Disney’s newest animated adventure Strange World is coming to theaters this November, and with a little help from Jake Gyllenhaal’s goofily incredulous voice acting, a first teaser for the film promises to deliver “a journey beyond what is possible.”
In Strange World, Gyllenhaal stars as Searcher Clade, the son of a legendary explorer who finds himself called to leave his life as a farmer and follow in his father’s footsteps, navigating new worlds alongside a crew of adventurers (and one very fluffy dog).
Disney shared that the new film “journeys deep into an uncharted and treacherous land where fantastical creatures await the legendary Clades, a family of explorers whose differences threaten to topple their latest—and by far— most crucial mission.”
The trailer’s gleefully B-movie feel and homage to adventure movies of decades past brings to mind 2009's Up, with Carl’s house of balloons replaced by a small silver blimp as the protagonists’ primary mode of transportation (leave it to modern animation to make an airship descended from the Hindenburg look downright adorable.)
Although glimpses of Gyllenhaal and his ragtag team of explorers appear throughout the new teaser, the trailer focuses wholeheartedly on the movies’ epic world-building, introducing grand animated landscapes that seem to span for miles. The trailer insinuates that the mysterious new worlds Searcher Clade and his crew will explore exist “beyond space and time.”
“Where in the world are we?” Clade remarks as a large chunk of a cliff sprouts legs and walks through a bubblegum-pink canyon. Gyllenhaal’s character is later excited, then terrified, as he reaches out to touch an amorphous blue being that looks as if a sparkling blob of Crest toothpaste came to life.
Don Hall, the Oscar-winning director behind Big Hero 6 and Raya And The Lost Dragon, will direct the film, with Raya And The Lost Dragon scribe Qui Nguyen set to co-write the script. The film will hit theaters on Thanksgiving (November 23) of this year.