CAPSULE: Kubo and the Two Strings (2016, Dir. Travis Knight)

Kubo and the Two Strings is a thing of eye-sinking beauty. It demands attention to the handcrafted detail and it rewards in kind. The craftsmanship here is exceptionally intricate and handsomely put together, tiny movement by tiny movement, to create an artistic fluidity that rivals anything created on a computer (even taking into account the few seams smoothed over in post-production). This is moving art.

There is magic here, folded origami-like into the image, and folded into the story's beginning where the young hero-to-be, Kubo (voiced by 'Game of Thrones'' Art Parkinson) enfolds the local villagers in the his mother's tales using paper squares and his enchanted shamisen. He has them enraptured and should have audiences similarly entranced, young and old.

But there is something missing in Travis Knight's film. Perhaps it is down to his screenwriters' aversion to Disney-style moralising. Perhaps it is the lacklustre voicing of Charlize Theron and Matthew McConaughey, who end up as Kubo's quest companions, a monkey and a beetleman. Perhaps it is the film's uneven construction.

In any event, Kubo and the Two Strings doesn't punch as forcibly with its emotions as it does with its visuals. More's the pity. Still, people are hailing it as a classic of the genre and that is not something I'm prone to argue with. I'll just resign myself to the fact that this is one magical leaf boat I've missed.

★★★☆

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