Blu-ray Review: STOPMOTION (2023)

STOPMOTION

Directed by:  Robert Morgan

Distributed by:  Acorn Media International /AMC

  I remember seeing the trailer for this film a while back, and thinking how bizarre it looked with it's mixture of stopmotion animation and live action. I also remember the stopmotion puppets looking so disturbing.  It really piqued my interest.   I got the chance to watch it finally, and my initial thoughts were correct.  This film is both bizarre and disturbing.   

  Here is a brief synopsis of the film from the film's official press release:

  Following the death of her overbearing mother, stop-motion animator Ella Blake (Aisling Franciosi – The Fall, Game of Thrones, God's Creatures), is struggling to control her demons. She embarks on a new film project; in the hope it will channel her creativity and help her escape her problems… but it soon becomes the battleground for her sanity. As Ella’s fragile mind starts to fracture, the characters in her movie take on a life of their own and things spiral into an unimaginable nightmarish hellscape.

  Franciosi gives another outstanding turn as a talented stop-motion artist who becomes completely consumed by the grotesque world of her horrifying creations – with deadly results.

  I have always loved stopmotion films, and I admire the creativity and the strict discipline it takes to create one.  This film has some of the best and most fluid stopmotion animation I have ever seen.   Looking at Director Robert Morgan's IMDb page, it looks as though he is a long time professional solely dealing in the stopmotion form of filmmaking.  This comes as no surprise to me, as I could tell whoever did this animation was a vet of the genre.   The movements of the characters is beautiful, even though the characters themselves are the exact opposite.  

  This isn't just another scary horror film as you may think, it is actually quite complex and is more of a psychological horror.   There are many things going on and at times, it's hard to tell what is real and what is only happing in Ella's twisted mind.  In fact, some of the things you think are real near the beginning of the film, turn out to have not been real at all.   I would love to go into more detail about this, but I don't want to spoil anything.   I'll let you watch and be as surprised as I was hopefully. 

  The film starts off a little slow at first, and almost seems like a weird arthouse/horror mix at the beginning.  This changes abruptly for the last half of the film and turns into a disgusting nightmare of gore.   There are a lot of creepy visuals and images in this film.  As I alluded to earlier, the stopmotion puppets are pretty gross and disgusting to look at.    Mix that in with a few nice jump scares and some unsettling sound effects and music, and you have a good recipe for some disturbing horror!   

STOPMOTION is available now on DVD and Blu-ray and includes the following Special Features:

*Interview with star Aisling Franciosi

*Interview with director Robert Morgan

*Behind-the-scenes of Stopmotion

*Subtitles

CLICK HERE to watch the trailer

CLICK HERE to purchase the DVD

CLICK HERE to purchase the Blu-ray