DreamWorks’ Forgotten Island Sets Digital Release for October 27

September brought plenty of movies worth watching, including Your Mother Your Mother Your Mother, Resident Evil and Primetime. The animated fantasy Forgotten Island mostly slipped past audiences. It made little splash at the box office despite positive reviews from critics and viewers. It currently holds a 94% on Rotten Tomatoes.

Weak marketing or bad timing may explain it. Either way, Forgotten Island has largely left theaters unnoticed. Starting next week, you can watch what may be the year’s most underrated film at home.

On Tuesday, Universal announced that Forgotten Island will be available to rent and buy digitally on Oct. 27, months before it reaches streaming services. The physical editions follow just over a month later, on Dec. 1.

Januel Mercado and Joel Crawford wrote and directed the film. Crawford also directed 2022’s Puss in Boots: The Last Wish. The story follows best friends Jo (H.E.R.) and Raissa (Liza Soberano) on their last night together before life pulls them in different directions. They get swept away to a mythical island full of fantastical creatures, but they can’t remember the night they spent there. They search for a way home and piece together the events of their adventure-filled night. Along the way, they are reminded why their friendship is so strong.

Forgotten Island’s cast and crew go behind the scenes

Forgotten Island draws on its setting, Filipino mythology, and on animation itself. It’s full of anime references, including a scene where Dave Franco’s character, Raww, goes full Super Saiyan. “It was a really cool opportunity to have a Filipino studio bring their craft and themselves to this story celebrating Filipino culture,” Crawford told Polygon.

The Filipino heritage of stars H.E.R. and Soberano helped make their characters’ bond feel real. “It was just so organic, especially because we’re both Filipino. We’ve been talking so much about how when you meet another Filipino, immediately you’re like family. […] You relate to each other, and it’s like a safe space. We experienced that recording together,” H.E.R. told Polygon while explaining what the film’s “Tayo na!” catchphrase means.

With its authenticity, comedy and beautiful animation, Forgotten Island is easily one of 2026’s best movies. Polygon’s Tasha Robinson made the case in her review:

“Forgotten Island plays with ideas that have been brought to the screen over and over, about how the official transition from childhood to adulthood is scary and melancholy as well as exciting, and how relationships are built on shared memories. But the creators put their own unmistakable stamp on those ideas. It seems uniquely appropriate for a movie built around the importance of memories to be this memorable itself.”

Related reading: Dave Franco, Manny Jacinto, and Jenny Slate reveal the hardest things to get right in Forgotten Island. In it, the actors also talk about what surprised them most when they first saw their animated characters on screen.

Source: Polygon