This review originally ran as part of our Sundance 2021 coverage. We’re re-upping it since Cryptozoo is having its Seattle premiere this weekend. Catch in-person screenings through September 2 at Grand Illusion.
Cryptids and their lovers should really send Dash Shaw and Jane Samborski a fruit basket.
The husband and wife duo’s expressionistic animated feature film Cryptozoo is an affectionate tribute to Earth’s most mysterious beasts. Set in the 1960s in the United States, Cryptozoo follows cryptologists as they create a romantic zoo for cryptids. It’s a space for all the fanged oddities to roam free—and also be gawked at, for a fee. The zoo has guided tours and a tanuki-themed lounge. It’s a little like Zoo Tycoon but with harpies. As you can imagine of a zoo with kraken where seals should be, things do not go off without a hitch.
Shaw’s first and previous animated feature, My Entire High School Sinking Into the Sea (2016), was a freewheeling and ecstatic debut about a shitty high school plunging into the sea after a tiny earthquake. It was tender and brutal, and if you’re a fan of Seattle publisher Fantagraphics, which publishes Shaw, you’ll be familiar with its style. Samborski animated High School Sinking, and Cryptozoo, the pair’s sophomore feature, has Shaw writing and directing and Samborski as its animation director. Here, their loving collaboration extends to bigfoot and devil birds and grootslang.
