'Cryptozoo' Review
NR
Runtime: 1 Hr and 35 Minutes
Production Companies: Fit Via Fi, Electro Chinoland, Washington Square Films, Low Spark Films, Cinereach
Distributor: Magnolia Pictures
Director: Dash Shaw
Writer: Dash Shaw
Cast: Lake Bell, Michael Cera, Angeliki Papoulia, Zoe Kazan, Peter Stormare, Grace Zabriskie, Louisa Krause, Thomas Jay Ryan, Alex Karpovsky
Release Date: August 20, 2021
Theaters & VOD
As cryptozookeepers struggle to capture a Baku (a legendary dream-eating hybrid creature) they begin to wonder if they should display these rare beasts in the confines of a cryptozoo or if these mythical creatures should remain hidden and unknown.
There’s hardly anybody else in the realm of western animation who creates independent animated features as unique, mature, and stylistically ambitious as writer/director Dash Shaw. A few years ago, I popped my Metrograph cherry when I saw his debut feature, My Entire High School Sinking Into the Sea, and it was such an immersive animated film that threw the entire treasure chest of 2D techniques into a fun DIY-style comedy. Now he’s back with his sophomore feature Cryptozoo, a René Laloux-type ‘60s action-drama that furthers his reach as a storyteller and a distinctive artist.
Watching a Dash Shaw film is truly a unique experience. He has a style that is transparently inspired by classic 20th-century animation while incorporating his techniques within the art design to enchant his viewers. From its background production to the character design, Cryptozoo is visually inspired by Fantastic Planet. The various cryptids and human characters have a detailed look that is completely hand-drawn, using various art methods ranging from pencils to paint. The cryptids’ designs are cut from different cloths so when they engage and interact, it’s like a beautiful hodgepodge of art styles clashing together. Even when it comes to lighting and shadows, the film incorporates different pastels and watercolors to emulate the method. Unlike Shaw’s previous feature, the movement in Cryptozoo takes on a slow frame rate to mimic stop-motion. It’s similar to how the underrated HBO animated series Animals was designed where it moves like colored storyboards, but you don’t mind because each action and element is completely hand-drawn. Once again, it’s truly like you’re watching the most expensive and beautiful DIY animated project ever, which is entirely Shaw’s style. He’s a creative artist who knows how to fully realize the worlds he creates in the stories he wants to tell.
As far as storytelling goes, Cryptozoo succeeds at being a tonally consistent and engaging narrative that feels like a hybrid of ample things, including a James Bond-style spy flick, an X-Men-type action flick, and Jurassic Park combined into an adult animated film. Oh yeah, this is an R-rated adult feature right off the bat with a cold open that involves a young couple having sex in the woods, fully nude and you see EVERYTHING. The film is set in the late ‘60s in a fantasy world where cryptids and humans co-exist. But because cryptids are expensive and rare creatures, people see them as money schemes to capture, weaponize, and/or torture, including mythical humanoids creatures. Lauren Gray (Lake Bell), a zookeeper at a place best described as a mix of a Jurassic World-type theme park meets sanctuary, is the combination of a brolic Lara Croft with Eliza Thornberry sensibilities. She’s called upon by park founder and friend Joan (Grace Zabriskie) to search and rescue the mythical dream-eater cryptid Baku. Unfortunately, it’s also being looked for by the U.S military which, of course, wants to weaponize it to prevent the new wave of progressive thinkers. You know… since it’s the hippie era. Along her quest, she befriends and enlists the help of a Russian gorgon Phoebe (Angeliki Papoulia), and must be steps ahead of general Nicholas (Thomas Jay Ryan). For the most part, the film plays like a standard spy procedural that’s action-packed, bloody, and violent. It attempts to be a straightforward spy thriller with fantastical elements and it delivers in its own manic and original manner. Granted, it ultimately becomes an X-Men-meets-Jurassic Park clone, Dash Shaw made it cooler than the last two Jurassic Park and the last three X-Men movies combined. It has familiar beats throughout and it’s thoroughly engaging, albeit way too overstuffed to compensate for the 90-minute runtime.
So much craft and care went into Cryptozoo’s production and world-building, both visually and narratively. That being said, its plot is overstuffed for its 95-minute runtime. During the second act, Shaw crams so many concepts and so much exposition regarding specific cryptids, their backgrounds, their backstory, and anti-capitalistic themes that you just go, “Whoa wait, calm down.” There’s a major imbalance within the worldbuilding by depicting how these mythological creatures coexist on a global scale by spending way too much time with characters and their backstories. It’s so unfocused that it disrupts the pacing and lessens the urgency of the plot. I admire the worldbuilding, which is still depicted in a visually engaging manner, but the movie often stops in its tracks to provide exposition for certain cryptids. While attempting to deliver themes of diversity, capitalism, identity, and environmentalism, it feels overstuffed with one theme being better executed than the other. The film eventually finds its footing but it does stumble over major hurdles to get there. You can see Shaw’s ambition and passion being worn on its sleeve but that screenplay needed more story pass for overall balance. There’s only so much one can do with a 95-minute runtime.
The film is packed to the brim with crypto-creatures of nearly every background, including Greek creatures, humanoids, and Asian cryptid creatures. As a Black viewer, I kept anticipating the inclusion of Black or African-based cryptid creatures, or Latinx-based cryptids. It never happened. The film features a variety of mythological creatures of different cultures but also… no Black ones? No African cryptids? Maybe it was a weird conundrum because the film is about these creatures being held in captivity masked as a sanctuary and including Black cryptid creatures would’ve come off the wrong way. Even then, at least give us a Grootslang or an Adaze. When your movie has a theme regarding diversity and equality during a time where neither elements applied to minority groups during the ‘60s, aka the civil rights era, you gotta put your money where your mouth is. Maybe I’m going too deep when I don’t need to be, but man if you’re gonna utilize the playbook of fantastical creatures of the world, you can’t be so selective in the areas you want to represent.
At the end of the day, Dash Shaw somehow combined the likes of Jurassic Park and X-Men and made… a better version of both properties’ sequels with his wildly imaginative, deranged, and entrancingly animated vision. Cryptozoo is a vibrant and colorful work of adult 2D-animated art that might be visually overwhelming to some, but his unique style is an immersive experience. Though its narrative bites off more than it can chew, Cryptozoo is a fun and inspired original feature that works as an entertaining and thrilling romp.
