First and most obviously, the film is simply gorgeous to look at. I saw a review that said that the movie was perhaps *too* well animated, in that Laika's stop-motion animation has gotten so good that it's easily mistaken by others as CGI. I'd say that even if you could not tell the difference and took the incredible technique for granted, the design and look of the film would be a triumph in CGI as well. The fact that they built everything you see just pushes it to jaw dropping.

As for the story, I found it both touching and exciting. At heart, it is a hero's quest with an interesting mythology exploring themes of loss and remembrance. There were actually more adults than children in the theater when I saw it, and it's not surprising... It's pretty intense in places and I could see younger kids being easily lost by certain events.

Really, the whole production reminded me of a well done graphic novel brought to life in great animation.

I saw it in 3-D which looked nice, but I'm not sure how much it really added (I remember being quite impressed with "Coraline's 3-D). On a tangent, there was a trailer for an animated film called "The Wild Life", which seemed to be Robinson Crusoe told from the point of view of wacky island animals. on the whole it looked like a dime-a-dozen other silly animated animal movies, but I'll be damned if the 3-D in the trailer wasn't among the most impressive 3-D I've ever seen in a theater. Even without huge depth of field (say, in an enclosed space) everything looked insanely 3-D. I don't know what they did differently, but this almost obnoxious amount of effect was memorable.