The Big Picture
The Imaginary
's team at Studio Ponoc, many of whom have ties to Studio Ghibli, creates an original, visually stunning, and emotive animated film.- The movie expertly balances whimsy, horror, and heartfelt moments, delivering a unique and captivating viewing experience.
- The film's near-perfect ending ties emotions and artistry together, leaving viewers with a poignant and resonant conclusion.
If Netflix’s new animated movie The Imaginary reminds you of some of the works of Studio Ghibli (even as it actually stems from Studio Ponoc), there’s a good reason for that. Namely, the film is directed by the veteran animator Yoshiyuki Momose whopreviously worked on films like Grave of the Fireflies,Porco Rosso, and, yes, evenSpirited Away. On top of that, it is also written by former Studio Ghibli producer Yoshiaki Nishimura who founded Studio Ponoc in 2015. So if you’re feeling a sense of déjà vu and the sense that you’ve seen this before, with Spirited Away feeling most linked to what is playing out here, that history is baked into the backgrounds of all who worked on this project. This is something that is not a criticism per se as much as it is a necessary early acknowledgment of what its visions, both artistic and thematic, were born out of. Much like its central character, there is much in its past.
The key to what makes it work is that nothing in The Imaginary feels derivative. Rather, it boasts what feels like some truly great points of inspiration. Even when it can’t quite rise to the same heights at every single moment in isolation, the overall picture that it paints is a poetic and playful one that you want to get lost in. It’s a beautifully animated work that manages to stand on its own, finding many earnestly heartfelt yet still strikingly horrifying visuals in its imaginative world. Sure, its premise may actually also feel similar to this year’s IF, but the care with which it unfolds is what makes it far greater than that. You’re unlikely to see an animated film on the steamer that is as frequently stunning as this one, even as one hopes that it may still get a proper theatrical release. However, wherever you end up seeing it, it’s one well worth seeking out and opening up every corner of your own imagination to.
What Is 'The Imaginary' About?
Based on the 2014 children’s novel of the same name by A.F. Harrold and the accompanying illustrations by Emily Gravett, it centers on the young Rudger (Louie Rudge-Buchanan) who is the imaginary friend of Amanda (Evie Kiszel). In an early opening scene, we get immersed in the wonder of the worlds which they inhabit together, which proves to be boundlessly breathtaking just as the real one they must inevitably return back to has plenty of challenges boxing them in. Namely, the charming bookstore run by Amanda’s mother Lizzie (Hayley Atwell) is in danger of closing. This doesn’t stop the young friends from going on adventures in their imagined worlds together, with one delightfully humorous early scene seeing them disagree on a very important name of a creature they create, but soon the dark forces of reality will come knocking in the form of a menacing man that takes a specific interest in Rudger. He is accompanied by a terrifying imaginary girl, who feels like she could be Samara from The Ring’s younger sister, and wants to consume the young boy. Following a crisis that separates him from Amanda, Rudger will have to navigate a fantastical world and find his way back to his friend while remaining out of the clutches of the man following him.
Any other discussion of what happens, especially surrounding what it was that brought Rudger into existence in the first place, is best left to the film as there are plenty of joyous discoveries to be found just as there are more reflective and somber ones. Even when it comes a little too close to falling into the bizarre trend in animation where the magical is made into something more like a banal business, it cleverly dances its way out of this and launches into far more spectacular scenes from the far reaches of outer space to the space between spaces. At moments, it almost feels like an echo of some of the ways the magnificent 2001 movie Millennium Actress leaps through its scenes.
Even when The Imaginary can get a little tied up in over-explaining parts of the way its world works, it still finds plenty of potent emotional payoffs when it leaves all this beyond and lets us feel the way everything comes together. Whether it is in the aftermath of said journey into space where a character gets the chance to start anew or the entire concluding act where Rudger must reinvent himself in order to find Amanda, it’s truly wonderful stuff. Even when you’re hungering for more of a look into this imaginary world, the fact that we must always keep getting pulled back to reality is the point. No matter how much we may want to fully leave the world behind, it is the things that tether Rudger there that provide the emotional grounding points that give the film its weight when it all comes crashing down.
'The Imaginary' Has a Near-Perfect Ending
Without tipping anything off, the end to this journey is where the film lays you flat one final time. You get wrapped up in the whimsy of it all just before it all hits you like a truck, finding plenty of resonant emotional flashbacks that contextualize and deepen the experience just in time for the conclusion. When further complimented by some bold swings, both narratively in terms of a late reveal and formally in the vibrant melding of animation styles, it builds to something smaller scale just as it is expansively shattering. Everything just clicks together perfectly, a demonstration of how the melding of art and emotion in this thing we call cinema can create an experience unlike anything else. You’d be hard-pressed to imagine better proof of this in graceful and gorgeous action than the astounding final frames you’ll see here.
REVIEW
The Imaginary (2024)
The Imaginary is a breathtaking wonder of animation that, while familiar in many regards, also more than stands on its own before leaping into a fantastical world.
- Though those behind the film have worked on other notable animations, The Imagination never feels derivative as it paints a poetic and playful picture you want to get lost in.
- The animation is stunning, bringing us plenty of wonder and whimsy just as it can also be more somberly reflective.
- The finale all the way up until the astounding final frames lays you flat, melding art and emotion in the way only cinema can.
The Imaginary screened at the 2024 Annecy Film Festival. It's available to stream on Netflix in the U.S. starting July 5.
WATCH ON NETFLIX
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