Wes Anderson's latest film, Moonrise Kingdom, is now playing in select theaters and will expand to more cities in the weeks to come. Today, ComingSoon.net had the chance to speak with the auteur filmmaker, who revealed that he has prepared a special animated short film designed to serve as a companion piece to Moonrise and that it will premiere online next week.

"[The character of Suzy has] a suitcase full of these young adult fantasy type novels," Anderson told us. "Sort of sci-fi/fantasy books. We had to invent them and give a little glimpse of each one. Different artists, most of whom very close to the filmmakers, were doing these. In fact, we have now animated them, each little passage, each in the style of the cover of the book. We've made a little short film that's hosted by Bob Balaban, the narrator in our movie. That will come out next week on the internet. It'll be a little companion piece to the movie."

Anderson took a similar approach with the release of The Darjeeling Limited in 2007, premiering the live-action short Hotel Chevalier online. That film starred Jason Schwartzman and Natalie Portman as their Darjeeling characters.

Check back soon for details on where, when and how to watch the new short film and for full interviews with the cast and crew of Moonrise Kingdom.