360|365 REVIEW: The Secret of Kells [2009]

Rating: NR | Runtime: 75 minutes
Release Date: March 3rd, 2009 (Ireland) / March 10th, 2010 (USA)
Studio: Cartoon Saloon / Buena Vista International / GKIDS
Director(s): Tomm Moore / Nora Twomey (co-director)
Writer(s): Fabrice Ziolkowski / Tomm Moore (story)

I’ve seen the book that turned darkness into light.

I was completely perplexed when The Secret of Kells was announced as a Best Animated Feature nomination at the Oscars. I had been nodding my head in agreement until that point because I had never heard the film’s title in my life. Well, thanks to the 360|365 George Eastman House Film Festival, I was able to finally enter Tomm Moore’s Celtic world at the time of the legendary Book of Kells’ creation.

Probably the most famous illuminated text in existence, Moore, along with screenwriter Fabrice Ziolkowski, crafted a mythology around its birth—the “secret” being how a young orphan boy named Brendan and his wood nymph friend Aisling were instrumental in its survival from violent slaughter at the hands of Vikings/Pagans. It’s a tale pitting the arts against military security and whether it is more important to spend resources on a wall that may only delay the inevitable or a manuscript that will unite a people and preserve a heritage worthy of death.

The story itself is the age-old tale of a boy becoming a man by learning what life is truly about from a sage old voice while rebelling against the parental figure who’s been caring for him his whole life. Add a fantastical creature like Aisling—an otherworldly entity that can talk to nature and soothe its more dangerous inhabitants—and voila! Disney has used this model for decades, but they’ve never allowed their hand-drawn two-dimensional animation look as spectacular as Moore’s hyper-stylized splendor.

The visuals are what set Kells apart from anything else released in 2009 to leave its mark on the world as a piece of art unafraid to use the technique and aesthetic it describes as the storytelling device itself. Everything on-screen carries the essence of the drawings within the sacred Book of Kells (including a great animated look at its Chi-Ro page brought to life directly before the end credits) by utilizing the same style its Irish monk creators did around 800 AD. This film becomes more a testament to the precise detail and impressive artistry of the book than an attempt to tell a great children’s story. Doing both only adds to its pedigree.

It is a wholly Irish endeavor, so don’t be surprised if you don’t recognize any of the voices besides Brendan Gleeson as Abbot Cellach—uncle to young Brendan (Evan McGuire). Don’t let that discourage you, though, as each voice actor does a wonderful job portraying this community of monks attempting to fortify Kells from the same insurgents that recently destroyed the city of Iona. Brother Aidan, the greatest illuminator the world’s ever known fled that city just in time and brought the unfinished manuscript (then known as the Book of Iona) with him.

His arrival occurs right after a quartet of bumbling, comic relief monks teach Brendan about him, so they are all awestruck to see the legend in the flesh. Performed by Mick Lally, he’s the sole voice of reason in the now totalitarian state formed by the Abbot considering he and his cat Panger are remanded to the scriptorium while wall fortifications continue. We never find out what occurred in the Abbot’s past to turn him so jaded and untrusting, but his ex-illuminator wields only an iron fist now. He even locks his nephew away in a cellar so he won’t enter the forbidden forest again.

No lock could keep Brendan away, though—not with Aisling (a great childlike performance with the perfect amount of stubbornness and authority despite Christen Mooney’s youthful voice) at his side. The sole song in the film sees her transforming Panger into a malleable visage to charm like a snake and free her brave friend so he can return to the woods and find the eye of the Dark One. This crystal’s magnifying power are necessary to complete the book’s drawings.

Aidan’s own was lost during his escape from Iona—shown via a beautifully animated sequence with tumultuous ocean waves reminiscent of Katsushika Hokusai’s famous The Great Wave off Kanagawa to show the full capacity of the film’s unique visual aesthetic. Between the Dark One’s lair and the menacing silhouettes of the bull-horned Vikings, I would pause when considering bringing your young child to the film as the imagery can be a bit frightening. When the story’s ultimate goal is to show how a book can turn horror into the light of optimism and hope, you do need evil to defeat.

The Secret of Kells is only around 77 minutes, but it does pack a lot in. Brendan’s evolution and help from his monk friends to subvert the authority of the Abbot are crucial to his becoming the man he grows up to be and a driving force in the Book of Kells’ completion. Aidan is only in Kells for a brief time before the Vikings arrive, so there isn’t much time to win the boy over and discover his true artistic potential or for the Abbot to inevitably conquer his own darkness before it’s too late. The fact that we’re able to have such stunning imagery tell the story serves as a metaphor for the book itself by showing how effective our senses can be at enhancing an otherwise straightforward trajectory.

The Book of Kells isn’t necessarily known for its tales of the New Testament as much as its artistic flourishes and incomparable beauty. Moore’s film is similar in that Brendan’s endearingly fantastical journey is overshadowed by the indelible mark left by the stunning swarms of butterflies, brutal reds and yellows of Pagan destruction, and textured marbleization superimposed as patches of light on the flat cells of animation. It lends the perfect Celtic feel to honor one of the most famous Irish works of art. You haven’t seen anything quite like it yet.