Review of Smallfoot (2018) by Ranny L — 02 Oct 2018

This entertaining and hilarious film is furrowed with a variety of different themes. I absolutely love when a film keeps an audience intrigued and teaches them different lessons. This film does just that.

The storyline is about a community of yeti, typically known as a snow monster with big feet, and their utopia. Life is perfect the way it is and no one wants to change it. Everyone bases their lives of off a set of laws written on stones. The stone keeper is basically the chief of the village and tells everyone if they ever have a question, to just push it down. One day, Migo ends up outside of their village. He has an encounter with a crashing airplane and sees a small foot, or human, eject out of the plane and descend under the clouds with a parachute. He immediately goes back to the village and tells them about what he saw. The stone keeper tells Migo that it is written in stone that small foot do not exist. Migo goes against the sacred stones and stands with what he saw. And for that, he gets exiled from the village. But he doesn't know that there is a secret organization that believes in him. That's when their quest starts to prove the existence of the small foot, but they uncover so much more than they expected.

There are numerous stars voicing the characters including Channing Tatum who plays Migo, Zendaya playing MeeChee, James Corden playing Percy and LeBron James playing Gwangi. Zendaya is the perfect person for the role of MeeChee, a very determined and rebellious character. Zendaya portrays those characteristics through her voice.

The animation in this film is very colorful and detailed. There are shots of clouds, outer space and overview shots of the yeti village and the human town that are absolutely stunning. In the outer space scene for example, the stars, galaxies, planets and the comet they ride on are all beautifully illustrated, especially the supernova at the end. I also love the inspirational songs that gave me goose-bumps, which are sung throughout the film.

My favorite scene is when MeeChee goes exploring outside the village with Migo. She starts to sing and shows Migo some beautiful sights. Somehow, they end up riding a comet in outer space, which is a little bit random, but the underlying message is that outside in the unknown there are so many beautiful things to discover. The animation for this scene especially brought to life all of the beauties that MeeChee shows Migo.

There are many messages in this film. Two of the main ones are to always remember there are two sides to every story and to think for yourself. The other underlying themes can be interpreted in different ways and you might find more than other people. I recommend this inspirational and unique film for ages 3 to 18, even adults. I give the film 5 out of 5 stars.

Reviewed by Jolleen M., KIDS FIRST! Film Critic. For more reviews by youth, visit kidsfirst dot org.