"Kubo is one of the best animated films I've ever seen. If Laika continues to produce films of this quality, we'll have a worthy successor to the great Studio Ghibli."
— Chris Stuckmann
Kubo and the Two Strings is a 2016 American stop-motion animated action fantasy film directed by Travis Knight (in his feature directorial debut) and produced by animation studio Laika as its fourth feature film. It stars the voices of Charlize Theron, Art Parkinson, Ralph Fiennes, George Takei, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, Brenda Vaccaro, Rooney Mara, and Matthew McConaughey. The film premiered at Melbourne International Film Festival on August 13, 2016, and was released by Focus Features in the United States on August 19, 2016.
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 His Quest Begins.
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Plot
The movie is about a young boy with one eye named Kubo, who owns a two-stringed, magical shamisen (a guitar-like Japanese instrument). His mother wants to keep him safe from his grandfather and aunts, who stole his eye and want to have his other one. Because of this, Kubo must not stay away from his home after dark and thus is cautious of being away from home. One day, after he tries to talk with his deceased father Hanzo, he forgets to return home and his two aunts find him. His village gets destroyed, but his mother finds and protects him before sending him away at the cost of her own life. Kubo later wakes up to find a snow monkey talking to him, and later finds out that a small origami figure of his father Hanzo was built after he had a dream about him. They try to find the armor, and later find a samurai who was cursed to take the appearance of a stag beetle/human hybrid. However, Kubo's aunts are still trying to find him, and so Monkey and Beetle must keep him safe.
Why It Got The Two Strings
- Detailed and beautiful stop-motion animation, especially how it has some styles of Japanese art such as origami and ink wash painting in it.
- It mostly stays quite true to Japanese culture.
- Kubo is a very likable protagonist, and could also be a good role model to children who have disabilities, missing limbs, etc.
- It has quite a lot of the same charm as other films created by Laika, such as Coraline. It also possibly references this film since it shows the conflict between family, as well as the theme of eyes being stolen.
- Raiden the Moon King is a impressive and amazing villain, thanks to Ralph Fiennes, who portrayed Lord Voldemort from Harry Potter series.
- The time-lapse clip showing how the skeleton demon was built showed true respect to Laika's other animations; for instance, in "Coraline" it showed how the mice coming from the door were rigged and how in "Paranorman" Norman was animated. This was also something that was interesting to see.
- Emotional scenes, such as when Kubo's mother dies.
- The plot twist where Beetle is actually Kubo's father is surprising and rather well-executive.
- Some moments that were intended to be funny were actually pretty funny, such as when Kubo sends a flock of paper birds into the sky as they chase a real bird.
- The soundtrack by Dario Marianelli is really great.
- It shows that Travis Knight, who worked as the lead animator for stop-motion animation studio Laika, directing very well.
- Excellent voice acting, like Charlize Theron, Art Parkinson, Ralph Fiennes, George Takei, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, Brenda Vaccaro, Rooney Mara, and Matthew McConaughey.
- The action scenes were very suspenseful and were great to look at.
Bad Qualities
- Although not as scary as Coraline, there were scenes that were still very frightening for its target audience.
- There are a few lighting errors, although these are somewhat difficult to notice.
- While excellent, the casting choice are whitewashing; like most of voice actors with non-Japanese, except for George Takei and Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa.
Reception
Kubo and the Two Strings received universal acclaim. Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film an approval rating of 97% based on reviews from 219 critics, with an average rating of 8.4/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Kubo and the Two Strings matches its incredible animation with an absorbing—and bravely melancholy—story that has something to offer audiences of all ages.". On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 84 out of 100, based on 38 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale, while PostTrak reported filmgoers gave it an 85% overall positive score and a 63% "definite recommend".
Trivia
- Director Travis Knight had later directed the film Bumblebee, a year after the box office failure of Transformers: The Last Knight..