Forgotten Island Review: A Stunning Animated Film That Is Almost Too Much

Forgotten Island Review Verdict: Forgotten Island throws absolutely everything at the screen: a dozen visual styles, a hundred creature designs, wall-to-wall sugar rush editing, and genuine emotional depth buried underneath it all. It is one of the most creative and visually stunning animated films I have seen this year. It is also, at times, exhausting to the point of needing to look away from the screen just to breathe. Both of those things are true at once, and I think that tension is the whole story of this film.

Forgotten Island is currently in theaters. This review is based on an early theatrical screening. Runtime: approximately 1 hour 40 minutes.

Quick Verdict: Is Forgotten Island Worth Watching?

Yes — with one important caveat that you can actually test for yourself before buying a ticket. If you have seen the trailer and thought, “that is too much for me,” trust that instinct. This film does not calm down from the trailer’s energy at any point. It is the trailer’s energy, sustained and multiplied, for the better part of one hour and forty minutes.

But if you watched that trailer and thought, “yes, give me more of exactly that,” this film delivers precisely what you are asking for, and it delivers it well. Underneath the sensory overload is a genuinely moving story about friendship, growing apart, and the specific ache of watching someone you love move on to a different chapter of their life. When Forgotten Island slows down enough to let that story breathe, it is genuinely excellent. The problem is that it does not slow down often enough.

Forgotten Island (2026) — Movie Info

What Is Forgotten Island About?

The premise is deceptively simple and genuinely moving at its core: two best friends who grew up together are facing the end of an era because one of them is about to move away. Determined to have one last great night together before everything changes, they end up pulled into a magical, chaotic world where the two of them wake up having forgotten what happened during the past twelve hours. Piecing together what occurred, and why, becomes the engine of the plot, alongside the more emotionally central question of what is actually happening to their friendship as their lives diverge.

That “forgotten night” structure is a genuinely clever device, and I found myself admiring it more the longer the film went on. It gives the film’s chaos a narrative justification; the characters themselves are as disoriented by the escalating madness around them as the audience sometimes is, while also creating space for real emotional stakes underneath all the spectacle. Their friendship, and what it means to watch it change shape rather than end, is what the film is actually about. Everything else is the delivery mechanism.

Along the way, they encounter a growing cast of creatures and characters on this forgotten island, some of whom land as genuinely funny and well-conceived, others who feel more like content generated to fill space than characters who earned their place in the story.

Forgotten Island Review: What Works

The Ambition Is Real, and You Can Feel It

This is one of the most visually ambitious animated films I have seen in a year that has had no shortage of ambitious animation. The film combines a dozen or more distinct visual styles and influences; you can see the fingerprints of Spider-Verse in its kinetic, mixed-media approach, you can see Up in the way it handles a wordless passage of time depicting the friendship’s history, you can see Turning Red’s emotional register, and you can see the current wave of stylised, high-energy animation that K-pop Demon Hunters and other recent hits have made feel current and commercially viable.

The team clearly looked at everything exciting happening in animation right now and decided to put as much of it as possible into a single film.

That ambition is admirable, and for long stretches, it pays off spectacularly. The layout and design of the island itself is a genuine achievement; every frame is packed with detail, in the foreground and background simultaneously, to the point where I found myself wanting to rewatch scenes just to catch everything that had flown past. The storyboarding alone must have required an enormous team, given how many distinct angles, edits, and stylistic shifts occur across the runtime.

The Emotional Core Genuinely Lands

When the film slows down, and it does, in meaningful stretches near the beginning and especially toward the end, it is genuinely excellent. The central friendship between the two leads is well drawn, likable, and their specific dilemma of growing apart is handled with real sincerity. There are emotional beats in this film that hit with real weight, particularly around the passage-of-time sequence depicting their friendship’s history, which recalls Up in its structure and its effectiveness.

I also appreciated a specific narrative choice the film makes near its conclusion: it does not explain everything. There is a mystery around the film’s antagonist that is deliberately left unresolved. My initial reaction was mild disappointment; I wanted the full picture. But sitting with it afterward, I actually think the ambiguity was the right call. Not every animated adventure needs to tie every thread into a neat bow, and leaving something genuinely unexplained gives the film a little more mystery and staying power than a fully resolved villain arc would have.

Some of the Supporting Characters Genuinely Work

Not every character in this sprawling ensemble lands, but several genuinely do. There is a merman character who got real, consistent laughs out of me — a well-conceived comic relief figure whose humor actually worked rather than just occupying screen time. A “Dave Franco” dog character oscillates between annoying and genuinely likable depending on the scene, but lands more often than not.

There is also a small army of tiny creatures who insist, repeatedly and with escalating frustration, that they are not cute, while the film keeps visually emphasizing exactly how adorable they are, complete with little hearts flying off them whenever they express themselves. It is a fun, well-executed running joke, even if this particular group of characters is not strictly necessary to the plot.

Forgotten Island Review: Where It Struggles

The “Sugar Rush” Problem

Here is the film’s central issue, and I want to name it specifically because it is the difference between a great film and a merely good one. Roughly seventy percent of this movie operates in a register I can only describe as sugar rush mode — fast, loud, zany editing, constant pop songs, rapid-fire visual gags, camera work that swings and cuts relentlessly. Individually, many of these sequences are genuinely fun, clever, or funny. Stacked back to back to back for extended stretches, they become exhausting.

There were multiple points during this film where I felt myself reaching a breaking point, genuinely close to wanting to shout at the screen to just slow down for a moment. And then, almost as if sensing that reaction, the film would do something clever or funny enough to buy itself a little more patience. That cycle repeats throughout much of the runtime: overwhelm, near-breaking-point, clever recovery, overwhelm again.

The problem is not that these high-energy sequences exist. For a film aimed partly at children with famously shrinking attention spans, some version of this approach makes commercial sense. The problem is the density and the lack of breathing room between them. The emotional moments that do work — and there are several that work very well- would hit even harder if the film gave them more than a few seconds before rushing to the next action beat or joke or needle drop.

Too Many Ideas, Not Enough Trimming

The film is trying to combine an enormous number of influences and ideas simultaneously: Spider-Verse, Puss in Boots’ own tonal DNA, The Hangover’s premise structure, K-pop Demon Hunters’ visual energy, Up’s emotional architecture, Turning Red’s specific brand of teen-adjacent anxiety — and while I can appreciate the ambition of trying to synthesize all of that into one film, the result sometimes feels like it needed about a third of these ideas rather than all of them.

There is a blue giant baby character who accompanies the protagonists for a significant portion of the film that, if I am honest, never landed a single laugh for me across the entire runtime. Characters and subplots like this one feel like they were included because nobody on the creative team was willing to cut anything, rather than because the story specifically needed them.

My honest note for a potential future cut of this film: either trim some of the characters and subplots that are not essential and use the freed-up runtime to let the sugar rush sequences breathe more, while keeping the overall length the same, or, if every character and subplot genuinely needs to stay, extend the runtime to properly pace everything out. As it stands, the film feels like it is trying to fit a two-hour story’s worth of ideas into a one-hour-forty runtime, and something has to give. What gives is pacing, and what pacing costs the film is some of its emotional impact.

Forgotten Island Cast — Voice Performances

The two central friends carry the emotional weight of the film effectively, with performances that feel lived-in and specific rather than generic. The supporting voice cast brings real personality to the film’s large ensemble of creatures and side characters, even in cases where the writing for those characters is thinner than the performances deserve. Across the board, the vocal work matches the film’s visual ambition — committed, energetic, and tonally calibrated to the anime-adjacent register the film is reaching for throughout.

How Does Forgotten Island Compare to Puss in Boots: The Last Wish?

I want to be honest about this comparison because it is the most natural one to make, given the same creative team is behind both films. The Last Wish, for me, remains the better film. Its combination of satirical fantasy with spaghetti Western visual storytelling, clearly indebted to the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly tradition, gave it a tighter, more controlled tonal identity. Its emotional beats landed with more consistency because the film trusted them with more space.

Forgotten Island is more ambitious in scope and arguably more visually daring, but that ambition comes at the cost of the control and pacing discipline that made The Last Wish so effective. I did not enjoy Forgotten Island quite as much as The Last Wish, but I came around to caring genuinely about these characters, and I do want to revisit the film, likely on a home release, where I can pause between the more overwhelming sequences and actually sit with the emotional beats the theatrical pace rushed past.

Will Forgotten Island Age Well? A Prediction

This is a genuine question I found myself considering throughout the film, and I do not think there is an obvious answer yet. There is a real chance that, looking back in ten or fifteen years, this film’s relentless pace and density will be seen as ahead of its time, similar to how a show like Duckman was initially seen by some as too fast, too word-dense, too much, before eventually being reappraised as sharp and ahead of the curve. Storytelling pace across media has only accelerated over time, and a film this rapid-fire might simply be early to where audience attention spans are heading.

Alternatively, it is possible this film will be looked back on as a product of a specific, over-saturated moment in animation, trying to cram in every trend simultaneously rather than committing to one clear identity, the animated equivalent of a film more interested in keeping restless attention than in trusting its own story.

I genuinely do not know which of those two readings will prove correct. What I can say is that even in its most overwhelming moments, there is enough craft, creativity, and thought behind every individual shot that the film earns some benefit of the doubt either way.

Pros and Cons

✓ Pros

• Visually one of the most ambitious and detail-packed animated films of the year
• Genuine emotional core around friendship and growing apart, especially in its best sequences
• The “forgotten night” structural device is clever and well-executed
• Several standout supporting characters (the merman in particular) land consistently
• Leaves some mystery unresolved by choice, which works better than expected
• Strong, committed voice performances across the ensemble

✗ Cons

• Roughly 70% of the runtime operates in an exhausting, high-energy “sugar rush” register with little breathing room
• Too many characters and subplots crammed into a relatively tight runtime
• Some characters (the blue giant baby, in particular) never land and feel unnecessary
• Emotional beats are frequently rushed past just when they need more time to resonate
• Combines so many stylistic influences that it occasionally loses a clear identity of its own
• Not quite as effective overall as Puss in Boots: The Last Wish from the same team

Final Verdict

Forgotten Island is a film I respect more than I unreservedly love, and I think that gap is the most honest thing I can tell you about it. It is bursting with creativity, genuine heart, and visual craft that rewards close attention, sometimes literally frame by frame. It is also, for long stretches, simply too much, too fast, with too little room to let its best moments actually land the way they deserve to.

If the trailer excited you, this film will deliver exactly that experience, sustained and multiplied. If the trailer already felt like a lot, this is not the film that is going to win you over by slowing down — because it mostly doesn’t. Recommended, with clear eyes about what you are signing up for.

It doesn’t quite carry the weight its title promises, but I had a good time with it, and I’m curious what this director does next. If you’re deciding which movie to watch next, explore our latest reviews of Daayra Review, The Vvaan Review, Primetime Review, The Dog Stars Review, Heart of the Beast Review, The Paradise Review, and Irumudi Review.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Is Forgotten Island a good movie?

Yes, with real reservations about pacing. It is one of the most visually ambitious and creative animated films of the year, with a genuinely moving core story about friendship. Its main weakness is a relentless, high-energy pace that rarely gives its best emotional moments room to breathe. Our rating: 3 out of 4.

Where can I watch Forgotten Island?

Forgotten Island is currently in theatrical release. Given the density of its visual design, this is a film that genuinely benefits from a theatrical viewing; the amount of detail packed into each frame is easier to appreciate on a large screen, even if a rewatch at home with the ability to pause may end up being the more comfortable way to fully absorb everything happening on screen.

Who is in the Forgotten Island cast?

Forgotten Island features a voice cast bringing to life two central best-friend leads along with a large ensemble of creatures and side characters encountered across the film’s magical island setting. The vocal performances are committed and energetic throughout, matching the film’s high-intensity visual style.

Is Forgotten Island suitable for kids?

Yes, it is designed as a family animated film, with the kind of fast-paced, high-energy sequences that are specifically engineered to hold younger viewers’ attention. Parents who prefer calmer, more measured pacing in animated films should know going in that this is a consistently high-energy watch throughout most of its runtime.

How long is Forgotten Island?

The film runs approximately one hour and forty minutes, on the longer side for an animated feature, though the film’s relentless pacing means the runtime does not feel as long as the number suggests, for better or worse depending on your tolerance for its energy level.

Forgotten Island is now playing in theaters.