Dang—really fucking cute. I talked some shit about this when the marketing first started a few months ago because the posters I kept seeing for this were so bland and nothing-looking (just photos of the cops and the manticore standing there? I had no idea what I was looking at). The movie itself is pretty dang great, though. Got a couple of pretty intense emotional gut punches!

The movie has a charmingly humble and uncomplicated way of depicting high fantasy modern times. They take about twenty minutes before telling you the main characters are elves. Many of the characters mostly don’t give a shit about ancient magic. Nobody in the main cast runs around yelling “I have to act XYZ way because I am a [fantasy species name]!!” They keep the focus pretty hard on relatable teen stuff. It works really well—less is more here, for sure.

The ending is much more complicated and sad than I anticipated—it carefully avoids doing the easy thing you expect. If I was a kid it would have fucking destroyed me. As an adult it nearly made me cry! Absolutely worth a watch.