o inflects her sentiments with appropriate levels of surprise and disbelief. Roz’s programming prevents her from outright rejecting the gosling — remember, she always completes the task, just ask — despite her narrow understanding of what it takes to raise a goose. So, she begrudgingly agrees to raise the gosling, whom she names Brightbill (Kit Connor of Heartstopper ).
Some more perplexed than frightened creatures including Fink, a shrewd fox humorously voiced by Pedro Pascal, and Pinktail, an overextended possum mother to whom Catherine O’Hara lends a delightful voice, help Roz on her journey. Their advice ranges from the helpful to downright dubious. Still, there’s a sweetness to the community effort that gives The Wild Robot some of its most poignant moments.
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Roz’s initial approach to raising Brightbill involves scientific precision and technological inflexibility — she scans the gosling and searches the database for information on how to teach him to hunt, swim and fly. Those methods don’t always work, and much of The Wild Robot concerns using the heart to counter the sometimes “crushing obligation,” in her words, of parenthood, rather than just her mind. As Roz leans into her more maternal role, Nyongo’s machine-like voice becomes more pliable and delicate, as if holding room for the answers to questions she doesn’t even know to ask.
Roz isn’t the only person that grows on the island. Brightbill ages, and with his own development comes the disaffection of being a teenager. Fink, who begins as a side character, gets rounded out with a backstory that helps us better understand the fox’s conniving and conspiratorial impulses.
Sanders, who wrote the screenplay in addition to directing, crafts an on-screen version of these characters that make them still feel like a family. If the personalities tether us to the story, it’s the animation that initially pulls us in. Sanders’s film blends photorealistic characters with painterly images of the landscape to create delightful and immersive scenes. Island life is energetically rendered, and there’s an appreciation for details too — from the splinters on the giant tree an industrial beaver (Matt Berry) gnaws at daily to the fine hairs on cantankerous grizzly bear Thorn (Mark Hamill). The remote locale represents untainted beauty, an environment undisturbed by human machinations.
The lack of people doesn’t mean there’s no human threat. Like Pixar’s own robotic adventure Wall-E , The Wild Robot is also about the subtle consequences of unchecked consumerism. When the humans send more machines, including a menacing drone voiced by Stephanie Hsu, to retrieve Roz, their impact on the verdant land is punishing to watch. There’s a striking sentimental undercurrent that comes from this environmental message, in addition to Roz’s journey through motherhood. Even as The Wild Robot speeds through its conclusion in a more rushed third act, these threads offer helpful reminders about interdependence and hopeful lessons in community.
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