Orion e o Escuro

This was a nice movie and it started of great but about 20 minutes into the movie it changed with the appearance of a new character that from that point kept jumping in.

Every part where she appeared the story came to a grinding halt in my opinion and it started jumping everywhere.

The end tied it together quite nicely but it didn't make up for the jumping up until then. And the appearance of the new character spoiled the rest of the movie. If that character and setting had been introduced from the beginning I would have felt differently about it.

So all in all. It is a nice movie with a great story and great potential about facing your fears but it could have been soooo much better.

I was enjoying the beginning so much that I paused the movie and made some popcorn. Everything was perfect; the story, the animation, nice heavy shadows in the animation, the drawings and separate little cutscenes which by the way reminded me of "Better off Dead" with John Cusack and a little of "Love and Monsters" with Ariana Greenblatt, in THAT movie the main character made a book with all the monsters in it that he came across, in This movie the main character made a book of all his fears. The beginning was so perfect, I was happy. But then the movie changed, I remember Buzz talking to all the alien dolls while Woody is watching and saying "This is Ludicrous". That's how I felt with the rest of the movie.

Orion and the Dark is a surprisingly heavy and layered animated film until you see who has a screenplay credit and then it all makes sense. What starts off as a film about how every aspect of life can be scary quickly morphs into something that celebrates the unpredictability of it whilst exploring how balance is essential.

Jacob Tremblay is almost too good at portraying Orion's fear of everything early on but that actually makes his newfound love of adventure all the more enjoyable. Paul Walter Hauser makes Dark so loveable, turning a concept that's scary to so many into a gentle giant with his own fears and doubts.

Sean Charmatz's direction keeps things moving and manages to find an animation style that feels fairly original and more importantly, really nice to look at. In a perfectly fitting fashion, its greatest moments of visual beauty come from the scenes at night, which is essentially the majority of the film.

Orion is a boy who is afraid of everything including bully Richi Panichi and girl crush Sally. He puts it all down in his notebook. One night, he is visited by one of his worst fears, the Dark. The Dark is an actual supernatural being and it takes him on a journey through the world of night-time beings.

This is based on a children's book. Charlie Kaufman is one of the writers and seemed to have injected his brand of existential dread. I love some of the ideas, but this may not be for the littlest ones in the audience. It's interesting that the Dark is such a friendly character. I would have thought that it should be a scary character at the start and Orion learns to see its beauty later.

We all have fears that we struggle with throughout our lives. Perhaps the biggest contribution to overcoming these fears was the support of our parents. The things that scared Orion and his narrative were very attractive and made us feel close to him.

But darkness has been the common point of most people at a young age. What we always had in mind from darkness was a scary and emotionless creature with a strange voice. But the story we had here was exactly the opposite of our childhood imagination. Darkness is a reliable, kind and helpful friend.

The border of creativity in the screenplay was not limited to darkness, and the night team of Darkness was really pleasant. This team included everything that happened to us at night and with extremely creative methods, they can make the night painful or relaxing for us. I had a lot of trouble with insomnia :)

This is a movie that appeals to everyone, regardless of age. From the beginning of the story to the end, the audience was accompanied by the story moment by moment, and both adults and children could communicate with it. Thanks for creating a safe space for families to enjoy a movie together.