It’s like watching a film of stained glass. They’re beautiful: classical pictorial animations, influenced by the art of Muslim north Africa and medieval books of hours.

I love animation but have to admit that – because the tech is so extraordinary – even the really great ones are beginning to look fairly similar to one another. The story is terrific – an epic adventure with echoes of the Arabian Nights – and genuinely moving.

The two boys are distraught when Azur’s father separates them, sending Asmar and Jenane back to Morocco. Jenane raises the two boys as brothers and tells them tales of an imprisoned Djinn who is waiting to be freed by a handsome prince. His new book, The Wonder Brothers, is out on 20 July (Macmillan)Īzur and Asmar: The Princes’ Quest (2006) is the story of the friendship between Azur, the young son of a French knight, and Asmar, the son of Azur’s nanny, Jenane. A whirlwind of empathy, soul-saving friendship, and innocent hilarity, Short Circuit is the antithesis of every machine-led war movie.Īuthor of Millions, which won the 2004 Carnegie Medal, and many other books including Cosmic and Sputnik’s Guide to Life on Earth. For a girl addicted to Lego, fascinated by robotics, and who had never seen an Indian in a movie outside of the Bollywood ones my parents watched, it had every ingredient I could wish for: an escapee robot that could feel, a hilarious female rescuer, and a deeply sweet Indian scientist (played with such brilliance I didn’t discover he was played by an actor who was anything but until many years later) who respects his creation. “Number 5 is alive!” And oh, how much I wished, on watching Short Circuit (1986) as a child, that he was! This 1980s treasure chest of a movie centring on a military robot prototype – Johnny 5 – who is struck with a Frankenstein’s monster-esque thunderbolt of intelligence, emotions and self-awareness, landed in my heart with a thud.

Author of The Boy at the Back of the Class, winner of the 2019 Waterstones children’s book prize, The Night Bus Hero and The Day We Met the Queen

Where was wild at heart filmed