Sakura, The Dash, and The Little
Jun. 18th, 2013 10:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
butterflydreamingWe saw Epic, the animated film, today. *I loved it.* That, of course, means that it is not going to be popular. Ticket sales are lackluster and critics don't like it.
It's stunningly beautiful. The opening scene is photographic. The end credits have a scrolling background that is delightful. In between, it is a brainy, complex narrative with long continuous camera scenes. It has a three legged, one-eyed, ancient dog that helps save the day. It has a kickass queen who is like a Jedi Leia. It has a villain who loves his son and isn't stupid.
I laughed often, but the jokes are sometimes high context, like the rapidly aging fruit fly. "How do you deal with such a short life span?" asks a character. The fruit fly goes from youth to death before he can say more than one sentence. Or the taxi driver's impression of the house: "That's not a house! That's termites holding hands!"
The theme of the story is the balance of nature and the cycle of life. The baddies are only evil really because they want to shift the balance out of wack by making decay overrun the forest. If they weren't aggressive, it would all be very yin yang. There is a minor bad guy who gets coerced into helping the villain with information, rather than selling it to him or just handing it over to make the heroes suffer.
The hero's army ride hummingbirds. William Joyce likes hummingbirds, as can be seen in Rise of the Guardians, too. I loved Meet the Robinsons, too, although Robots was meh, and Ice Age was just pretty good.
What is really weird is that the characters barely have names, even according to the official site. Mary Katherine (MK) and her father Bomba... is that Mister Bomba or is Bomba his first name? If so, it must be a nickname! What did the animators call the (very cute) red haired second-in-command leafman? (He has spoken lines!) How about the other leafman, who looks like she could be Queen Tara's sister? (The camera focuses on her!) There is even a chin-in-hand guy.
My first impression of MK was that she looked like a late teens Sakura, green eyes and all. She is an endearing character. She never wears a princess dress. She has lots of agency. They did good things with all of the female characters in this film.
I do think it is a good film, a well made film. I think it is solid as it stands -- even if it won't do well in the box office because the right audience for it is not the usual audience for American animated films.
It's stunningly beautiful. The opening scene is photographic. The end credits have a scrolling background that is delightful. In between, it is a brainy, complex narrative with long continuous camera scenes. It has a three legged, one-eyed, ancient dog that helps save the day. It has a kickass queen who is like a Jedi Leia. It has a villain who loves his son and isn't stupid.
I laughed often, but the jokes are sometimes high context, like the rapidly aging fruit fly. "How do you deal with such a short life span?" asks a character. The fruit fly goes from youth to death before he can say more than one sentence. Or the taxi driver's impression of the house: "That's not a house! That's termites holding hands!"
The theme of the story is the balance of nature and the cycle of life. The baddies are only evil really because they want to shift the balance out of wack by making decay overrun the forest. If they weren't aggressive, it would all be very yin yang. There is a minor bad guy who gets coerced into helping the villain with information, rather than selling it to him or just handing it over to make the heroes suffer.
The hero's army ride hummingbirds. William Joyce likes hummingbirds, as can be seen in Rise of the Guardians, too. I loved Meet the Robinsons, too, although Robots was meh, and Ice Age was just pretty good.
What is really weird is that the characters barely have names, even according to the official site. Mary Katherine (MK) and her father Bomba... is that Mister Bomba or is Bomba his first name? If so, it must be a nickname! What did the animators call the (very cute) red haired second-in-command leafman? (He has spoken lines!) How about the other leafman, who looks like she could be Queen Tara's sister? (The camera focuses on her!) There is even a chin-in-hand guy.
My first impression of MK was that she looked like a late teens Sakura, green eyes and all. She is an endearing character. She never wears a princess dress. She has lots of agency. They did good things with all of the female characters in this film.
I do think it is a good film, a well made film. I think it is solid as it stands -- even if it won't do well in the box office because the right audience for it is not the usual audience for American animated films.
no subject
Date: 2013-06-20 12:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-06-22 03:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-06-22 03:10 am (UTC)I did like the non-princess, non-romance story, and the equal focus on the female and male leads. Also liked the many layers of story, the loss of children/parents, etc.
Also it was just plain fun =)
no subject
Date: 2013-06-22 03:21 am (UTC)