Laika's Wildwood brings a flock of crows and 231 puppets to cinemas on Oct. 23

Hundreds of crows lift a baby into the fog in Laika's Wildwood, a stop-motion adventure that reaches cinemas on Oct. 23, according to Variety.

Written and directed by Travis Knight, the film follows 12-year-old Prue on a rescue mission after her baby brother Mac is taken by a murder of crows, the proper term for a flock. Her search leads into the Impassable Wilderness, an enchanted forest just outside Portland.

For handmade film-making, the numbers tell the story. The Oregon-based studio built 231 puppets, 54 hero characters and 136 locations for the production, Variety reported.

The abduction scene mixes old tricks and new tools. Knight looked to Denis Villeneuve's Arrival for the thick fog and to Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds for the sudden fill of the sky with crows. The birds themselves were digitally designed. Prue and Mac stayed practical, handmade puppets.

To show Mac being carried, the team fixed tiny fish hooks with monofilament line to his costume and pulled upwards. Stop-motion means moving puppets a fraction at a time and photographing each step to create movement. Each move is small. The effect builds slowly.

Faces work the same way. Animators sculpt expressions digitally, 3D-print them and swap them onto puppets frame by frame. One second of film can need 24 separate faces.

Look up and you will see home. Aerial shots nod to real Portland landmarks, including Mount Hood and St. John's Bridge. Knight has called the film a love letter to Portland, where Laika is based. Knight is also President and Chief Executive of Laika, and the studio describes the film as its next animated feature and as a love letter to its home just outside Portland, Oregon.

Peyton Elizabeth Lee voices Prue McKeel, according to Variety. Carey Mulligan voices a grieving mother, Variety reported.

Wildwood opens the 40th AFI Fest on Oct. 21, which serves as its United States premiere, followed by a closing-night slot at the Animation Is Film Festival, according to Variety. AP News included the film in its fall movie preview, describing Laika's continued stop-motion work as "a quiet act of rebellion." Tickets are on sale now through the studio's site.

What makes this stand out is the labour. Computer animation can conjure a flock in minutes. Here each bird, each gust of fog and each frightened glance was placed by hand. For fans, this means a theatre experience built one frame at a time.