The mainstream entertainment world doesn’t get a lot of animated dark fantasy. So, besides outliers like Fire & Ice, Heavy Metal, and, to a degree, Netflix’s Castlevania, if you wanted to dive deep into mystical and alluring universes in the world of adult animation, your choices are finite. Now enter a curious entry called The Spine of Night. It clicks most of the boxes those titles occupy, and then some. Sorcery? Check. Wildly imaginative? Check. Violence, nudity and dazzling visuals? Check, check and check!
The Spine of Night is an epic fantasy tale about the history of a land that never was. The story begins when an ambitious young man steals forbidden knowledge from a sacred plant. He falls to its darker temptations and in doing so, unleashes ages of suffering onto mankind. As his power grows over the years, it falls to people of different ilk and culture to attempt to stop him. Among those who stand against him are a daring tomb-robber, star-crossed lovers, a maniacal necromancer, winged assassins, and an undying guardian.
We got to speak to Philip Gelatt and Morgan King, the creators of this film, to discuss the challenges and triumphs in resurrecting this ostensibly dead art form. Was it difficult? Hell yes! Was it fun? At times. But was it rewarding? An even louder yes! Co-director/co-writer Philip Gelatt notes that a film like this could never exist in Hollywood. So the way to indulge in the elements that interested him was for he and King to do it their way.
Together, Gelatt and King set out to refine a modern approach to hand-drawn rotoscope animation. King has a background as a graphic designer and drawing for the better part of a decade. His process draws heavily on the work of Ralph Bakshi and the cult classic Heavy Metal.
The hope is that their film “will introduce a new generation to a niche of animation that hasn’t really seen a resurgence since its prime, while also evoking everything that made it so memorable for those of us who still remember it fondly.”
One thing is for sure…well, three things: the duo pull no punches when it comes to violence and gore, they love this material, and you’ve never seen anything like this. So behold, our glorious interview with King and Gelatt!!
Journey beyond the cosmic dark, to a lost age of steel and sorcery, in this rotoscope animated fantasy epic. Follow the mystical Bloom’s path as it falls into sinister hands and unleashes ages of suffering upon mankind. People from different eras and cultures will join in the struggle to end this oppression at all costs.
Directed by Philip Gelatt and Morgan Galen King, the film stars Richard E. Grant, Lucy Lawless, Patton Oswalt, Betty Gabriel, and Joe Manganiello and is available In Theaters and On Digital October 29, 2021.
