Birdboy: The Forgotten Children is one nightmare after another, gorgeously illustrated and poetic on a fate we may all suffer. Like if Lars von Trier directed episodes of Adventure Time, Birdboy: The Forgotten Children traces a series of increasingly upsetting character lines: a female mouse whose abusive step-parents drive her to flee their decimated homeland a young rabbit trying to shake off the demonic voices in her head a pig sailor forced to feed his mother's addiction, which manifests as a mutant spider two rats, a father and son, who rummage through the wasteland until another father-son pair fight them to the death over scrap metal and the title character, an avian orphan with a heroin addiction who might save the planet, if the rifle-toting cops don't kill him first. This isn't just a movie reveling in the eye-popping visuals of Dia de Los Muertos, but one that speaks a language, and plots a roller-coaster ride through a living, breathing heritage. The ofrenda, the holiday's ritual alter, is a centerpiece of the movie, and it's design extends to corner of Coco's imaginative alternate dimension.īased on director Alberto Vázquez's graphic novel Psiconautas, this Spanish-language cartoon stars adorable, anthropomorphic animals in the most horrific, post-apocalyptic scenario imaginable. Toy Story 3 director Lee Unkrich worked with bastions of Mexican culture to give Coco an air of integrity and it shows. It takes a magical guitar, a trip to underworld during the Day of the Dead, and Hector, a skeletal specter no one on Earth remembers, to help Miguel learn a thing or two about responsibility and to show his family the truth about its musical history. Twelve-year-old Miguel dreams of being a musician, but ever since his guitar-playing great-great-grandfather walked out on his wife, music has been banned in the family. Pixar's latest original is cast from the classic 'you're special and here's why' mold - but when it looks this fantastic, you can't write it off.

New animated movies from 2017