WOLFWALKERS (Animation) - Irish Film Week at FOMO Cinema Tbilisi

Irish Film Week at FOMO brings together a week of films from across Ireland and Northern Ireland, moving between black comedy, music, political cinema, animation, cult classics and some of the defining independent films of the last thirty years. The program isn’t intended as a neat history lesson. It’s a snapshot of how strange, funny, dark, inventive and internationally influential Irish cinema has become. Expect familiar faces, lesser-known discoveries, strong accents, bad decisions, great music and a lot of Brendan Gleeson.

WOLFWALKERS

Tomm Moore & Ross Stewart | 2020 | Ireland/Luxembourg | 1h43m | Presented in the original English audio with English subtitles

WOLFWALKERS takes us to Kilkenny in 1650, where Robyn Goodfellowe arrives from England with her father, a hunter ordered to help eliminate the wolves living beyond the city walls. Robyn wants desperately to join him, but everything changes when she enters the forest and meets Mebh, a wild-haired Irish girl whose people are said to leave their bodies while sleeping and roam the woods as wolves. What begins as a hunt gradually becomes a friendship, and Robyn starts questioning everything she’s been taught about the supposedly dangerous world outside the town.

The film comes from Kilkenny-based animation studio Cartoon Saloon, whose work has developed one of the most recognisable visual languages in contemporary animation. Moore and Stewart deliberately resist the polished three-dimensional look of mainstream studio animation. The town is rigid, angular and enclosed, while the forest is loose, hand-drawn and constantly moving. As Robyn crosses between them, the animation itself becomes part of the argument about control and freedom. Irish folklore sits underneath the story, but WOLFWALKERS uses it to explore colonialism, environmental destruction and the instinct to fear whatever exists beyond the boundaries society has drawn for us.

Irish cinema isn’t usually associated with animation, but Cartoon Saloon is rapidly changing that. This one is especially for animation fans. If you like SPIRITED AWAY or SON OF THE WHITE MARE, you’re going to find a lot to love in WOLFWALKERS. It gives the week something visually unlike anything else in the program and draws directly on Irish history, landscape and mythology while remaining completely accessible as an adventure film. I’ve put it into our first Sunday slot, where it makes a great entry point for anyone who wants to experience Irish Film Week without immediately confronting Brendan Gleeson with an existential crisis.

WOLFWALKERS received Academy Award, Golden Globe and BAFTA nominations for Best Animated Feature and won Best Film at the 2021 Irish Film & Television Academy Awards. It also won five Annie Awards, including Best Independent Animated Feature and directing for Moore and Stewart, while taking major critics’ awards in Los Angeles and New York.

FOOD AND DRINK POLICY: FOMO Cinema Lounge Bar opens 1 hour before the first screening of the day and closes at 02:00, serving a wide selection of beer, wine, cocktails, and non-alcoholic refreshments, as well as fresh hot popcorn! Outside food is allowed in the bar but not in the cinema. No alcohol from outside allowed. All guests are invited to arrive early and stay late!

LOCATION: FOMO Secret Cinema, Bazari Orbeliani, Tbilisi. A five minute walk from Liberty Square metro.

HOW TO FIND FOMO: Enter Bazari Orbeliani via Atoneli St above Carrefour and take the stairs on your left to Level 1. Signage on the door. You can also check our Instagram story highlights for a video showing exactly how to find us: https://www.instagram.com/s/aGlnaGxpZ2h0OjE3OTMzMTA2Mjk0MDI5MjM1