Lupita Nyong’o, Catherine O’Hara Suggest Audiences Bring Tissues to Tear-Jerker ‘The Wild Robot’

Rebecca Rubin

Lupita Nyong’o, Catherine O’Hara and the cast of “The Wild Robot” have a suggestion for moviegoers wanting to see their new animated film: Bring tissues to the theater.

The movie, a sci-fi survival story about a robot that’s marooned on an uninhabited island, debuts on Sunday night at Toronto Film Festival and may prompt moviegoers to shed a few tears. As the android ROZZUM unit 7134, who goes by Roz (voiced by Nyong’o), learns to adapt to the harsh surroundings, she gradually builds relationships with other animals on the island — O’Hara voices a droll mother possum called Pinktail, Kit Connor plays an orphaned gosling named Brightbill, Mark Hamill is grumpy grizzly bear Thorn — and starts to raise Brightbill. But teaching the runt of the litter to eat, swim and fly before migration season is something that proves to be more difficult (and sentimental) than Roz is programmed to handle. Stephanie Hsu voices another robot named Vontra, but let’s just say her character won’t be pulling at any audience’s heartstrings.

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“I’ve watched it only one time, but it was heartwarming at the end of the day,” Nyong’o said at Variety’s Toronto Film Festival studio, sponsored by J.Crew and SharkNinja. “And that kind of cry is worth it.”

Her co-stars won’t fault anyone for welling up, either. It’s even OK to ugly cry. “Embrace it,” Connor said.

“Crying is healthy. Crying is good,” Hsu noted. The Oscar nominee for “Everything Everywhere All at Once” advised moviegoers to pack “tissues and gummy bears.”

O’Hara was confused by the latter suggestion. “Gummy bears? I’m thinking of a certain kind,” she cracked.

“Oooh, yeah,” Hsu said. “Mine was more innocent.”

Though the animated “The Wild Robot” is geared toward younger audiences, Nyong’o believes the story touches an emotional nerve for older ones, too, because it “gives grace” to parenting.

“The journey that Roz goes on, as this robot who finds herself with the task of being a mother, illuminates the fact that every parent is doing it for the first time. There’s a learning curve,” she said. “We see that projected on Roz who has the naiveté of a child, but in the role of a parent, we expect her to know everything.”

Because of these themes, Hamill believes that adults will enjoy the viewing experience just as much as their youngsters. And he’s saying that as someone who’s had to sit through a fair share of family-friendly movies.

“As a father of three who took them to see so-called ‘children’s movies’ as a kid — and you’d suffer through some horrible moments… This one effortlessly appeals to every age,” said Hamill. “The parents will have as good a time as the kids. It’s rare to hit that sweet spot.”

Chris Sanders, an animation veteran known for “Lilo and Stitch” and “How to Train Your Dragon,” directed “The Wild Robot,” adapted from Peter Brown’s book of the same name. He came across the project during a chance meeting at DreamWorks while looking for his next gig. “They laid some things out on the table, among them was the book ‘The Wild Robot,'” he recalled. “The briefest description of it let me know that it would be the right thing for me to do.”

Once Sanders signed onto the movie, he instantly called Brown. The author shared details about the story that weren’t necessarily written in the text. One was the guiding principle that compassion could be a survival skill.

“The heart and soul of this story is about a character who has this unrelenting kindness. Roz has no agenda to do anything but complete a task. Her willingness to change her programming changes the culture of the entire island,” Sanders said. “The lesson I took away from this whole thing, which I still think about now, is the idea that kindness is strength.”

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