From the brilliant mind of Chris Sanders, writer/director of ‘Lilo & Stitch’ and ‘How to Train Your Dragon,’ comes a new adaptation of Peter Brown’s NYT bestseller, starring Lupita Nyong’o and Pedro Pascal… and robots… and otters! In theaters September 20.
As we wait patiently for this Friday’s big Kung Fu Panda 4 release, DreamWorks Animation just dropped the first official trailer for its next great animated adventure, The Wild Robot. From the brilliant mind of Chris Sanders, writer/director of Lilo & Stitch and How to Train Your Dragon, comes a new adaptation of Peter Brown’s New York Times bestseller. It hits theaters September 20.
The film follows the epic adventure of a robot - ROZZUM unit 7134, ‘Roz’ for short - that is shipwrecked on an uninhabited island and must learn to adapt to the harsh surroundings, gradually building relationships with the animals on the island and becoming the adoptive parent of an orphaned gosling.
The Wild Robot stars Oscar winner Lupita Nyong’o (Us, The Black Panther franchise) as robot Roz; Emmy and Golden Globe nominee Pedro Pascal (The Last of Us, The Mandalorian) as fox Fink; Emmy winner Catherine O’Hara (Schitt’s Creek, Best in Show) as opossum Pinktail; Oscar nominee Bill Nighy (Living, Love Actually) as goose Longneck; Kit Connor (Heartstopper, Rocketman) as gosling Brightbill and Oscar nominee Stephanie Hsu (Everything Everywhere All at Once, this summer’s The Fall Guy) as Vontra, a robot that will intersect with Roz’s life on the island.
The film is written and directed by three-time Oscar nominee Sanders, who wrote and directed DreamWorks Animation’s How to Train Your Dragon, The Croods, and Disney’s Lilo & Stitch. Jeff Hermann (DreamWorks Animation’s The Boss Baby 2: Family Business; co-producer, Kung Fu Panda franchise) produces.
The film also features the voice talents of Emmy winning pop-culture icon Mark Hamill (Star Wars franchise, The Boy and the Heron), Matt Berry (What We Do in the Shadows, The SpongeBob Movie franchise) and Golden Globe winner and Emmy nominee Ving Rhames (Mission: Impossible films, Pulp Fiction).
Known as a powerful story about the discovery of self, a thrilling examination of the bridge between technology and nature and a moving exploration of what it means to be alive and connected to all living things, Peter Brown’s “The Wild Robot,” an illustrated middle-grade novel first published in 2016, became a phenomenon, rocketed to #1 on the New York Times bestseller list. The book has since inspired a trilogy that now includes “The Wild Robot Escapes” and “The Wild Robot Protects.” Brown’s work on “The Wild Robot” series and his other bestselling books have earned him a Caldecott Honor, a Horn Book Award, two E.B. White Awards, two E.B. White Honors, a Children’s Choice Award for Illustrator of the Year, two Irma Black Honors, a Golden Kite Award and a New York Times Best Illustrated Book Award.
Source: DreamWorks Animation
Dan Sarto is Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Animation World Network.
