Secret of Kells

The Secret of Kells, an Irish animated movie with multi-national European funding and creative participation, would probably have languished in obscure festivals. It still will, but will also gain bigger audiences attracted to it by its 2010 Academy Award nomination (and 9 wins and 3 other nominations elsewhere). The Oscar nod was a well-deserved recognition of its animators' use of colour, and originality of story and hand-drawn designs.

Tomm Moore is the main credited writer-director, along with Nora Twomey (direction) and Fabrice Ziolkowski (screenplay). This was Moore's debut feature; Twomey had worked with him on previous projects; Ziolkowski is a veteran French TV series writer.

Their ambitious little (75-minute) charmer tells the tale of a medieval Irish monastery boy destined to complete an illuminated religious book during the era of Viking plunder. Rather than try and emulate the rich and exquisite details of the historical sources, the movie team appear to have found inspiration in Disney's free-wheeling and exuberant modern Fantasia.

At times, the creators' desire to draw fresh and exciting visual images is bewitchingly over-obvious, at the expense of the thinly-developed monk characters, their nervously loyal cat and the wispy wolf-fairy helping them defeat the evil Celtic spirit in the surrounding forest. Those images, however, are often enchanting representations (spiraling, screen-splitting, elaborately-framed, gleaming) of reality and myths. The Irish-accented English-speaking voices behind the characters are rightly under-emphasised.