The new DreamWorks film is based on a hugely popular book by Peter Brown and also stars Lupita Nyong’o, Catherine O’Hara and Bill Nighy in its voice cast.
A new trailer has launched for the upcoming DreamWorks animated film The Wild Robot – which is based on a hugely popular book of the same name and features an all-star voice cast including Lupita Nyong’o, Pedro Pascal and Kit Connor.
The trailer gives us a closer look at the epic adventures of a robot named ROZZUM Unit 7134 – Roz, for short – after she gets stranded on an uninhabited island and must find a way to survive in a harsh environment she was not programmed for.
Exciting stuff!
You can view the full trailer – which features some stunning animation – below:
To mark the trailer launch, the film’s director Chris Sanders (Lilo & Stitch, How to Train Your Dragon) spoke exclusively to RadioTimes.com about the new film and why he was so desperate to tell the story of Roz.
“I was looking around for my next project, and I dropped by DreamWorks,” he explained. “And amongst the things that they had to offer as things to develop was the book The Wild Robot.
“And when they described it, and gave me the lowdown, I immediately picked that one out as the one that I was very interested in. It lined up very much with what I’m all about, and the kind of things I do, and my sensibilities.
“So I read it. And I ran back as fast as I could and said, ‘Yes, I’d like to do this, please. May I be the director on this? I’d love to write and direct it.’
“And once we started, I actually mentioned to my daughter the project I was working on, and she said, ‘I read that book,’ and she immediately pulled it out.
“And I was like, ‘Yes, I do remember seeing that around the house for a while.’ It’s a book that is widely read in schools. So she was very excited that I was working on it.”
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Sanders explained that one of the “very first conversations” he had when he boarded the project was with the book’s author Peter Brown, who he said gave him “a great gift” in the form of some key advice on how to approach the source material.
“In our very first conversation with him, he revealed to us that the guiding theme and principle in his head, as he wrote the book, was that kindness can be a survival skill,” he explaned.
“And it was a key to Roz’s story, because she’s a piece of high technology lost in a wilderness. She’s in the opposite place, in every way of what she was designed to exist in. And the place that she’s in is unforgiving.”
He continues: “When she finds herself most animals, she connects with them, and learns very quickly that they do not want to have anything to do with her and they don’t like her. And she also learns the rather savage and unforgiving nature of the island.
“And that was something that Peter Brown revealed to us – is that this is a story all about defying and exceeding your programming.”
Of course, robots have been a feature in several acclaimed animated films from years gone by – from The Iron Giant to Big Hero 6 – and Brown said that Roz had one key thing in common with most of her predecessors.
“One of the things that she shares with all those films is a lack of facial articulation,” he said. “The only robot I’ve ever seen that I felt was successful that did have facial articulation would be The Iron Giant by Brad Bird. And that was a very restrained articulation.
“Wall-E, R2DT, C-3P0, the robots from Forbidden Planet – they have minimal to zero facial articulation. And there’s a really good reason for that, I think it allows you to empathise with them more.
“I think too much articulation tends to be off-putting – it has the opposite effect, actually. Little to no articulation allows the audience to empathise and to connect with these characters.
“So, that was one of the guiding principles. And a difference that you can see between the illustrations in the book and the creature here in our film is that we eliminated the mouth.
“In the book, Peter Brown’s illustrations have just a very simple, understated line for a mouth – and his illustrations are still, so it’s a really good thing for that.
“In a movie where we’re able to move the robot, we put all of our eggs in the eyes and the body movement basket. Giving the images those limitations is exactly what I wanted to do, because I knew that when you do that, they can do extraordinary things.”
The Wild Robot will be released in UK cinemas on Friday 18th September 2024.