Kubo and the Two Strings

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Kubo and the Two Strings

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Postby pwhodges » Sat Mar 12, 2016 6:11 pm

Unusually, this trailer caught my attention:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p4-6qJzeb3A
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Re: Kubo and the Two Strings

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Postby Ray » Mon Mar 14, 2016 8:31 pm

George Takei is in this?

Alright, I'm sold.

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Re: Kubo and the Two Strings

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Postby Ray » Fri Aug 05, 2016 11:05 pm

Any Beatles Fans in the audience?

Cover Of "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" Performed On The Shamisen and the Shakuhachi(Japanese Flute) for the films soundtrack.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KoujdXqptnc

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Re: Kubo and the Two Strings

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Postby Director Black » Mon Aug 08, 2016 6:56 pm

Laika (The Production Company that made this), already has a solid track record (Coraline and Paranorman were both great.), and from I get from the trailers, it looks like it could be their best movie yet.
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Re: Kubo and the Two Strings

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Postby Ray » Mon Aug 08, 2016 7:52 pm

Given the lack of decent publicity for it, and the huge amount of other movies coming out eating up peoples time. I'm fairly confident it will underperform.

I mean you've got Suicide Squad eating up the Superhero crowd. Sausage Party taking the Stoner/R-rated comedy crowd.

and it doesn't look like your typical CGI bright kids movie, and it looks like some parts might be genuinely scary, so that might turn off parents from taking their kids to see it.

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Re: Kubo and the Two Strings

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Postby Literary Eagle » Sat Aug 20, 2016 5:03 pm

Saw the movie yesterday. Amazing visuals! I love stop-motion animation so much. Go see it! :D
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Re: Kubo and the Two Strings

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Postby NemZ » Sat Aug 20, 2016 6:11 pm

Huh, that does look pretty awesome.
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Re: Kubo and the Two Strings

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Postby Ray » Sun Aug 21, 2016 8:24 pm

Laika's made two movies I loved (Coraline, Paranorman) , and one movie I found really annoying (Boxtrolls). So just judging from the trailer to Kubo I was at least expecting something okay.

I was blown away. This movie is so good. This movie is to Animated kids movies what Fury Road was to adult movies.


I respect the fact that Laika had the cahones to make a kids film with actual peril, frightening imagery, and harsh real world realities in it. In the spirit of kids fIlms from the 80's, before they became too clean and friendly like today. I mean, I saw a trailer for TROLLS right before this, where a horse literally poops rainbows. Kubo is to kids films what The Dark Knight Trilogy is to Comic Book Movies.

The opening scene sets the tone for the film right away. You see a character smash their head on a rock, HARD. There's blood, then you see them later washed up on the beach, the cut is still painful to look at, there's blood oozing through the bandage. That takes some serious guts you don't see in kids movies today.

The animation. Good lord, the animation here is so smooth. I mean, I've NEVER seen Stop Motion this good in my life, not even in Laika's previous films, (though Paranorman came close). The fight's are really well choreographed, seeing puppets clash with each other like something out of Crouching Tiger is worth the price of admission alone, but it's really in the smaller moments where the movie really shines. At the start of the movie, Kubo is making breakfast for his sick mother. There's no dialogue or score, just a boy feeding an ill woman soup, one spoon at a time, a little rice drops off her lip and onto her face, he picks it back up to her mouth with the spoon. Also, the characters have actual teeth, that move around in their mouth as they talk exactly like you'd expect a human (or Monkey) mouth to move.
The stop motion and the CGI mesh perfectly, I couldn't tell where the stop motion ended and the CGI began.

About that scary imagery. . . Well, let's just say that although they aren't as scary as I thought they'd be, what's under the Tengu demon's masks are best left to the imagination. They're right out of a Japanese horror movie.
Also, the end Credits are traditionally animated in a 1990's Disney-esque style. Which I thought was a cherry on the cake. If I were a kid watching this, it would blow my mind.

The story is also decent, it's based on Japanese Folklore so it's . . . simple, and you have to accept that this is a world where magic just exists and is a part of everyday life. But it has some really great twists in it that I'd never have expected from a story like this. This is a movie where the trailers do not spoil the movie. The way Kubo beats the movies main villain is actually quite creative. I won't spoil how, because you need to see it to believe.

This is easily one of the best movies this year, and easily the best fantasy movie we've seen since at least the original Lord Of The Rings Trilogy.

My biggest worry is that coming in towards the end of a bloated and overall disappointing summer movie season, that Kubo might underperform or even outright flop.

So if you haven't seen it yet, please go see it. If you've seen it already, PLEASE go see it again. I want this movie to do well enough so that more movies like this are made.


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