Holy shit, was I surprised. Zootopia is the best Disney animated film in years, and will probably up with my favorite movies of this year. I was absolutely shocked at how good this movie was, and the shitty part is that I barely even want to go into detail as to why it's so good, because I want people to have the experience I had of being completely floored once they realize what this movie's going for and, more importantly, how brilliantly it pulls it off. I'll go into that toward the end of the review, so if you want to be surprised and are convinced by my enthusiastic recommendation alone, stop here and go see this movie. If you don't care, I'll go into detail.
Let's get the obvious out of the way - this movie is gorgeous to look at. I noticed it the last time I saw the sloth trailer play in the movie theater (for about the 400th time - not complaining because it's a fun trailer but one of the downsides of going to the movies almost every week is you get super burnt out on trailers for popular movies). The level of detail in the design as well as the actual animation of the characters is impressive, especially considering this is actually one of the lower-budgeted Disney films of the last decade. And the world that they've created here, just on a pure visual level, is breathtaking. I'm usually one to hate introductions to locations in movies set to poppy upbeat music, but I can completely forgive it here because Zootopia - the actual place - is beautiful. There are lots of small bits of practicality thrown in around the universe that add some believability to the notion of having animals of all these different sizes and immunities in one place, which is refreshing from a filmmaking standpoint and makes the world feel more lived-in, but also serves the themes of the story very well, which again, I'll get into in a minute.
These characters are really fun too, specifically the two leads in Nick and Judy. Everyone in the cast does a pretty great job, but Goodwin and Bateman give great voice performances that are funny, believable, and charismatic. The story, while massively benefiting from its themes, is slightly formulaic, with a bit of kid-pandering exposition at the beginning that could've been more gracefully shown and not told as well as the cliche of the two protagonists having a brief disagreement at the turn of the third act before very quickly resolving it that we see in every buddy cop movie (because essentially that's what it is). But again, the subtext is so well-realized, the characters are so much fun, and the movie is fast and funny enough that these things can mostly be overlooked. These are by no means huge problems, but minor nitpicks.
I've heard a few critics express this and I agree with the assessment that, from a visual and filmmaking standpoint, this movie mostly stands out during its action sequences, which are fun, fast-paced, colorful, and well edited. Everything is kept visually interesting and the visual gags (along with the more subtle ones, including a really unexpected Breaking Bad reference) keep coming at a fast pace, and the beautiful environments are engaging and utilized well. It's just an overall fun time for pretty much anyone. Kids will like the bright colors and silly characters, and adults will probably appreciate the legitimate cleverness in some of these scenes. However, I think there's something that I think adults will appreciate much more...
A great family-friendly movie does a sort of dual-packaging for its message - it more obviously gives the simplistic, agreeable message that children can understand and embrace, but then it simultaneously gives a subtle, much more mature and thought provoking message that in essence is the same thing but means something different when you apply it in a mature setting. Zootopia does this beautifully. If you haven't heard or figured out, Zootopia is essentially an allegory for modern Western racism and xenophobia. Who would've thought that this silly animated comedy about a bunny cop with a trailer featuring a sloth trying to enter a license plate number would have some of the most thoughtful and intelligent commentary on media sensationalism, xenophobia, police and government corruption, social stigmas, multiculturalism, and even the fucking drug war? And I'm not reading into this too deep - this stuff is all just subliminal enough for kids to not quite catch it exactly (but still get the general message), but just at the forefront enough that it's pretty obvious to older teenagers and adults, yet never preachy or overbearing.
Watching this movie play out was amazing. The ails of society that this film touches on are so unbelievably timely and well-rounded - how the media will misconstrue or misread facts to suit an agenda, how political leaders can use fear as a tactic to stay in power while pitting people against each other for their differences, how the criminal justice system and social stigmas can make certain races validate other people's phobias of them, how figures in pop culture will weigh in on political polarization, how a society reacts aggressively in the face of tragedy. Some people have been asking legit questions about how animals procreate in Zootopia (and therefore why we never see any horrible hybrid animals), and the great part is the movie covers this by showing us the ways in which multiculturalism and trying to include every kind of person and way of life isn't always fun for everyone or practical. Judy is severely put off by some of the stuff she sees, despite considering herself an open-minded person. But, as Nick explains, with the freedom to "be whatever you want to be", some people choose to be weird shit that we have to learn to deal with, adapt to, or regulate thoughtfully. The movie doesn't promote blind tolerance even when it's of something actually negative, but rather it makes the argument that just because trying to be as tolerant as possible is difficult doesn't mean we shouldn't try.
These themes are all dealt with in such clever and thought provoking ways, and I really cannot believe that this movie did what it did, and when it did. This movie has had a March 2016 release date for three years, and the fact that it's making these points as well as it is in this political climate where the Republican frontrunner for president is talking about banning all Muslims from America and building walls to keep out Mexicans, it's almost a miracle how timely and dare I say even important this movie is. And it succeeds it wonderfully. This isn't a political film; at its very core it just promotes a message of being what you want to be and trying to accept people who are trying to do the same, and adjusting accordingly if need be. It makes the case that society needs to be a team effort, and we need to be able to work with each other to truly overcome the most "animalistic" parts of our nature. And that's what's great about Zootopia - it does all of this just subtly enough that it never feels overbearing. It's just genuine, honest, and thoughtful, and it respects its audience to be mature enough to be able to apply it to what they're seeing in real life.
You know, I had some great animated movies while I was growing up, and we can all groan about the horrible soulless cash-in that will be The Angry Birds Movie or the screaming garish cancer that is Minions or the absolute messes of noise like the Smurfs movies and their ilk, but really - between this, Big Hero 6, The Lego Movie, Inside Out, Wreck-It Ralph, and some of these other animated films that have such well-rounded themes and messages, I'm actually kind of jealous of little kids today that they get to grow up with such smart movies. Whether films like those are diamonds in the rough or fairly easy to come by is up to you, but I'm sincerely grateful for movies like Zootopia making thoughtful messages for kids that aren't preachy and lame, and also don't pander to them.
Overall, Zootopia was an absolute shock of a movie, and I cannot believe I'm considering giving it an A+. I'm holding back until I see it again next week, but this one is really, really good, and I highly recommend it. It's fast, silly, and colorful enough to keep the younger kids entertained, but underneath it has a really smart and awesome message that's cleverly and intelligently presented, not to mention incredibly timely. This is truly the Animal Farm of Disney animated movies, and one of their very best in a long while in my opinion.
Grade: A
nice meme
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