Review of Brave (2012) by Jacob B — 28 Apr 2018
What if How to Train Your Dragon and Brother Bear had a baby? You get this movie. How the tables have turned, Pixar. Everyone accuses DreamWorks of copying you but then this movie comes along deriving elements from How to Train Your Dragon.
Right down to having Craig Ferguson in both movies. I don't think Lord Macintosh's (snicker at that name all you want, it's more plausibly Scottish than MacGuffin) voice fits the character.
Maybe because all I hear is Gobber. There's also the infamous misleading advertising. Seems that the trailers made it difficult to determine what exactly the movie's about. They were meant to hide a twist that's the true conflict of the movie whilst still getting audiences of both sexes interested in seeing it.
Especially seeing how this was Pixar's first film to have a female protagonist. But I don't hate Brave in spite of the whole HTTYD + Brother Bear problem. The movie is still a step-up from Cars 2.
The animation is, of course, beautiful. Some lovely fake cinematography of Medieval Scotland with the animators really showing their work on Merida's hair. 1,200 locks or something. I mean...damn.
There were a decent amount of scenes that had me laughing. For all the faults any Pixar movie might have, the voice acting is always good. The British actresses doing Scottish accents are spot-on. You have to remind yourself that Emma Thompson and Julie Walters are English and not Scottish.
As I occasionally show signs of in past reviews, I believe in equality without acting like a social justice warrior. Before Moana, there was Merida. A strong, smart independent girl who don't need no man.
Young girls need role models to look up to, you know? Maybe people were dubious about how well Brave would perform but the end result, while failing to meet up to the standards of Andrew Stanton, Pete Docter and John Lasseter (oh, and Brad Bird, but technically, he's an outside director so I'm not sure if he counts) is still a massive improvement over Cars 2.
This review of Brave (2012) was written by Jacob B on 28 Apr 2018.
Brave has generally received positive reviews.
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