The Legend of Ochi

The Legend of Ochi is a A24's attempt at an E. T. movie. It follows a little girl as she attempts to take a cute baby creature home while being pursued by her angry father and his band of boys who are trying to exterminate the creatures. There has been a lot of attempts to make an E. T. like movie before but what makes this attempt charming is all of the creatures are done by puppetry. I am a sucker for puppetry so I really like it. The creature also has a great designs. The cast is ok with Willem Dafoe playing the out of touch dad and the girl playing the weird quirky kid. She isn't annoying but she isn't likable either. Finn Wolfhard plays the adoptive brother who has nothing to work with and is kinda an afterthought. The chemistry of the girl and the creature is good but unfortunately they take a decent size break in the middle of the movie so you never really get emotionally invested in their relationship. The creature is cute though so I enjoyed all the scenes it was in. Overall it's an ok sweet kid and its creature feature but nothing too memorable.

This film has atmosphere, I'll give it that. The previews had me excited to check it out; Willem DaFoe hunting ape monsters in a viking outfit? Sign me up! The production design is top notch, the strange lost in time setting of Carpathia is beautiful and haunting, and the creature design and execution is very well done.

The story, on the other hand, seems to be an afterthought. The dialogue is indistinct (figuratively and literally; oftentimes I had no idea what they were saying), and the characters really lacked any nuance or development. Quirky for the sake of quirkiness.

My main gripe, though, is that it mostly fails as a kids' movie. I normally love slow, atmospheric films, but this one moved like the tectonic plates that formed the mountains of Catpathia. I brought my 9-year old and he didn't hesitate to tell me how boring he found the film, and we left before it ended. There was very little humor, and most of the parts that seemed to be attempts at laughs fell completely flat.

I really wanted to like this film. I admire the dedication to practical effects, and the attention to feeling and atmosphere in the world building. Unfortunately, the lack of a compelling story or characters made this into a slog.

A24's first family feature film offers a decent throwback to the 80s sci-fi fantasy stories that were created and it's clear the filmmaker has a lot of passion. The colorful background, designs, costumes and the special effects are all wonderful and beautifully designed to capture the atmosphere and tone. Alongside with the layers of the designs of the creatures and the make up. It reminds me a lot of The Neverending Story vibe.

With the musical score being pretty good and the atmosphere, I appreciate the new world concept the filmmaker is able to make as I love to see a new whole world to be made or explored. The performances from the cast are all pretty good and the creature, Ochi, is so cute!

However, what holds the movie back from being good is the writing and structure. The writing offers new concepts and ideas but the cliche approach to how it navigates the scenarios starts to feel uninteresting and doesn't hit the emotional impact. Alongside with the thinly written characters that really made me struggle to connect with their goals or understand their motivations. Kind of a shame since I love the vibe but I did wish the writing was better.

Overall, it's a good movie from children as it is a clear film for family entertainment. A24 recently has been having a weird timeline of movies ever since they opened to make more commerical films.

The Legend of Ochi is a very ambitious project for someone to tackle as their directorial debut and I give praise to Isiah Saxon for really going for it. The world building here is pretty solid for the most part and the movie starts off with a strong setup and some good action. The main Ochi creature himself is very endearing and his connection with the young girl is very sweet. The fact that the creatures are practical is awesome. The movie has some funny moments especially the scenes with Willem Dafoe and that main duo. However the movie loses the plot a little bit in the second half. Character actions feel like they're forced in order for the plot to continue and some of the pay off feels cheap. The movie's ending feels a little cliche and because of that I feel like this movie is going to have a hard time really engaging general audiences. Overall it's an entertaining enough movie and I love that Saxon got to express his creative vision, but some more fleshing out of the world and characters could've helped.

One of the most visually interesting movies I've seen in a while. They certainly went for the nostalgia vibe, giving an 80s feel to the scenery. Plot was a bit boring for me, a tad predictable, but still enjoyable. I'm not sure if it was an issue for just my theater or an issue with the sound production, but it was incredibly loud throughout yet dialogue remained soft. I found myself covering my ears in many parts due to the overwhelmingly high-pitched sounds of the ochi and the background score and sounds just to be struggling to hear many of the characters when they spoke. Props for using an orchestral score. It was beautiful regardless of volume and added to the warm ambiance of the movie. Warming to those sensitive to loud and high-pitched sounds, you may not want to see this one in theaters.