‘Nimona’ Defied Disney to Become 2023’s Best Animated Film
Watching Netflix’s Nimona (streaming June 30), it’s hard to feel anything but gratitude. Well, scratch that—maybe not “anything.” The new animated film elicits just about every single emotion that any decent one should be able to dredge up out of the icy hearts of its adult viewers, just as much as it does for children. But gratitude is certainly the premier feeling, especially if you know that the film was nearly shelved entirely.
Back in 2020, Disney acquired 21st Century Fox, which had been heading up Nimona’s adaptation from the graphic-novel page to the big screen, under the animation house Blue Sky Studios. Disney absorbed all of Blue Sky’s projects, eventually dissolving the studio and canceling the film. But former staffers revealed that, before Blue Sky’s untimely end in 2021, Disney execs were already pushing back against Nimona for apparently not being in line with the company’s messaging; the movie features a gender-nonconforming lead character and a gay kiss. In 2022, the film was given new life when Annapurna Pictures and Netflix picked it up, saving it from being yet another animated film with a queer storyline censored to the point of nonexistence.
Disney’s loss is an epic one. Nimona is a near-perfect film, with animation so dazzling and dizzying that it puts Pixar’s recent attempts to shame. Like Stevenson’s 2015 graphic novel, the movie takes place in a technofuturistic medieval colony, where a young knight, Ballister Blackheart (Riz Ahmed), is framed for a heinous crime. He’s turned into an outcast with a bounty on his head—that is, until a young shape-shifter named Nimona (Chloë Grace Moretz) comes into the picture, vowing to help Ballister clear his name and recover his glory with her radical chaos.
Nimona might have a formulaic narrative framework—a hero and their plucky sidekick discover long-kept secrets of the kingdom as they try to save the day—but that’s about the only thing recognizable about it. The script is pin-sharp and extremely funny, energizing old story tropes along the way. The film is also brazenly queer and fittingly timely, exploring themes of acceptance, identity, and loneliness without ever once feeling insincere. Nimona is a bastion of hope for mainstream American animation, a whopping dose of proof that high-concept, offbeat stories are worth saving, not sanitizing.
From its opening exposition sequence, Nimona makes apparent that it’s as special as it is unconventional. The story is set gracefully, building the film to a point of tension right off the bat, refusing to overstay its welcome. The kingdom (which is nameless) is set to knight Ballister, who has completed his teaching at the Institution, where knights spend their formative years training to protect their kingdom from the fabled monsters lurking outside its walls. Unlike the nobility, who are typically students of the Institution, Ballister was a young orphan, welcomed in from the streets by the kindhearted Queen Valerin (Lorraine Toussaint).
But during the ceremony, an unexpected tragedy strikes, implicating Ballister in its wake. Suddenly, the entire kingdom—including the Institution’s Director (Frances Conroy) and Ballister’s secret boyfriend, Ambrosius Goldenloin (Eugene Lee Yang)—is out for blood. While hiding out on the outskirts of the kingdom, Ballister meets Nimona, who offers her services as his sidekick. Nimona’s ideas are a bit loftier than Ballister’s; he envisions a safe return to his home to prove his innocence to the man he loves, while she suggests grisly murder and a coup of the government that wronged him.
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Eventually, they find a happy middleground that involves some thrilling chase sequences, jailbreaks, and complex fight scenes. That’s a tall order for an animated film to pull off so frequently without its art getting muddled or repetitive, but Nimona makes it look easy. When its titular character morphs into whales, gorillas, rhinos, and more to get herself and Ballister out of their binds, there’s always something new to look at and admire. The film experiments with a gorgeous combination of 2D and 3D animation styles, with brilliant uses of shadow and light to deepen each frame. On a visual level alone, Nimona outpaces its peers time and time again.
The bold animation of the surrounding world trickles right on down to the film’s characters, who are all a joy to watch. One of the biggest shames about Nimona moving to a streamer is that most audiences won’t be able to study the character details (and enjoy all those bombastic action sequences) on a big screen. The details of Ballister’s facial scruff, Nimona’s freckles, and every tuft of Ambrosius’ flaxen locks are worth getting up close and personal with. Catching them is enough to warrant multiple watches, but you’ll likely be inclined to do that anyway, given film’s mesmerizing story
Even as the mystery behind Nimona herself is filled in, the film never takes a dip in its back half, as more about her comes to light. It remains exhilarating throughout, while finding just enough pouches of intimate, character-driven detail to elevate the film beyond its familiar storytelling. Its climactic moments are also some of the most magnificent of the year thus far. Examined against all of the movie’s excitement, these scenes are intensely emotional, particularly because of how well they’re written to reflect the queer experience—or that of anyone who feels like an outcast.
Though it’s never explicitly said, Nimona is non-binary and trans-coded; which of the two resonates more will depend on the viewer. Nimona describes her ability to shape-shift as something that she has to do, a necessary part of her happiness. Though she most often takes the form of a young girl, she refuses to be referred to as only a girl. Nimona needs to transition into something else to feel like she’s at home in her body, and that allegory is one that will no doubt resonate with any viewers who have ever felt that same dysphoria. Hopefully, it’ll also prove to be an easily digestible way to educate those who can’t seem to wrap their heads around the normality of the trans experience, along with all of the isolation and unacceptance it unfortunately brings.
Ballister and Ambrosius’ relationship is equally nuanced, a far cry from the Pixar promo-machine likening that cyclops cop in Onward to a queer icon. There are no one-second throwaway lines that equate to queerness here; Nimona even treats us to a very sweet gay kiss. But first, Ballister and Ambrosius have to wrestle with the secrecy of their relationship and the accusations against Ballister breaching their bond of trust. It’s a joy to see these characters written like actual humans who must deal with real problems, even as fantastical as the faultlessly built world around them is.
Nimona also sports a wonderful cast of queer voice actors alongside Yang, including RuPaul, Julio Torres, and Indya Moore. Not only do these casting choices bolster the film’s unapologetic queerness, but they also give voice acting roles to the types of actors who are typically overlooked in the industry. Each one makes for a fabulous addition to an already considerable array of vocal performances. But nothing compares to Moretz and Ahmed’s perfect chemistry, which gives the film most of its humor and powerful emotional heft.
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It’s easy to see how Nimona could have become a mere skeleton of its final form in another studio’s hands—a forgettable animated flop, expurgated to the point of total emptiness. Instead, the film unites two outsiders, in all of their loneliness and confusion, to create a pair of incredible heroes. By doing so, Nimona not-so-covertly suggests that power can be drawn from community, even if societal acceptance has a long way to go. Nimona is both the ideal note to end a contentious Pride season on and a hopeful benchmark for progressive animation.
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