DreamWorks Forgotten Island Release Guide: September 2026 Family Movies
Let me get one thing out of the way: I haven’t seen Forgotten Island yet. It opens tomorrow, and I refuse to fake a review of a movie I haven’t sat through. But I’ve read everything, watched everything, and argued about it enough to have a loud opinion. Part of it is excitement, part of it is the kind of suspicion you develop after years of being burned by animated movies with a great pitch and a lazy third act.
So this is a pre-release take from someone who wants this film to be great and won’t forgive it if it isn’t.
Why this movie already matters
Look at what DreamWorks has been living on: sequels, sequels, and more sequels. Shrek, Kung Fu Panda, Dragon. A safe, printable-money slate. Then, out of nowhere, they greenlight a completely original story built on Philippine mythology, directed by Joel Crawford and Januel Mercado, the duo behind Puss in Boots: The Last Wish.
That last detail is why I’m paying attention. The Last Wish made a talking cat’s fear of death land harder than most live-action dramas manage. If those two are now pointed at friendship and memory loss, I’m in. Mercado is a Filipino-American filmmaker making his feature directing debut with stories from his own family, and that’s the difference between folklore used as set dressing and folklore that has a pulse.
And yes, it’s the first major Hollywood animated feature centered on Filipino myth. That should have happened a decade ago. Better late than never, but “finally” is not a review, and I’ll judge the movie on the screen, not on the press release.
The premise, and where it could fall apart
Here’s the setup. It’s the 1990s. Two inseparable best friends, Jo and Raissa, stumble through a hidden portal and land on Nakali, a gorgeous, unsettling island with glowing jungles, waterfalls that flow upward, and terrain that reshapes itself around the moods of whoever’s standing on it.
Then comes the hook that got me: the island eats your memories. The longer you stay, the less of yourself you keep.
That’s a great engine for a family film, because it turns the clock into something emotional instead of a ticking bomb. But the ending is what worries me. To get home, the girls have to give up every memory of their friendship. They can return as strangers, or stay on Nakali together, remembering everything, but never going home.
Spelled out like that, it’s brutal, and I love that DreamWorks is willing to go there. Here’s my fear, though: the cheat. Animated movies love to set up a devastating choice and then wriggle out of it with a magic loophole in the last five minutes. If Jo and Raissa lose everything and then a convenient spell hands it all back, I’m going to be furious. Make the choice cost something. Kids can handle it. They handled Coco.
The Manananggal better still be scary
The main villain is the Manananggal, the folkloric creature that detaches its upper body from its lower half and flies off at night. The filmmakers are reportedly reading her as a symbol of separation, of being torn from the people you love. That’s a smart angle, and it fits a story about two friends drifting apart.
But please, do not sand her down. If she turns into a misunderstood, cuddly misfit by the second act, the whole idea collapses. Fear of being torn apart only works if the thing doing the tearing is genuinely unnerving. Give me one real chill in the theater, DreamWorks.
The voice cast
This is where I’m least worried. The cast is loaded, and it’s largely Filipino and Asian-American, which matters for how the dialogue and jokes are going to land.
| Actor | Role / Why it caught my eye |
|---|---|
| H.E.R. | Voices Jo, and contributes original music. A Grammy winner doing both is a real bet on emotion. |
| Liza Soberano | Voices Raissa. Her Hollywood run is still young, and this is a big showcase. |
| Lea Salonga | An ancient guiding spirit. If you cast Lea Salonga and don’t give her a big vocal moment, that’s a crime. |
| Manny Jacinto | A fast-talking island guide. Pure charisma on tap. |
| Dave Franco & Jenny Slate | Bickering magical creatures. Comic relief, and hopefully sharper than that sounds. |
| Dolly de Leon, Jo Koy, Ronny Chieng | Island spirits and locals. A stacked bench for one-liners. |
There’s also Roar, a giant fluffy werewolf-dog and the designated sidekick. Merchandise-friendly? Obviously. But I’m a sucker for a big goofy animal who’s terrible at being helpful, so I’ll allow it.
The look
DreamWorks has spent the last few years proving that its animation can be weirder and more handmade than the Pixar-style polish everyone imitates. The Bad Guys and The Wild Robot pushed painterly textures, and Forgotten Island reportedly leans into that with watercolor-style overlays on top of 3D rendering.
What I want is a distinct look for Nakali itself, something that feels like a place with its own rules, not a generic tropical fantasy. From the trailers, the bioluminescent plants and shifting landscapes look promising. Show me a scene where the terrain reacts to fear or grief and I’ll be hooked.
Slow down on the hype
Now the part where I get grumpy. The online chatter is out of control. I’ve seen people call it an “instant classic” and a “lock” for the Best Animated Feature nomination, and it isn’t even out. Early festival and screening reactions are glowing, sure. But early reactions from people who were invited are not the same as a paying audience on a Saturday afternoon.
Same goes for the numbers. Trackers are projecting a $45 million to $55 million domestic opening. That’s a projection, not a receipt. Original animated films are notoriously hard to open big, which is exactly why this one deserves support, but let’s not declare victory before the tickets are torn.
The other family movies competing for your money
September is stacked, which is a good problem to have if you have kids.
| Film | Studio | Vibe | Who it’s for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Forgotten Island (Sept 25) | DreamWorks | Big emotional adventure, mythology, memory | Families with older kids, teens, adults who cry at animation |
| Shaun the Sheep: The Beast of Mossy Bottom | Aardman | Dialogue-free stop-motion slapstick with a horror-movie wink | Everyone, but especially little ones |
| Tom and Jerry: Forbidden Compass (Sept 4) | Viva Kids | Live-action/animation hybrid, time-travel chaos | Younger kids |
Honestly, Shaun and Forgotten Island make a sneaky-good double feature: one is pure, wordless silliness, the other is a gut-punch about friendship. Different ends of the emotional spectrum, and you won’t feel like you saw the same movie twice.
What I’ll be watching for
Here are my non-negotiables, the things that decide whether I walk out happy or annoyed:
- A real cost to the ending. No last-minute memory reset that erases the stakes.
- A Manananggal with teeth. Scary first, symbolic second.
- Music that earns its place. With H.E.R. and Lea Salonga involved, mediocre songs are inexcusable.
- Jokes that don’t undercut the emotion. Franco and Slate are funny, but the film can’t puncture its own big moments for a cheap laugh.
- Filipino culture treated as the point, not the garnish. If the mythology could be swapped for any generic fantasy world without changing the plot, they’ve failed.
My bottom line before the lights go down
I’m going in hopeful and armed. DreamWorks took a risk that most big studios avoid, and it landed on a story that speaks to something real: the fear that the people closest to you will slip away as you grow up. If they stick the landing, this could be the animated movie people bring up in five years when someone says studios don’t take chances anymore.
If they blink at the ending, I’ll say so loudly.
Come back after the weekend, because I’ll be reporting on whether it earned the noise.
