Focus Features has released the first teaser trailer and poster for the upcoming animated feature The Boxtrolls.  The film comes from Laika, the stop-motion animation studio behind Coraline and last year’s excellent ParaNorman, and tells the tale of the titular trolls who live underneath the streets of Cheesebridge.  Legend has it that the Boxtrolls steal the townspeople’s children and cheese, but the truth of the matter is that the monsters are raising an orphaned human boy named Eggs as one of their own.  This teaser unsurprisingly shows off some gorgeous animation and character creation from Laika, while also teasing a charming story about misunderstood outsiders.  In an animation marketplace dominated by unprovoking, inoffensive family fare, Laika is truly doing something unique by telling stories that reflect our ever-changing social culture and the “modern family.”

Hit the jump to check out the teaser trailer and poster.  Directed by Anthony Stacchi (Open Season) and Graham Annable, the film features the voices of Ben Kingsley, Isaac Hempstead-Wright, Elle Fanning, Toni Collette, Jared Harris, Simon Pegg, Nick Frost, Richard Ayoade and Tracy Morgan.  The Boxtrolls is due out September 26, 2014.

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Here’s the official synopsis for The Boxtrolls:

The new 3D animated feature from Laika Studios tells the tale of the Boxtrolls, monsters who live underneath the charming streets of Cheesebridge, who crawl out of the sewers at night to steal what the townspeople hold most dear: their children and their cheeses. At least, that’s the legend the townspeople have always believed. In truth, the Boxtrolls are a community of lovable oddballs who are raising as one of their own an abandoned and orphaned human boy named Eggs. When the Boxtrolls are targeted by a villainous exterminator who is bent on eradicating them, Eggs must venture aboveground to save them, where he teams with an adventurous young girl to save not only the Boxtrolls but the soul of Cheesebridge.