For so many people, Disney was the company that shaped their childhoods; we look back fondly on their animated classics and live action adventures and remember our younger years being completely infatuated with these iconic tales. We all have that nostalgia hit, but Disney is still shaping childhoods as we speak – Star Wars is alive and well and open to new generations with new films and cartoons, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is inspiring the heroes in children everywhere, classics like Cinderella and Beauty and the Beast are getting the live action treatment, and of course, we’re still getting animated hits every year. Disney are as successful as ever, but whilst their more recent animated flicks aren’t as beloved as their older work, I’m going to go as far to say that Moana is their best film in over 15 years, and one of their best films period.
Moana (Auli’i Cravalho) is a young girl growing up in the village of Montunui, daughter and heir to the chief, who consistently tries to convince his daughter that this is where she belongs, but her heart yearns to sail on the oceans as her ancestors once did. When the village’s vegetation begins to die and the fish grow scarce, it’s up to Moana to sail across the seas to locate the Demigod Maui (Dwayne Johnson), and return the heart of Te Fiti to her land, an adventure Moana was specifically chosen for.
Moana is Disney’s best film since Lilo & Stitch; the 2000s gave us a lot of underwhelming releases from the animation giant, and while some of their 2010s work like Tangled, Wreck-It Ralph and Zootopia proved excellent, Moana blows all of them out of the water. Moana is rich in character and adventure, and doesn’t let up for a second. The animation is completely beautiful, and the characters fully formed and loveable. Maui is hilarious, often stubborn but never unlikable, and Dwayne Johnson brings him to life perfectly, in the exceedingly excellent way he does with all of his characters. The film boasts minor but entertaining characters like Tamatoa, Heihei and Moana’s grandmother Tala, who all serve a purpose in the story, and no time is wasted on characters that don’t matter, but the stand out of the film is of course Moana. She’s easily one of Disney’s best characters to date, a young girl fueled only by her passion for adventure. No handsome prince, no motivation for anything other than what she longs for in life, and it’s a dream that she makes come true. She’s a great role model for young children, and an important one too Auli’l Cravalho made her debut in this film, and her voice acting is phenomenal, but not as good as her singing voice which is just out of this world. The fact that she’s only 16 years old, 14 at the time of filming, is mind blowing.
On top of great characters, this script delivers an amazing world to explore, an exciting adventure to be had, and some folklore worth exploring. Beyond being entertaining, it’s an interesting and engaging film that has a lot of culture to it (Although apparently not all of it is accurate, so we’ll pull up on calling it educational for now). And we must talk about the astounding soundtrack; Lin Manuel Miranda is already beloved for his stage work, and now he’s proven himself again with his Oscar nominated work here. There’s not a single song in this film that isn’t important. There isn’t one that isn’t catchy, there isn’t one that fails to conjure up some kind of emotion, it’s a soundtrack full of hilarious, heartfelt, inspirational songs that add a whole new level of beauty to this film. “How Far I’ll Go” is generally considered the best one, and was nominated for an Oscar (Rightly so), but my personal favourite is “You’re Welcome”. Dwayne Johnson patting himself on the back to a great tune is everything you need in life.
There’s nothing not to love about Moana; it’s an endearing, exciting, emotional story with an unbelievably great soundtrack, an amazing voice cast and even better characters to accompany them. Whilst it will never reach the level of popularity and mania that Frozen has, it’s absolutely Disney’s best work this decade, their best since 2002, and just one of their best works full stop.
Moana is out on DVD & Blu-Ray now!