It didn’t cop the Oscar on Sunday, but the good news is a few hundred million people have now heard of Song of the Sea. The Best Animated Feature category often includes a title or two that—while utterly obscure by Disney or DreamWorks standards—are at least as impressive in the realm of cartoon art. This year Disney’s lukewarmly received Big Hero 6 was a bit of a surprise winner, its triumph perhaps the result of votes being siphoned off by two tiny but acclaimed competitors, Tale of the Princess Kayuga and this one.
Song of the Sea comes from an Irish company, Cartoon Saloon, whose previous feature The Secret of Kells (2009) also snagged an Oscar nomination. Like that picture, Song is absolutely dazzling in its visual presentation and not so thrilling in its conventional storytelling. The plot is drawn from Celtic folklore, specifically the tradition of the selkie, those mythological shapeshifters who can live on land or sea, as humans or seals. Our hero is Ben (voiced by David Rawle), a young lad whose mother vanishes under dramatic circumstances the night his mute younger sister Saoirse is born. They live on a wee shard of an island with their mournful father (Brendan Gleeson), a red-bearded lighthouse-keeper, but a series of marvelous events lead Ben into a secret world of magical creatures and spell-spinning songs. Little Saoirse, Ben’s nemesis, tags along for the adventure, and in fact proves central to the unraveling of the mystery. (If you’ve ever wondered how to pronounce Saoirse, the matter is settled after hearing it spoken approximately 126 times here.)
Director Tomm Moore lets the movie’s forward momentum run aground at various moments, but he and the Cartoon Saloon crew seem more interested in creating the gorgeous vistas that occupy virtually every frame. The character designs follow circular, looping patterns, and the visual influences seem inspired by anime and the line drawings of 1950s-era UPA cartoons (Mr. Magoo is not forgotten, people). Add the Irish taste for sadness and fairy folk, and the film really does have a distinctive look. It’s even more geared for children than The Secret of Kells, a film I admired but never really felt enchanted by. I can’t shake the idea that the filmmakers really want kids to know about folk tales, as though dutifully passing on a somewhat cobwebbed tradition—when what a tale like this really needs is a storyteller drunk on the dark magic of seals and mermaids and the deep blue sea.
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SONG OF THE SEA Opens Fri., Feb. 27 at Guild 45th. Rated PG. 93 minutes.
