Review of Moana (2016) by Jenna I — 12 Mar 2017

Like, this was mostly fine as far as enjoyablity goes. But I have two big gripes with it:

1) Why the heck was this movie so mean? Like The Rock is just mean. Like I get that he's meant to be a conceited asshole so I get why he'd be dismissive or insulting but this goes way beyond that. He's constantly trying to kill Moana. Like straight up kill her???????? It's not fun and charming, its just weirdly mean. Dude even straight up pees on her at one point, like... huh?????? Why are children's movies becoming so sarcastic when kids are the number one group that don't appreciate or truly understand sarcasm. Like this goes beyond slap stick and just makes you scratch your head and be like, where's the joy in this? Is this the future Shrek has wrought?

2) This movie wins the award for BIGGEST WASTE OF JEMAINE CLEMENT EVER. When I heard that crab open its mouth I was like holy shit, is this Jemaine? and then he promptly gets stuck with the worst and most pointless song in the entire film and also a lame ass character with zero charm or points of interest. Wtf! I am ENRAGED.

Bonus 2.5 point) I hated those goddamn angry-bird-esque coconuts. What a waste of time and potential with zero explanation and never-to-be-heard-from-again head scratching bizarreness. Also I hated the pointless animal sidekicks.

I will admit that finally for the like second time ever (Ratatouille being first) does a CGI movie impress me visually. This movie looks excellent and they really play with lighting in a way that looks truly cinematic. THAT SAID..... this movie might also have just been better than average because like 30% of it is traditionally animated anyhow (re: the flashback stories, the tattoos, the blacklight crab bit). The music in this movie was like, better than it has been but that's not saying much.