'The Great Bear' Trailer

Depending on whether you consider a 45-minute film (Carsen & Gitte's Movie Madness) a short or a feature, The Great Bear is either the first or second full-length movie by Danish director Esben Toft Jacobsen. Either way, he seems to be off to an auspcious start. The new film is about an 11-year-old boy who ventures into the woods to rescue his sister from a gigantic 1,000-year-old bear. And we mean gigantic. See that massive eyeball in the image above? Yeah. That thing.

Watch the trailer and read the synopsis after the jump. No worries if you don't speak Danish — the action's not that difficult to follow.

[via Twitch]

The animation's not quite as polished as we've come to expect from big-budget studios like Pixar, particularly when it comes to the human characters. But there are some really lovely shots of the forest setting, as well as potential for some exciting action. With its timeless themes of familial love and heroism, I'd expect The Great Bear to appeal to moviegoers of all ages — not just small children.

The Great Bear is currently playing at the Berlin Film Festival as part of the Generation Kplus section, and it opened in Denmark last Thursday. As of right now, we don't know of any plans for its release in the U.S. Of course, if it does well domestically and at the festival, that could change.

Here's the official synopsis from the production company, Copenhagen Bombay:

Jonathan and his little sister Sophie are on holiday at they grandfather's cabin deep in the forest. Jonathan tries to get rid of Sophie, but when he finally succeeds, it's in a way Jonathan would never have imagined.

Sophie has been kidnapped by a huge bear, and now he has to somehow find her and get her back home. In the course of their journey the two are mixed up in an epic battle between a hunter dwelling the forest and the great bear. But before Jonathan and Sophie can save themselves, the forest and the bear from an evil fate, they have to accept each other as brother and sister.