The “extraordinary” movie Natalie Portman called a “dream come true”
After spending her entire career avoiding the medium, Natalie Portman came out with not one, but two animated films in 2025, and one of them was an adaptation of Roald Dahl’s The Twits, where she lends her voice to Mary Muggle-Wump, one of the victims of the titular couple’s reign of terror.
Despite a stellar voice cast also including Margo Martindale, Alan Tudyk, and Johnny Vegas (yes, really), unfortunately, most reviews of the film rhymed with the word ‘twit’, but luckily for Portman, she had something else up her sleeve in the form of Arco.
Arco revolves around the titular character of a young boy from the far-flung future who is able to travel back in time to the year 2075, but finds himself stuck there, and while attempting to return to his own era, he befriends a girl named Iris and draws the attention of a group of conspiracy theorists who want to kidnap him.
Many critics labelled it the best animated film of the year, having won a number of awards, and being in contention for ‘Best Motion Picture – Animated’ at the 2026 Golden Globe, so there’s a very strong chance it could pop up at the Oscars too. In fact, while promoting the movie to Gold Derby, Portman, who also produced the project, was very complimentary about her latest endeavour.
She spoke very highly of her character, a ‘nanny droid’ raising Iris while her parents are away, and spending time surrounded by robots brought on flashbacks of another sci-fi franchise, one that helped launch her career.
“It was a dream come true,” she said, “Finally, I got to be the droid instead of just acting opposite the droid! It makes sense that if you have a nanny bot, you would want it to embody the best of the mother and father.”
The droid in question, Mikki, is an amalgamation of Iris’ mother and father, and to create the effect of both a male and female parental presence, Portman’s voice was blended with Mark Ruffalo’s. Strangely, Ruffalo doesn’t play Iris’ father, Chris Hemsworth does, and maybe Portman just wanted to get her other Avengers co-star a payday. In the original French version of the film, the mother is voiced by Alma Jodorowsky, granddaughter of visionary director and certified fruitcake Alejandro Jodorowsky.
The time Portman acted “opposite the droid” is obviously a reference to her outings in the Star Wars universe, where she appeared as ass-kicking senator Padmé Amidala in the prequel trilogy. She famously died giving birth to Luke and Leia after falling in love with Anakin Skywalker, because who could resist the undeniable dynamism of Hayden Christensen. Despite the torrid reception the prequels received, the actor has hinted at a comeback, and perhaps this robotic role is a subtle hint.
Even if she never again sets foot in the galaxy far, far away, Portman has proven that she can do science fiction well, so between Arco, Alex Garland’s Annihilation, and her work for Marvel, her legacy in this arena is secure; given that she’s also seemingly cracked animation as well, her future looks very, very bright.
