Let's start out with a little creative exercise. I want you to furrow your brow... like someone has just told you something that makes no sense, or you're trying to read really small text. Okay, now open your mouth slightly, like you've forgotten to close it for about 20 minutes.
Got it? You there? Great.
Now you know the expression I had on my face for essentially the entire run time of this movie.
Actually, I'm not even sure this qualifies for any of the technical definition of "a movie".
But, I'm getting ahead of myself.
Welcome to Disney's Strange World.
I do not know what this is. It is not, however, an actual movie. Because a movie has a plot. And characters with personality and motivation. An actual movie makes me feel something other than "confused".
What this is, is if an AI was given the scripts for every Disney and Pixar movie ever (most specifically Raya and the Last Dragon, Finding Nemo, Onward, Atlantis and Moana) as well as Journey to the Centre of the Earth (all versions), Fantastic Voyage, Inner Space, Flubber and a description of that one dream you had that time when you had a really bad fever and were slightly delirious. And then it shat out this script.
Also. I have said this many times. And I'm saying it again.
Disney. Stop. Just flat out stop.
Stop mistaking "appearing on screen" for "representation". Making a main character "gay" by giving them a highly stereotyped same sex crush (oh, he's got blonde tips, wears pink and a skirt over his pants... groundbreaking), mentioning it at the start of the movie, once during the movie and again at the end while it having absolutely zero effect on that character, their journey or their personality is NOT having a gay character.
You know how you fix that. You send the crush with them on their adventures and those two characters say more than... I don't know... 9 words to each other. They develop a relationship. You know, like existed in Raya before you look all the lesbian out of it.
Or you just, and I can't emphasis this strongly enough, fucking stop.
While we're on the subject.
Having a character show up on one side of the screen for 11 seconds in a wheelchair is not representing disability. Putting a three legged dog in the same movie is even worse because the dog with a disability is on screen longer than the wheelchair woman.
You do get a very, very, very small amount of points for having the physical ethnicity of the characters in the movie match (or thereabouts) the ethnicity of the voice actors portraying them. And by points, I mean "doing the bare minimum".
Speaking of the cast. They deserved a better movie. Wasting Dennis Quaid, Jake Gyllenhall, Gabrielle Union and Lucy Lui on this piece of trash is insulting to all of them. And me as the audience.
The writer/co-director, Qui Nguyen, and director, Don Hall, wrote/directed Raya and the Last Dragon. So, clearly, those "gay pages" from Raya ended up here. Half the characters look like background extras from Raya anyway.
But it's also incredibly clear that this movie had no actual script or story. It has some words. But it's over 100 minutes long, rushes through any set up for story and character in the first ten minutes and somehow rushes through the next 90 minutes without saying anything that Disney hasn't said before or Pixar hasn't made into a masterpiece. And leaves you at the end going "whut?".
Also, Disney, as a company, can you please ensure that your male Animation Department employees have access to mental health care, because they're all very clearly suffering from some unresolved issues with both their fathers, children or both. And writing it into a movie script for the 10th time isn't the same as actual therapy. Or maybe it's time to let some women write and direct. The men clearly need a nap.
And, if you're paying enough attention, the twist in the movie becomes obvious at a certain point. Or if not "obvious", I found myself thinking "well that looks like [blank]" many, many times, and it turns out that, yes, that's because that's exactly what that was.
As an idea, it's fascinating. But it breaks down in so many different ways if you think about it for more than about 11 seconds. And no, I'm not spoiling it. It's the single thing the movie has going for it.
But the movie does not earn the reveal or have me care about the characters in the movie enough that I'm still interested in the movie by that point.
I continued to watch this movie mostly because by that point I needed to know what they thought the pay off for the movie was supposed to be and what they thought a successful resolution was. It is none of those things.
I honestly need a behind the scenes featurette about this movie. I need to know what they thought they were making. Because they failed.
This is a movie based on listening to too many Twitter threads, Tumblr memes and YouTube hot takes. And then failing, fundamentally, to make an actual movie.
This is that Disney movie that you will 100% forget existed. Or that in future will become the subject of many long video essays on YouTube that include the terms "developmental hell" and "plagued with problems from the start"... or even my absolute favourite "started principal production without a finished script".
It's this generations Meet the Robinsons (also written by Hall), Home on the Range, Dinosaur, Oliver and Company or The Black Cauldron. A movie that in about 5 years, if someone mentions it, you'll say "Oh, I totally don't remember that one... are you sure that was Disney?". Or you'll just shake your head and say "nah, never seen it", even if you did.
It's instantly forgettable.
The usual caveats apply. The imagery of the movie is stunning. As always. It's Disney Animation. Of course it's stunning. But it's candy floss and marshmallow... it's empty calories with no substance. None of it made me go "wow" because it's either weird and off-putting images or else I was staring at the movie with a confused look on my face going "but why?".
So, for the first time ever in the history of the blog, I'm introducing a new rating. Which hopefully I will never have to use again, because hopefully I won't encounter something like this again.
This isn't a real movie. It's an exercise in pretty images with nothing behind it.
yani's rating: Whut? electric brussel sprouts out of 5
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