I watched the animated film ‘Wolfwalkers’ again last night, and marvelled again at the beauty of this gorgeous film. I think I’ve seen all of the feature length ‘Cartoon Saloon’ films now (some, like Wolfwalkers, more than once), and I love them all. A second (or third) viewing lets you admire the details of the images more, since you know the story.

Wolfwalkers is set in Kilkenny, Ireland in 1650, and revolves around our heroine, Robyn, and her father, who have moved from England to serve the ‘Lord Protector’ (not named, but very strongly hinted to be Oliver Cromwell during his brutal invasion of Ireland at that time). Robyn’s father is a hunter, hired by Cromwell (ahem, “the Lord Protector”) to kill the wolves living in the forest beyond the walls of the town. Robyn wants a life of adventure rather than domestic drudgery, so ignores her father’s entreaties to stay safe in the house, and follows him into the woods.

There she meets Mebh, a ‘wolfwalker’: someone whose spirit leaves her body and roams the forest as a wolf while she sleeps, returning to her human body at dawn. She can command a wolf pack to her will, as well as heal wounds. Mebh’s mother (also a wolfwalker) has gone missing, and her body sleeps on, unresponsive. The story revolves around Robyn and Mebh’s friendship, and them trying to find Mebh’s mother.

All of the Cartoon Saloon films are visually stunning. You can pause almost any frame and marvel at the detail and the colours. The drawing style is often used to distinguish different worlds in the film. As in The Secret of Kells, the town of Kilkenny and its inhabitants is drawn in a very angular geometric style, while the forest is all glorious swoops and curves, and spirals, as are Mebh and her mother. When we first see them sleeping, Mebh on her mother’s lap, their matching copper-red hair forms a huge circle around each of their heads like a red halo, and the forms reminded me strongly of Gustav Klimt’s art, particularly parts of the Beethoven Frieze. In the town, everything is squares, diamonds or triangles. There is a repeated visual motif of Robyn, trapped in the house, looking out of a leaded window where the diamond pattern of the leading forms a cross centred on her face, as if she is trapped behind bars. There’s also a clever use of odd perspective, so that when we look back towards the town from the forest, the forest is in proper perspective, but the town appears to literally be at 90 degrees from the forest, and flat like an aerial plan of the town pinned to an invisible wall. It’s a clever way to show the separation of the two and hint that for all the magic and enchantment of the forest, it is the real world, not the town. When we see through the eyes of the spirit wolves, we see sketchy, monochrome visual details, but scents and sounds in vivid, neon colours.

There are ecstatically beautiful images and heart-breakingly sad ones. The townspeople are gradually felling the forest (under orders from Cromwell/the Lord Protector), and at one point we see — almost incidentally — that a huge landmark tree used as a meeting place for Robyn and Mebh has been felled and is just lying on its side. I had forgotten about that part, but it really hit me this time and made me think about the recent felling of the Sycamore Gap tree. And despite the fact that I had seen it before and knew it was coming, the beautiful, ecstatically emotional resolution of this film hit me right in the feels again, and I ended up crying. “Mammy!”. Sniff.

Anyway, provided you have a box of tissues ready for the emotional parts, I highly recommend this film.