Noah’s Ark

Noah’s Ark is a feature-length animated musical inspired by the poetry and songs of legendary Brazilian artist Vinicius de Moraes. Directed by Sérgio Machado and Alois Di Leo, the film transforms the classic story of Noah’s Ark into a colorful adventure led by Tom and Vini, two musician mice who must find a way to stay together when the great flood begins.

Produced by Gullane and VideoFilmes, with co-production by Symbiosys, Globo Filmes and Telecine, the feature brought together animation talent from Brazil and abroad in one of the country’s most ambitious animated productions. It was released theatrically in Brazil in November 2024 and sold to more than 70 international territories.

At the heart of Noah’s Ark is music. Tom, a talented and pragmatic guitarist, and Vini, a romantic and dreamy poet, are inseparable friends whose journey aboard the Ark becomes intertwined with conflicts between the animals over territory, food and survival.

When tensions begin to divide the passengers, music becomes a way to bring them together. A musical contest emerges aboard the Ark, turning the story into an adventure about friendship, coexistence and the power of art to overcome differences.

The protagonists themselves are a playful tribute to Tom Jobim and Vinicius de Moraes, whose friendship and artistic partnership inspired the film’s central duo.

The project grew from Arca de Noé, Vinicius de Moraes’ collection of poems and songs for children, a work that has been part of Brazilian popular culture for generations. Development of the screen adaptation began years before production, with Vinicius’ daughter Suzana de Moraes championing animation as the ideal way to introduce the material to new generations.

Rather than directly illustrating the original poems, the filmmakers created a new narrative around them. Vinicius’ songs, animals and playful sensibility became the foundation for an original adventure capable of connecting a distinctly Brazilian musical heritage with the universal mythology of Noah’s Ark.

This was one of the areas in which Hype Animation had its most significant involvement. Based on the approved designs and artistic direction of the film, Hype was responsible for the 3D modeling and look development of all characters and environments.

That meant transforming the production artwork into the final three-dimensional assets that would become the foundation of the movie: defining forms, proportions, surface qualities, materials and the overall visual behavior of characters and sets inside the production pipeline.

The work had to satisfy two needs simultaneously: remain faithful to the visual identity established by the directors and art department, while also creating technically consistent assets capable of supporting a feature-length animation pipeline involving multiple teams and studios.

In addition to its work on asset creation, Hype was entrusted with the complete execution of approximately the first 50 seconds of the finished film.

Unlike Hype’s broader asset contribution — which supported the production as a whole — this sequence allowed the studio to take the approved visual universe through to final moving images. It became a concentrated showcase of the production language established for the film and of Hype’s ability to carry feature-animation material from assets into finished cinematic shots.

As the first images seen by the audience, the sequence also had the responsibility of introducing the tone, scale and visual identity of the world before the story moved into the broader international production pipeline.

Music is fundamental to the identity of the film. The story uses the work of Vinicius de Moraes as its starting point while introducing it to a new generation through contemporary arrangements and a large ensemble of Brazilian performers.

The Portuguese-language cast includes Rodrigo Santoro, Marcelo Adnet, Alice Braga, Lázaro Ramos, Ingrid Guimarães, Heloisa Périssé, Seu Jorge, Adriana Calcanhotto and many others. The original soundtrack was developed by Mario Caldato, Beto Villares, Roberto Schilling, Erico Theobaldo and Fil Pinheiro.

This combination of animation and Brazilian music gave the film an identity that could travel internationally while remaining deeply connected to its cultural origins.

Noah’s Ark went on to receive important recognition in the Brazilian and Ibero-American film industry. It was a finalist for Best Animated Film at the 2025 Platino Awards and won Best Animated Feature Film at the 2025 Grande Otelo Awards, presented by the Brazilian Academy of Cinema.

The award marked an important achievement for a production that brought together some of Brazil’s largest audiovisual companies with artists and animation teams working across several countries.