Cryptozoo
95 Minutes, Not yet rated
Written and Directed by Dash Shaw
Synopsis:
Cryptozookeepers try to capture a Baku, a dream-eating hybrid creature of legend, and start wondering if they should display these beasts or keep them hidden and unknown.
Cryptozoo, I quickly discovered, was a hand-drawn, full-length animated movie made for adults.
Adults. I mean it. No kids.
You’ve been warned.
The zoo, of course, will warrant immediate comparisons to Jurassic Park, and those comparisons are not without merit on some level.
But Cryptozoo is so much more.
This is really a wonderful film to watch, and not just for it’s stripped-down animation stylings, but for the story and moral dilemmas the film presents the viewer. Is it better to contain all of these beautiful/terrifying/obscure mythological creatures “for their protection,” or should they be allowed to remain free and unknown, as they have for millennia?
The voice work is great, and the characters are fleshed-out enough to give the viewer a sense of who they really are and why they do the things they do.
Overall, Cryptozoo is not going to be for everyone, and that is kind of depressing.
Perhaps that is part of its charm, though, this idea that not everyone can appreciate this kind of mythological creature of an animation species long thought lost.
Regardless, we recommend it.
Cryptozoo features the voices of Lake Bell, Michael Cera, Emily Davis, Alex Karpovsky, Zoe Kazan, Louis Krause, Angeliki Papoulia, Thomas Jay Ryan, Peter Stormare, and Grace Zabriskie.
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