The First Secret of Success: The Pursuit of the Self in Wolfwalkers (2020)

By Trevor Ruth

In his novel, Dandelion Wine (1957), Ray Bradbury writes something along the lines of, “Be what you are, bury what you’re not.” As an introvert by nature, it’s no doubt that I know the struggles of being oneself in this largely conformist world. Being a creative only makes this more difficult; the inclination being that my pursuit in writing would only prove to be useful should I aspire to be an English teacher or a professor. Admittedly, this was my original intent, however I’ve been led to believe, in recent years, that perhaps it is not my true calling to be a professor and—after all—the financial security that being a professor offers these days is rather poor. That being said, having one’s livelihood be put into question certifiably throws one’s belief into a wild flux. Maybe it is only a matter of my own, but I have come to believe that a creator of any kind secretly longs to be something else, if only to adapt to the world that we are forced to live within. Perhaps it is for this reason that storytellers—more specifically, ancient storytellers—turn towards transfiguration with regards to myth. Therianthropy takes many forms depending on which tribe one hails from. In my particular case, a good portion of my ancestors favor the canine, though this is hardly a new concept for any culture. Dogs have it easy. Their lifespan may be shorter than ours, but they seldom have to wonder as to the legitimacy of their craft or search for validation amongst their peers and elders in their professional pursuits. I personally do not wish to be a dog (or any animal outside of a human, for that matter), but the point remains that the very concept of shapeshifting takes us away from the banality of the life in which we live, and it is surely for this reason that even the storytellers of today look towards this concept with a romantic eye. Leave it to one of the more idealistic, independent animation studios of the current millennium to come up with a visually grand and unique approach to such an ancient form of myth.

Inspired by the folk legend, “The Wolves of Ossory,” directors Tomm Moore and Ross Stewart set out to work on a passion project of Moore’s: an animated coming-of-age tale involving ancient Irish shapeshifters (though to be fair, the characters of this film are not shapeshifters, but rather their spirits are projected from their bodies in the form of wolves). To this end, Wolfwalkers (2020) is a return to form for animation studio Cartoon Saloon, though only in setting. Moore’s previous film, Song of the Sea (2014), gave us a deeply moving Sidhe tale set within a modern age. It’s also one of my favorite animated films of all time (though I’m certainly biased in that regard). In Wolfwalkers, Moore returns to the ancient historical forestland of his first film, The Secret of Kells (2009), this time in mid-seventeenth century Kilkenny, Ireland. Here we are introduced to Robyn; a young girl whose father works for a British counselor (known simply as the Lord Protector) of the city as a hunter. The Lord Protector oversees the eliminating of the forest to make way for a new society to flourish, seeing it as his Christian duty to prolong expansion. The soldiers and farmers tasked with cutting the trees down are scared away by the wolves of the woods, all of whom follow a singular master—a young wolfwalker named Mebh—and her mother. At some point, Mebh and Robyn meet up and become friends before Robyn ultimately becomes a wolfwalker herself, as a result of Mebh accidentally biting Robyn on the arm. Along the way, Robyn learns to gain the strength to be herself, against the wishes of her father and the puritan society they live in. Despite the original screenplay and initial concept, Wolfwalkers certainly feels like a retread of other fantasy tropes, however it never at any point feels derivative of its predecessors and—in some ways—surpasses Moore’s previous films altogether.

While sharing a definitive visual style, it’s obvious that Cartoon Saloon looks to give each film its own character and Wolfwalkers is no different. Much is borrowed from Song of the Sea, including the glowing, wireframed mysticism bleeding off of the characters and landscape to affirm the Celtic belief that beauty and spirit exist in the natural. This time around, however, we are introduced to a much starker form of visual narrative, given the heavy dichotomy between nature and industry that acts as a motif for not just the central plot, but also for our characters, as well. The world design by Maria Pareja is minimalistic, but gorgeously rendered (as depicted in The Art of Wolfwalkers, 2020). A great deal of research went into manufacturing the city and the woods to make it feel realistic, despite its obvious storybook nature. The city and its inhabitants are vast and numerous, and the buildings, from a distance, appear like a wall of triangles while the country is more concentric to match the divinity associated with the circle. The world of the city is more geometric to adhere to the logistics of their ideologies; the lines of certain bodies and buildings appear straight and cubist to match the logistical nature of contemporary societal belief. Meanwhile, the forest follows a more ocular approach: the trees all bend inward and openings take on a circular shape to make the imagery feel more whole. Consequently, the characters take on a similar design to their surroundings; often when Mebh and her wolfpack move through the forest, they flow smoothly like a river, while the watercolored grey backgrounds of the city and lush chlorophyll hues of the surrounding foliage of the forest are obvious in their connotation.

To harp on the descriptive qualities of the animation would take an entire lifetime. There are so many fine details in the film to be enamored by: the way that Mebh’s mother is given a larger, curved body to give the viewer a more maternal sense for her character; the way that the druidic cave drawings mirror the oneness of humanity and nature; the fact that an archway made from the roots of a tree signifies the true division between the city and the hidden world of the forest (similar to a faerie gate); even the bite marks on Robyn’s arm are somehow beautiful. The impeccable level of detail is something to be admired with multiple viewings—much like Song of the Sea—and enriches the atmosphere without making each shot feel like a cluttered mess. Incorporated this time around are more experimental approaches to the animation style including a frayed, scratched look to the frame and coloring whenever a scene of great distress is taking place, along with panel work that splits the screen into multiple images at one time. Also unique to the film is wolfvision: a new technique wherein the camera takes on the wolf’s point of view; the background is animated digitally before being rendered by hand onto paper to achieve a hand-drawn effect. It’s beautifully effective and allows the film to maintain its traditional animation style without having to forfeit to computer-generated imagery for three-dimensional visuals.

Tonally speaking, the film does well to balance its serious subject matter with its folkloric sense of magic. This is a film where the PG rating is well deserved. It’s cold and despairing, but also striking and emotional when it needs to be. When we watch Robyn forced into the scullery, forced into a life of puritanical obedience, we feel a sense of loss. Similarly, we like to see our characters in the forest because it is a naturally pretty location for them to explore. Some might see the historical context of the puritan English rule over the Irish farmlands from a religious, almost critical, viewpoint, and they would be totally justified in doing so. There is a good deal of dichotomy between Paganism and Christianity in Wolfwalkers, though this is only due to the stern, idiosyncratic nature of the Lord Protector, modelled closely after Oliver Cromwell but exhibiting a bit of hypocritical Frollo energy from Disney’s The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996). The people of Kilkenny follow the Lord Protector’s direction, not because it is what is best in the eyes of God, but because they are terrified by what will happen to them if they don’t. Primarily, going against the Lord Protector means getting put into the stocks, and this is what drives Bill, Robyn’s father, to follow the orders of his superior. Bill doesn’t tell Robyn to follow orders because it is the right thing to do, he tells her to do it because it “keeps her safe” and that it gives them the opportunity to live happily. The only thing is that it keeps Robyn from living the life that she wishes to live and, evidently, it keeps Bill from doing the same. Small details do well to elicit Robyn’s imprisonment, as it were; when she is working in the scullery, her duties are shown in a four-panel grid with the panels themselves being constructed out of chain. I especially love the parallels between the scene where Bill leaves her in the scullery, telling her that it’s for her own good, with the scene of Robyn telling Mebh that it’s for her own good when she is put in a cage.

It’s worth mentioning that while the story is wholly Robyn’s, the charisma fully belongs to Mebh. She acts as an aspirational foil for Robyn’s societal constriction, a young girl free from the bonds set by society, her hair loose and entangled with leaves, her actions less enforced. It’s exactly the kind of person Robyn wishes she could be and it’s in that wild, feral demeanor that she finds the freedom to express herself. It is only when we are stripped of our outer visage that our natural selves are most prevalent. It is only when we are separated from the rest of the world that we are able to be at our most pure self. This obviously gives the film a transcendentalist feel, though that is to be expected from a story in which the main focus is placed on the division between two very different worldviews: the naturalism of the Celtic spiritualist and the restrained order of modernization. Eventually, Robyn decides that she’s had enough of letting society, of letting the people around her, decide what is right for her and lets her own hair loose as she stands in defiance against her father and the Lord Protector.

If there’s one aspect of Wolfwalkers that I don’t love, it’s sadly the soundtrack. The gloomy and sometimes rampant violin work of Bruno Coulais’ score is totally serviceable and lovely to hear, but it doesn’t strike my emerald heart in the same way that his work with Lisa Hannigan and Kila did in Song of the Sea; a tin whistle and a wood flute can go a long way. Not to mention the mid-film sequence of Robyn and Mebh in their wolf forms with Aurora’s “Running with the Wolves” playing in the background felt poppy and a bit too mainstream for the kind of film that Wolfwalkers wants to be; a film that wants to be completely foreign and unique, but as impressionable as any other animated film being produced by a major studio, today. It’s in this way that the films of Cartoon Saloon remain so clandestine; it’s what gives each film its own little wrinkle to offset it from other films of its caliber.

The beauty of a film like Wolfwalkers is that in a world—at a time—where the individual self is meant to follow the direction of the normative, the creative spirit suffers from the complacency of the arbitrary. To be oneself is not enough anymore. Instead, we are told to adapt to the world that we live in, because it is only by pleasing others that we are able to remain relevant. Meanwhile, here comes a film from a studio which largely rejects that norm, that instead chooses to be inspired by tradition, that instead chooses to tell a story about how being yourself is enough so long as you are willing to fight for who you are and what you believe in. This is how we can learn to be comfortable in ourselves as creators, as human beings, and as dreamers. I think there’s something to be said about the fact that Mebh and Robyn don’t turn into wolves until they fall asleep; our dreams are what drive us and those same dreams move us to be our truest selves, free from the limitations of our society, free from the overprotection of our parents, free from the world that we feel utterly lost within. As a creative myself, I can safely say that this world may not be made for us, nor does it choose to encourage our sense of expression, but we have the freedom to be ourselves, regardless, and that freedom is a wonderful thing to have.

The First Secret of Success: The Pursuit of the Self in Wolfwalkers (2020)

First Cow (2020): Hope for a New Beginning

You Cannot Capture an Entire Man’s Life in Two Hours: Examining David Fincher’s Mank (2020)