Movie Review: "Zootopia"

Zootopia (2016)

PG

4.5 Stars out of 5

Director                                Byron Howard, Rich Moore, Jared Bush (co-director)
Writer                                   Jared Bush and Phil Johnston (screenplay)
Music                                    Michael Giacchino
Art Direction                        Matthias Lechner

Ginnifer Goodwin               Officer Judy Hopps, European Rabbit
Jason Bateman                    Nick Wilde, Red Fox
Idris Elba                               Police Chief Bogo, Cape Buffalo
Jenny Slate                           Dawn Bellwether, Asst. Mayor, Sheep
Nate Torrance                     Officer Benjamin Clawhauser, Cheetah
Tommy Chong                     Yax, Yack
J.K. Simmons                       Mayor Lionheart, Lion
Shakira                                 Gazelle, Thompson’s Gazelle
Maurice LaMarche             Mr. Big, Artic Shrew
Alan Tudyk                          Duke Weaselton, Least Weasel
Raymond S. Persi               Flash, DMV Agent, Three-Toed Sloth

 

“No matter what kind of person you are, I implore you. Try to make the world a better place. Look inside yourself and recognize that change starts with you.”

Disney’s new animated movie, “Zootopia” is the 55^th in their Animated Classics series, and in all likelihood will be one of their highest grossing feature films as it has earned over $1 billion worldwide in only few months since its opening, placing it at number 25 in the highest grossing films of all time. It is at the same time a thoughtful film with a message about prejudice and stereotyping, another message about reaching for the stars, and a buddy-cop movie made with astonishing technical expertise in terms of animation. It is in several ways quite in keeping with Disney’s recent formula for success: a movie centered on a “princess” that has more moxie than all around her, with a story line pumped up with a little comedy and a lot of heart. It is also something of a departure from recent Disney films in that all the characters are essentially human personalities in various animal forms. It is in short an interesting mélange of genre.

The story begins with a young hare, Judy (Ginnifer Goodwin) playing in a school play. She and several of her comrades enact a play that describes how animals have evolved from savages in an intellectual if not physical sense. There are physical components, too: they walk upright and speak. I found this small side story intriguing as to me it implied the writers (Jared Bush and Phil Johnston) were seeking to establish an immediate animal parallel to the human world we live in. However, the play also creates a curious demarcation to this fantasy world: the animals that evolved were the mammals alone; one is left to wonder about the reptiles, fish and so forth; or even more to the point, what became of the primates?

Well, back to the story… Judy will finish her play with the declaration of her desire to become a policeman, the first bunny to do so in their capitol city of Zooptopia, or anywhere else. Her parents are distraught and will try for most of the film to dissuade Judy from a position that places her in danger. But Judy will not be dissuaded. She will face her parent’s opposition, the opposition of her Cape Buffalo supervisor, Chief Bogo (Idris Elba in his second animated flick of 2016 – see also “Finding Dory”), the derision of her fellow, though gigantic (on a bunny scale) police comrades, and most significantly of a certain fox soon to make his appearance in the story. Bogo in an expression of his displeasure (dare I say bigotry) about having a bunny on his squad will assign Judy to meter maid duty. In one fell swoop, the writers have incorporated both a form of racism and sexism into Bogo’s action.

Judy will lift up her chin and decide to outdo, as a meter maid, what Chief Bogo assigns her to do. In the course of her duties she will encounter a raconteur of a fox, Nick Wilde (Jason Bateman). The movie will take a while to explain it, but he too has been the recipient of bias that is based on his species and its reputation as being a predator that cannot be trusted. He has as a result decided to better everyone’s expectations of him and be the best fox at being a fox that is someone who can (can I say it) out-fox everyone around him. This leads him into some shady realms, legalistically speaking. Unfortunately for Nick, Judy out-smarts him and forces him into an alliance with her as she pursues a case that Bogo very reluctantly gives her. Over the course of the film, they will move from antagonists to the closest of allies, and of course solve the mystery of the case assigned to Judy.

In terms of writing, “Zootopia” tackles some heady topics, especially so for young children. Judy will experience bias and bigotry that is aimed solely at her as a young woman/hare with dreams. Her dreams are hers to pursue and after finishing first in her class at the police academy, she should have had a clear shot at working towards a fulfillment of her dreams to the extent that her abilities would take her. Instead, her large, male and fearsome boss would do everything in his power (initially) to frustrate her at doing her job. Such counterproductive efforts would stiffen Judy’s resolve – the lesson of her story, as well as the truly marvelous song by Shakira, “Try Everything” is a lesson very well suited to youngsters. However, there is another theme to Judy’s travails and to the case she is working on: racism and stereotyping. To my perspective, the exploration of this topic is the only flaw in the film. It is not a flaw in terms of discussing it with children, but in the nature of the parable used by this film to explain it to kids. That parable is centered squarely on the real life reality of prey and predator versus this film’s use of that dichotomy as a means to define racism. Here’s my problem: is it racism for a prey animal to fear a predator? This movie says yes due to the prey and predator’s evolved state in this movie. I say, the parable is confusing enough to begin with, but when the story line requires certain prey animals to resume their predator status due to a plot point I won’t reveal here, then I repeat, the parable has uncertain footing in its path to child enlightenment. I applaud the effort, but I feel the writers should have kept to the simpler theme of personal goals versus personal bigotries. I agree this concept overlaps with racism, but for an audience composed to a great extent of children, this would have worked better in my opinion.

Technically speaking, this movie is flawless. The animation of illustrating animal characters that retain some of their animal-like movements (watch closely as Mrs. Ottern embraces her husband in the hospital – it is awesome from an animation viewpoint) and at the same time introduce some very anthropomorphic movements (watch Judy’s hips sway as she leaves Chief Bogo’s office). I really liked the direction that is used during Judy’s first time entrance to Zootopia by train and via each of the various lands/climatic niches that make up Zootopia. Her entrance is incredibly enhanced cinematically by varying the camera angles to emphasize what she can she out her window or of her as she reacts. And this entire sequence is really improved with the soundtrack that has Shakira singing the song about her/everyone’s dreams as Judy enters the city where she hopes to live those dreams.

And one small last point, this movie is almost, almost completely straight in terms of tone used in telling the story. Judy and Nick will interact as two adults who do not know one another, then two that respect one another, and finally two who really like (love?) one another. It is really an adult story about solving a crime and two adults working together to do so. But there is comedy in this movie. It is not frankly included in a manner normally used in buddy cop movies, but adheres more closely to a traditional Disney brand of humor. Without revealing too much, I will say only that the writers have taken the concept of every person’s frustration at standing in a long line at the DMV and combining that frustration with a member of the animal kingdom most likely to be the best candidate for a job of frustrating those in line wishing the line would move faster: a sloth. There is also a little inside joke that involves the pronunciation of the word “weasel” in the animal sense of this movie versus a different sense in Disney’s hit from 2013's, “Frozen”. Both movies employ the same voice actor (Alan Tudyk) and the same names of duke and weasel. Watch for it, it’s a cute point for the adults in the audience, while the sloths are hilarious for adults and children alike (my granddaughter’s laughter was astonishing in volume).

Go see this movie. You will truly be happy that you did.

Movie Review: "Finding Dory"

Finding Dory (2016)

PG

4 Stars out of 5

Director                                Andrew Stanton, Angus Maclane
Writer                                   Andrew Stanton, Victoria Strouse, Bob Peterson

Ellen DeGeneres                 Dory
Albert Brooks                      Marlin
Ed O’Neill                             Hank
Kaitlin Olson                        Destiny
Hayden Rolence                 Nemo
Ty Hardin                             Bailey
Dianne Keaton                    Jenny, mom
Eugene Levy                        Charlie, dad
Idris Elba                              Fluke
Dominc West                      Rudder
Bob Peterson                      Mr. Ray
Sigourney Weaver             herself

 

“I look at you, and I’m home.”                   Dory

 

I’m sitting in a dark room, filled with children and their parents. Surrounded by an audience filled with anticipation; my wife, adult daughter and her three kids, my grandchildren are here, too, also filled to the brim with excitement. We’re all here for the new Disney/Pixar movie, “Finding Dory”. The happiness in the room is blessed balm from this week’s stories from the outside world. For the next two hours or so, we can all escape to a place filled with love and joy. And within moments of the movie’s beginning, with my daughter and her eldest daughter’s laughter echoing through the room, it begins…

In the summer of 2016, the summer of sequels, Disney/Pixar has released a long awaited sequel to 2003’s “Finding Nemo”. This new movie has with justification recently been promoted by Ellen DeGeneres; she as Dory in “Finding Nemo” was the comic highlight in that film. Now in 2016 after Disney gave the movie the green-light roughly in the summer of 2012 when they announced they had signed “Finding Nemo” director Andrew Stanton to come back for the sequel, the world, or a good chunk of the English-speaking part of it and certainly Ellen was filled with anticipation. She and Albert Brooks were announced a year after the Stanton announcement in 2013 to have agreed to reprise their roles of Dory and the worry-wart of a father to Nemo, Marlin. Initially, back in 2005 Disney in the midst of their protracted snit with Steve Jobs had decided to farm out the sequel to a subsidiary; but in 2013 it was to be time for Pixar magic once again. The release date was pushed back from the fall of 2015 to the summer of 2016. Now, the only question is, could Pixar duplicate the magic they accomplished with another sequel, “Toy Story 2” (1999), i.e. a sequel superior to its progenitor? Well, in the words of my granddaughters and adult daughter: “yes”!

Yes, to be absolutely certain, “Finding Dory” works to repeat the charm, poignancy and sentimentality of “Finding Nemo” and it does so in fine fashion. Your children will laugh as my granddaughter did when the sweet but nearsighted whale shark, Destiny (Kaitlin Olson) runs into the wall of her tank, or when the bug-eyed Loon, Becky (unvoiced) goggles her eyes at Marlin and pecks him on the noggin for no apparent reason. The sight gags work great for the kids and they will have fun. There isn’t the clever two layered topical joking of "Aladdin" where kids and adults can laugh at the same joke, though for different reasons. But chances are you will find yourself laughing alongside your kids, if only for the joy of their joy.

One minor problem for me as an adult, is that “Finding Dory” repeats with considerable rigor the various plot points in “Finding Nemo”: there is a lost waif, a vicious carnivore that does not get his way, various dark places to swim through, amusing helpers that bark out amusing monosyllabic threats (remember “mine”, now look for “off” from Idris Elba of all people; this is one of the adult level jokes in the movie – see “Beast of No Nation” for a prolonged explanation of why), and of course an ingenious escape from a trap that seems quite reasonably impossible to adult human eyes to escape from. So, yes, the plot worked the first time for its cleverness and sentimentality, and it works here, too for the same reasons, but it is a little derivative. I might have yearned for the pathos of “Up” or the wit of “Aladdin”, but the non-stop laughter coming from my daughter and grandkids, makes such yens quite irrelevant. “Finding Dory” may not reach the sky-high levels of these two predecessors, but it does quite nicely equal “Finding Nemo”, and for the kids, that is quite enough.

For the adults and their enjoyment, it is truly amazing what can be done with computer-generated animation these days. To help prepare the adults, “Finding Nemo” was preceded in our theater by an animated short called “Piper”. Anyone would be excused for believing (as I did for several moments) that based on the visuals, this short was a live action short. I could not find one single aspect of the animation to find fault with. “Finding Dory” continues with this exceptional level of animation. “Finding Dory” won’t be confused with live action movie the way “Piper” was due to the cartoonish depiction of the characters being portrayed, but the underwater lighting and color of the kelp beds is, I can assure you as a scuba diver, as close to reality as an actual live action film might have been. It was breathtaking. Other scenes such as those within the “Open Ocean” exhibit at the Moro Bay Marine Life Institute (where the bulk of the movie takes place) create their own versions of breath taking animation. These parts of the movie are simply remarkable. Every adult will enjoy the movie for the visual treat it is designed to be, and is.

 

There are a few comedic aspects that I had wished might have been improved on. Ed O’Neill’s performance as the reluctant helper Octopus/”Septopus” (he’s down one tentacle due to a rambunctious child visitor to the center) to Dory has several scenes where his role as curmudgeon provides occasional comic relief. Two sea lions outside the Center (Idris Elba as Fluke and Dominic West as Rudder) also provide some comedy, though less I think than was intended. These three actors perform adequately as comedians, they just do not stand out as such. Instead, the most amusing character in the movie is the Loon, Becky, who apparently spent too long in the 60’s of California. She provides "help" of a visually comedic and quite unreliable sort to Marlin and Nemo. And lastly, for the adults, the inclusion of Sigourney Weaver as the recorded voice for the Moro Bay Marine Center (that Dory hears from afar as a source of help) also provides a sly kind of humor.
In terms of writing, it is clever in the way writers Andrew Stanton, Victoria Strouse and Bob Peterson intentionally write Dory, Marlin and Nemo into corners that it does not seem possible for them to extricate themselves from. But in the manner of the dentist’s aquarium in “Finding Nemo”, the writers do find clever ways that may push an adult’s credulity to its limits but it most likely merely entertains the child (and those that are children at heart). It’s time for me and the like-minded to stop being a scientist, worrying about logic (these are after all talking fish), and just go with the crazy childlike logic of an octopus fixated on getting to Cleveland. I’m there and enjoyed it, right up to the final denouement. I loved the use of the sea otters to get there, they are cute and lovable, and using them as a plot device was funny and effective in this crazy Pixar world. My only small complaint about the writing was maybe they pushed movie-land silliness a little too far with a truck-driving octopus*.

Lastly, for the adults, the closing song of Nat King Cole’s “Unforgettable” sung here by Sia will be another gift for viewers of a certain age; it is both a nostalgic and an empathic ending to the beautiful imagery and emotions they just witnessed in the movie.

Anyway, it’s a fine sequel to “Finding Nemo”. It’s a little less witty, and perhaps does a less effective job of turning a “disability” into a strength than it did in “Finding Nemo”, but without question your grandkids, your adult kids, and in all probability you will love it, if only to see old friends that are like family once again! Go see it, its summer time, after all.


*I read that following the release of the documentary “Black Fish” and its criticism of life within a Marine Exhibit, that the ending was changed away from such a final destination for our piscine heroes to one of the open ocean. Who knows, if maybe the final ending was a last minute change; to me it feels a little forced.

Movie Review: "Beasts of No Nation"

Beasts of No Nation (2015)

No Rating

4.5 Stars out of 5

Director                                                Cary Fukunaga
Writer                                                   Cary Fukunaga (screenplay), Uzodinma Iweala (book, 2005)

Agu                                                        Abraham Atta
Francis Weddey                                   Big Brother
Kobina Amissah-Sam                          Father
Idris Alba                                              Commandant
Emmanuel Nii Adom Quaye             Strika

 

Writer/Director Cary Fukunaga first gained public critical notice with his heartbreaking 2009 film, “Sin Nombre”, a story of a Honduran girl trying to immigrate to the United States. At about the same time, he was doing research on a brutal war in Sierra Leone, a war that employed child soldiers. He later came across Uzodinma Iweala’s book on the same subject, “Beast of No Nation”. In October of 2015, Fukunaga’s film of the same name was brought simultaneously to the public via release to theaters and on Netflix. This latter point was an unfortunate decision on Netflix’ part as it caused the four largest theater chains in America to boycott the film – and that is a shame. “Beasts of No Nation” is not a perfect film, and it certainly is a very difficult film to watch due its subject material, but it also a movie that of necessity uses violence to tell a story the world needs to know: the use of child soldiers.

Fukunaga begins his story in a seemingly disarming manner. His camera follows the family life of Agu (Abraham Atta), a twelve-ish year old boy living in an unnamed Central West African country. Agu lives with his parents, senile grandfather, beloved older brother and two younger siblings. His father and older brother are shown interacting with Agu in a variety of well-developed scenes designed to show just how much they love each other as a family. Agu is shown to be very precocious as he leads his fellows in games that demonstrate their camaraderie and intelligence. If one knows the background of this movie, one surely knows Fukunaga is using a kind of contrary for-shadowing of events to come. One of the last moments of this ideal set of events has Agu selling a TV set frame to a soldier from ECOMOG (Economic Community of Western States Monitory Group). It is a gentle scene that shows the concern the ECOMOG soldier has for the boy (and presumably for the nation he is helping to protect) and of the boy’s creativity – it might be the best scene in the movie, though the final scene is also simply brilliant and hopeful at the same time.

We know from Agu’s frank and childlike narration to the film that his country is at war. He and his family seem to live comfortably with this knowledge; they do until the inevitable happens, war comes to their village. Agu is able unlike some of this family to survive; it is left unclear as to else in his family might also have survived; we know that not all do so.

Agu’s desperate, world shaking escape into the jungle takes him from a form of modern Africa into a far different world, one more natural in the sense of the abundant plant life he walks through, and also in the sense that he now has no parent to guide and shield him, nor even water or food. He is driven to eat grass and insects. But worse awaits him. Agu is captured by the rebels that have been fighting Agu’s government, and from whom the ECOMOG troops had been trying to protect his village. The real horror of Agu’s predicament is now made painfully clear as the leader (Idris Elba) of the rebel battalion that has Agu begins a process of converting Agu from boy into killer. This process is filled with eye-averting violence and stomach-wrenching irony. Agu’s first exposure to his own role as killer has him murder a man seemingly innocent of the government’s treachery against its own people. Agu’s natural indecision about murder is contrasted with the man pleading for his life. Later in the movie after Agu’s heart has apparently been hardened, he first clings to a woman he believes is his mother only to callously shoot her later.

Agu’s acceptance into the battalion as a full member requires his acceptance of the battalion’s mindless brutality and of his commandant’s absolute authority. Agu and his mates yell out slogans as they march; slogans designed to prepare them for battle but also to continue their religious subservience to the commandant. Both Atta’s portrayal as Agu and Elba’s as the commandant are absolutely first rate performances. It is easy to praise young Atta’s command of his role as Agu as he gradually progresses from the aforementioned precocious village child to a frightened waif to brutal killer to child again as he reminisces about how his family loved him; and this latter part right after confessing that he should be thought a beast for what he has done. Elba’s performance is equally brilliant as he navigates the line between fatherly leader to Agu and the others, to practical military commander, to an egotist that has confused his military role with his assumed God-like role to his battalion.

This movie utilizes excellent writing in creating a story arc (one that does not surprise, admittedly), outstanding character definition and growth, and a morally compelling theme of the effects of war on the affected children. It is at times an excruciating film to watch, but it is story that Westerners need to see. They need to see the effects of their colonial practices in Africa; effects that included destroying the existing social order, erasing historical tribal boundaries, and doing so without installing a stable replacement. It is almost certainly true that the wars that have lately waged throughout Central West Africa and Central Africa have many causes, and likely not all the blame can be laid at doorstep of the West (I leave room for simple brutal humanity as well). That being said, it is the effects that must be dealt with now, origins aside, and the first step to dealing with the situation must come from greater awareness of those effects. “Beasts of No Nation” is a good introduction to such an awful topic.