When I saw that there was a LAIKA studios retrospective event in central london - with special screenings of my favourite stop-motion films, AND Q&A's after, AND a section in the lobby with props from the films, I immediately knew I had to book tickets. I am so glad I went - stop-motion is something I will never cease to admire and appreciate, it is a glacially slow process (his words) with production taking up to 5 years for a film (for paranorman, he basically had the idea since he was a teenager) but what you get out of it is something so artfully crafted that you go back to watch and rewatch it again just to take in every handled frame. I recorded the Q&A audio, it was 20 mins, and it was really interesting to understand a bit better from a writer/director's perspective on such a grand project.
One of the questions was if he has to limit himself when writing, thinking about the limitations of production. He said he never limits himself when writing, and that's the good thing about LAIKA studios, they never stopped him. Missing Link (the newest) was very, very hard to make, it shouldn't have been possible, yet here it is, it is the most ambitious and technologically advanced film they'd ever done and I can't wait to experience it. Another question was about how far you can push horror in a 'children's film' and he said that is always a game you have to play, it always depends, sometimes it's dependent on how well the parents know their children's limitations...a really great thing he said here was that he likes that animated cinema, or 'cinema for kids', in general can be something that both parents and kids can talk about, and have a conversation with... and I think that is really the essence of stop-motion films, especially the ones produced by LAIKA, there is always so many wonderful layers of things to be learnt and things to appreciate in them no matter what age you are. For example, he mentioned that the characters came in all shapes and sizes, which was important to him as this film is also very much about not judging a book by its cover, and on this note, mitch was the first openly gay character in animation in 2012. I could go on about the fantastic writing in these films but that would go on forever. I will also insert photos of the Missing Link booklet below that goes through some of the tremendous craft involved in such a laborious project.
