This weeks movie is Moana, and it is about a girl who goes on an adventure to find a Demigod and a mythical island. It is based on a Hawaiian legend that I am excited to see Disney bring to life. I will be honest, I like the idea of going on adventures, but I am scared of them as well, because I would have to leave everything I know and venture into the unknown. Here is what I think of Moana's adventure.
The movie starts with a story on tapestry narrated by Gramma Tala (voiced by Rachel House) about the goddess Te Fiti, and how she created islands from the sea. She then laid on her side and became an island, and people came to take her heart, one of which was the demigod Maui (voiced by Dwayne Johnson). When he came close to the island on boat, he morphed into a giant hawk and flew the rest of the way. When overhead, he turns into a lizard and crawls across the island and finds the heart. He turns back to a human, and removes the heart with his giant fish hook. When he does, the island begins to turn black and crumble, so he runs off the island and turns back into a hawk. But the lava monster Te Ka was waiting at the reef of the island, wanting the heart for their self. As Maui flew closer and closer, he turned human to strike Te Ka, but got hit himself and fell deep into the ocean, along with his fish hook and the heart.
It moves to Gramma Tala finishing telling the tale to a group of children by saying that one of them would go beyond the reef to find Maui and restore the heart of Te Fiti. The Chief Tui (voiced by Temuera Morrison) comes in and says that no one goes beyond the reef, and that the monsters in the stories aren't real, when the tapestries with art of such monsters drop down. Most of the children run around screaming, except for one, a young Moana (voiced by Auli'i Cravalho). She sneaks out and goes to the ocean, where a baby turtle is trapped by birds and unable to go to the ocean. Moana helps it to the water, which parts shortly after to reveal a shell. As Moana picks up the shell, the water parts more to reveal more shells, until she is in deeper water than her own height, where the sea creatures swim around her. A green stone floats towards her while she plays with the water, and she grabs it and begins to feel the markings on it. But before she can properly grip it again, her father calls out and the water brings her back to shore, causing her to drop the rock. Chief Tui, who happens to be Moana's father, comes out and takes her around the island town, teaching her about all her duties in song while she ages into teenage years.
The story plot went through differently than you would expect, but was consistent throughout anyways. The movie itself was mostly an original idea, which seems hard to come by these days. It was a great breath of fresh air for the most part. There were parts that could have been done differently, like the dragging part in the middle where Moana is first heading out on her own. It also seemed to move slow after we meet Maui as well, but the pace did pick up after a while, so it worked out in the end. I also think they over did the crazy chicken joke a little too much as well, but the theater full of kids seemed to disagree with me on that.
The voice acting was better than most animated movies, and that's saying something. With how Auli'i Cravalho voiced Moana, it felt more like watching a live action movie than animation. She was expressive in her voice and played well against Dwayne Johnson's booming voice for Maui. Alongside the animation, it was one of the better 3D Disney movies. Though I wish they would bring back the hand drawn and 2D style animation, this was still great.
Overall, The animation was top notch, coupled with the outstanding voice acting, it had a lot of great moments. With how the story plot went, it could have used some work, but otherwise still pretty good. And with the reasons stated above, I would rate this 8.7/10.
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