The Legend of Ochi

Yuri, the daughter of the leader of a troop of child soldiers, lives on a small, remote island in the Black Sea inhabited by creatures called Ochi. Yuri feels that she is different than the others. When she finds a baby Ochi in a trap, she embarks on a journey to reunite the baby with its mother and finds herself on the way.

This movie is about adolescence and rebelling to become who you are meant to be. The story has potential, but there is limited backstory on the village, the people, the characters, the island, and the Ochi. The runtime of one hour and thirty-six minutes forces the story to get to the point quickly, but somehow, it still manages to create portions that make the movie drag. Fans of A24 might consider streaming it when available, but it could be skipped overall.

I went to Cinemark's "secret movie" last night. It was "The Legend of Ochi", a fantasy adventure film about a young girl (Helena Zengel) who lives on an isolated island who is taught to fear the titular creature. But when she finds an injured baby one, she embarks on a journey to return it to its mountain home. The puppet animation of the creature is amazing, but the story itself is a bit silly even for a children's film; Willem Dafoe as her father and Emily Watson as her mother are fine, but they do overact a bit. Finn Wolfhard is wasted as Dafoe's adopted "son". I would rate it as a 5/10 for adults - children and young adults may rate it a 7/10.

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.

Once again, the world is introduced to a supremely cute and photogenic creature meant to evoke child-like joy. The only difference is, this isn't some E. T. knock-off, but more like a dark Disney film from the early 80s.

Filled with dark imagery, ominous music and some deep themes about parental control and relationships, The Legend of Ochi gives us a sense of fear, joy and triumph amidst the backdrop of the Carpathian Mountains. It's rare to see this kind of movie made these days, especially since the hyper reality of the film's world has a touch of Wes Anderson. Fortunately, the film doesn't go too hard in that department as the world feels a little more real than Anderson's sensibilities.

Overall, the story starts out pretty strong, giving us a very good foundation to focus on. However, it's the muddled middle where the problems begin. A couple of overly convenient contrivances occur, and while they were certainly meant to move the story quicker, it was still jarring in their sudden entrance.

The only other complaint was sometimes the VFX shots didn't look convincing, but this was a low budget movie and they did a good job considering their limitations. Overall, I found the film to be a joy and interesting to look at, which is fine from time to time.

All that I knew about this 2025 fantasy movie titled "The Legend of Ochi", from writer and director Isaiah Saxon, was the title of the movie and what the poster looked like. I had no idea what the movie was about when I sat down to watch it. But of course, any movie that I haven't already seen deserves a fair chance, and thus I opted to watch this movie too.

As I had no expectations to the movie, I have to say that writer and director Isaiah Saxon definitely delivered here. The storyline in the movie was rather entertaining. Sure, it was a bit simplistic if you think about it, but there was just something fundamentally beautiful about the story and the way that it was told. I was genuinely entertained throughout the course of the entire movie.

The movie has a pretty small cast ensemble, and with only a few familiar faces on the cast list, which were Willem Dafoe, Emily Watson and Finn Wolfhard. Needless to say that the acting performances in "The Legend of Ochi" were good.

The CGI effects in the movie were spectacular. The creature design was great and they looked realistic and life-like on the screen, which really added a lot to the overall enjoyment of the movie. And you can't help but get swept away by the cuteness of the small creature in the movie. And I was rather impressed with the way that they managed to portray characteristics in the creature through the use of CGI. Proper special effects or CGI effects in a movie such as this is a make or break thing, and thankfully it was great here and thus served in favor of the movie.

"The Legend of Ochi" is a good and enjoyable movie for the entire family, regardless of your age.

This is definitely a movie that I would recommend you to sit down and spend 95 minutes on watching.

My rating of writer and director Isaiah Saxon's 2025 movie "The Legend of Ochi" lands on a seven out of ten stars.