I didn't expect this animated film to move me as much as it did.
The animation itself is smooth and pleasant to watch, and the voice acting delivery is, for the most part, flawlessly emoted.
What really captures the heart is the divine innocence of Asterion, and the mortal flaws in all the other characters. Asterion is beautifully illustrated and kudos to the filmmakers for managing to make the entire audience immediately fall in love with and feel fiercely protective of a creature that is both strange and familiar, foreign yet intimate.
The film is both a bildungsroman and a triptych on masculinity and fatherhood - in a patriarchal world, when does the love of Manhood stop and the love for fellow Man begin?
The myth of Icarus and arrogance punished is obliterated in this more compassionate, more human retelling. If the downfall of Man can be found in arrogance, the panacea could be love and forgiveness. If death is inevitable, then embrace its warmth with love and forgiveness.
The film falters in its portrayal of inner conflict within the female characters, but that only begs for more from the filmmakers in the future :)
Highly recommended for anyone who has ever been a child - the film inspires a gamut of difficult questions about independence, desire, ambition and parenthood, which makes for lovely conversations over tea.
