Bill Dubuque's original 'The Night Gardener' at LAIKA

April 28 2022

LAIKA, the studio best known for Oscar-nominated films Coraline, ParaNorman, The Boxtrolls, Kubo and the Two Strings and Missing Link, today announced The Night Gardener, an ambitious new stop-motion film project in collaboration with Bill Dubuque, creator of The Netflix hit series Ozark. LAIKA CEO and President Travis Knight, who directed Paramount's Kubo and the Two Ropes and Bumblebee, will direct from Dubuque's original script.

Adding to the studio's diverse catalog, The Night Gardener is a crude neo-noir folktale about a young man in rural Missouri struggling to keep his family together in the wake of tragedy. The film will paint an unshakable portrait of sacrifice, self-confidence and revenge.

“The Night Gardener is a beautiful and timeless story that quickens your heart every time it breaks your heart,” says Knight. “Bill is a masterful storyteller. He created a layered lyrical world with complex characters, provocative ideas and deeply felt emotions. It will be a hellish movie ”.

Adds Dubuque: “I am delighted that Travis Knight saw in The Night Gardener a story worthy of the long process and collective talent of LAIKA's in-house craftsmen. LAIKA's creativity and dedication to detail is, in my opinion, as close as possible to evoking the magic of storytelling.

The Night Gardener teaser art (courtesy of LAIKA Studios)

As previously announced, LAIKA is currently in production on Wildwood, the first film set in the studio's hometown of Portland, Oregon. Knight will also direct this film, based on the bestselling fantasy novel written by Colin Meloy, singer and songwriter of the rock group The Decemberists.

Bill Dubuque co-wrote Warner Bros. The Judge, with Robert Downey Jr. and Robert Duvall, as well as writing The Accountant with Ben Affleck. Dubuque is also the co-creator, writer and executive producer of the Emmy-nominated Netflix drama Ozark. Prior to a career in screenwriting, Dubuque worked as a headhunter for over a decade, a profession he transformed into the film A Family Man, starring Gerard Butler and Willem Dafoe.

LAIKA was founded in 2005 in Oregon by President and CEO Travis Knight. The five studio films Coraline (2009), ParaNorman (2012), The Boxtrolls (2014), Kubo and the Two Strings (2016) and Missing Link (2019) were all nominated for the Oscar for Best Animated Film. Kubo and the Two Strings won the BAFTA for Best Animated Film and received an additional Oscar nomination for visual effects. Missing Link was awarded the Golden Globe for Best Animated Film. LAIKA received a Sci-Tech Oscar in 2016 for its innovation in 3D printing. Recently, the studio announced its first live-action feature film based on the action-thriller novel Seventeen by writer John Brownlow.

Go to the source of the article on www.animationmagazine.net