Disney

Finding Dory

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Finding Dory
  • IMDb: link

Finding DoryPixar’s first sequel since Cars 2 returns audiences under the ocean for the follow up to 2003’s Finding Nemo. This time our story is centered around Dory (Ellen DeGeneres), the Pacific regal blue tang suffering from short-term memory loss who helped Marlin (Albert Brooks) find his lost son Nemo (Hayden Rolence) in the original film. With her dim memory sparked, Dory sets out to find her parents with Marlin and Nemo in tow. However, it’s not long before Dory and her friends are separated and she must fend for herself.

Although I enjoy Finding Nemo, if I rank my favorite Pixar films it’s always near the bottom. The sequel, however, surprised me. Making Dory, rather than Marlin, the main character of the film makes for a more engaging story with a far more likable lead. The supporting cast surrounding Dory is also more vibrant the second time around including an ill-tempered scene-stealing septopus named Hank (Ed O’Neill), a near-sighted whale shark (Kaitlin Olson), a beluga whale (Ty Burrell) with performance issues, sea lions, the odd loon Becky, and the most adorable bunch of sea otters you’ve ever seen on film.

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Finding Nemo

/ / Home Video
  • Title: Finding Nemo
  • IMDb: link

Finding NemoSo it’s like An American Tail underwater? That was my first response to Pixar’s Finding Nemo which stars Albert Brooks as a clown fish named Marlin who is forced out of his comfort zone when his son Nemo (Hayden Rolence) is abducted by scuba divers on his first day of school. While on his journey to save his son, Marlin will meet a host of odd characters most notably Dory (Ellen DeGeneres), the Pacific regal blue tang suffering from short-term memory loss, sharks who have sworn off eating fish, and a sea turtle named Crush (director Andrew Stanton). Meanwhile Nemo meets an assortment of odd fish after being placed in the fish tank of an Australian dentist’s office before ultimately being reunited with his father.

Finding Nemo isn’t my favorite Pixar film. While I enjoy the underwater appeal, the story is pretty basic relying on several cheap gags and body function jokes. It’s not a bad movie by any means, but it lacks the depth of the Toy Story series, and I wasn’t awed by the design of the world the way I am with Cars.

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This Jungle Book lacks the Bare Necessities

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: The Jungle Book
  • IMDb: link

The Jungle BookAs with Alice in Wonderland, Maleficent, The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, and 101 Dalmatians, Disney’s latest attempt to offer a live-action version of one of their classic animated movies offers mixed results. Originally based on the stories of Rudyard Kipling, 1967’s The Jungle Book took us into the jungle to follow the adventures of Mowgli the Man Cub (Neel Sethi), a young orphan raised by wolves. Rather than offer a straight reinterpretation of Kipling’s work or a direct live-action version of Disney’s animated feature, the new movie attempts to do both leading to an uneven story that is too dark for its lighter moments and simple bizarre when it tries to recreate animated sequences (such as Mowgli and Baloo singing “Bare Necessities” down the river) in realistic CGI.

The choice to cast well-known actors in the main CGI roles also turns out to be a questionable decision. While Ben Kingsley and Idris Elba are used well, and the plodding plot certainly picks up with the introduction of Baloo (Bill Murray), Murray isn’t so much acting here as doing his own shtick which, while entertaining, works against creating the seamless reality needed to sell the story.

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The Jungle Book

/ / Home Video
  • Title: The Jungle Book
  • IMDb: link

The Jungle BookOriginally released in 1967 The Jungle Book may not have aged as well as some of the older Disney films, but the spirit and legacy of the film has lived on through countless films from Disney (and other animation houses) over the years. Several current filmmakers, including Brad Bird (The Incredibles, The Iron Giant, Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol), credit the movie for getting them interested in animated filmmaking.

Re-released in 1978, I fond have memories of seeing the film in theaters, especially the musical sequence of “The Bare Necessities” sung by Mowgli (Bruce Reitherman) and Baloo (Phil Harris). It’s hard not to see the film’s influence in movies such as Robin Hood (which reused multiple character designs) and others years later particularly in The Lion King with its own animal jungle sidekicks singing a very similar philosophy about life.

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