Review by C.J. Bunce
Remember when epic animated movies didn’t come around so often, when Disney movies dominated theaters and clamshell home video releases? A new animated movie from Skydance Animation is the next film in the spirit of classics like The Jungle Book, Ice Age, and Finding Nemo. But it also has the modern fantasy depth found in Hayao Miyazaki’s films like Nausicaa and the Valley of the Wind and Princess Mononoke. The movie is Swapped, and it has the sensibilities of a folk tale or classic storybook, with a compelling theme, action, and fun for kids of all ages. Its fantasy world blends a world of beautiful plants and trees with incredible, fantastical new creatures. Its environments and landscapes are like nothing you’ve seen before. Swapped is now streaming on Netflix.
Ollie is a Pookoo, an orange and brown hedgehog-like little fellow. When he reacts to others, Ollie looks quite like the Disney version of the man-cub Mowgli from The Jungle Book. In a simple act of well-intentioned selflessness, Ollie makes a mistake that results in the devastation of all the Pookoos.
Ollie eats a special seed pod, that only Pookoos know how to crack, and the seeds are abundant, enough to feed all the Pook00s. When Ollie meets a young Javan–a brightly colored bird–named Ivy, he sees her playing with a pod, and he casually teaches her how to open it. But then she shows another and as Ollie’s father watches from the brush, the abundance of the seed pods are now a food source taken over by the Javan.
That’s only the beginning. Executive producer John Lasseter, director Nathan Greno, and writers John Whittington, Christian Magalhaes, and Robert Snow, who looked to Peter Wohlleben’s The Hidden Life of Trees (discussed here) and studied other nature resources in creating this tale, assembled a fully-fleshed out world and a story with a resounding, consistent theme: empathy. It has a giant scope with environmentalism and the importance of preserving parks and forests key, while the evils and horrors of man, like intentional or negligently set wildfires, are part of the peril and villainy of the story. Along the way the would-be villains of the story end up in partnership with the heroes, and the true villains emerge where you would least expect it.
The title comes from these shiny, magical pods that cling to old beings called Dzo. Dzo are like Ents from Middle-Earth, only Ents are walking trees. Dzo are ancient hybrid animals like elephants who are also part plant or tree. Some of the Dzo are host to tiny, bright dots. But when someone comes in contact with one of these will-o’-the-wisps, they turn into the creature they last said aloud. For Ollie and Ivy, what begins as Freaky Friday turns into a valuable tool for saving the valley from the legendary Fire Wolf.
Then there are the voices. Completely masked is Michael B. Jordan as Ollie. You wouldn’t think the actor famous for leading man roles could be so believable as a cute young forest creature. Juno Temple sounds almost like Julie Andrews as Ivy. Together just the magic of their conversation as they get to know each other is something special. Listen for Tracy Morgan as Boogle, a giant fish the two heroes befriend early on. The visual artistry behind Boogle’s fish-like qualities are so vivid you can practically smell him.
Siddhartha Khosla’s music is exceptional. A quiet march at a key scene where all is almost lost for Ollie and Ivy is the stuff of goosebumps.
It’s probably the most gorgeous and emotional entry in the world of animation since Ferdinand, with eye-popping natural visuals like those of Brave, and its story is compelling and true as last year’s animated film Oscar winner Flow, but without the primitive animation.
Nature finds a way, but sometimes it needs help. Swapped has the soul and magic I think James Cameron was shooting for with his Avatar world. But Swapped has more–gravitas, authority, and emotion. Its animation is a great extension of the best technology of past animated films. It’s steeped in the kinds of creations thought up by J.R.R. Tolkien. It’s rich and layered, full of sacrifice and empathy. It has lots of scenes of peril, but the writers never let the viewer down, so it’s a story for all ages.
It’s a timeless story, brilliantly executed. Don’t miss Swapped, now streaming on Netflix.
