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BaftaBaby 
"Always entranced by cinema."
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 Posted - 06/29/2008 : 20:59:30
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King Fu Panda
I wouldn't say all the target-market kids in the audience of the screening I attended were enraptured to the point of total hush, but they certainly paid attention and were audibly delighted by much of the action, especially Po the Panda's more slapstick moments.
So without giving too much away, we've got a cute little Dreamworks summertime refreshment. Of all the innovative drinks it could be, it probably ends up as a tall glass of good old fashioned lemonade, possibly toned-up a bit with a dash of grenadine.
Which is to say there's this Panda called Po, voiced to great comic effect by Jack Black, who sure knows how to deliver a line. And - just a little sideboard here - I happened to catch him again recently in Enemy of the State. That is, before he became the loudmouth charmer we've come to know and love. His Panda is far closer to that hi-tek-nerd tracking Will Smith and Gene Hackman, than his wildman persona. Here he's never OTT, yet doesn't let a comic nuance slip by, and his timing is terrific.
Now, we cannot leave aside the fact that this pudgy panda is the son of an Asian bigbird - stork? heron? - whose noodle house has been in the family for generations - so that's a father-son relationship on a par with those male-voice cows from the execrable Barnyard. At least there's a tiny moment when the filmmakers tease you that the dad's possibly going to spill the beans about that genetic anomaly ... but the rug's pulled from under and on we trundle with the tale.
It's derivative, of course, and only slightly develops the primary premise: Panda-teen works in Pa's noodle house, but is obsessed with Kung Fu superheros - The Furious Five, all trained to perfection by Shifu, a red panda. Do not dismiss Dustin Hoffman's vocal performance of this tiny terror, forever striving to attain his inner calm. Probably more than any of the others - and some are very fine indeed, within the limits of such a constrained script - Hoffman manages to invest every line with intelligence, subtlety, and a great deal of unforced humor.
Both he and Black are greatly aided by the visuals, for this is especially an exercise in superb and unexpected graphic art. The characters themselves move and behave within their CGI skins, but the look and feel of the piece evokes an ancient Chinese sensibility without becoming either pretentious or fawning. OK - maybe some interiors smell a tad too much of The Golden Dragon Chop Suey House around the corner, but there are some sumptuous landscapes and some truly impressive action sequences. There's even a throwaway touch at the beginning run-up to the Dreamworks logo - you'll know it when you see it.
The story, as you'd guess, concerns how Plumpy-Po overcomes his doubts to realize his dreams of joining the Kung Fu elite, and in doing so, how the other main characters learn life-lessons too. We won't dwell on those, not because many aren't valid ... they're just so dag-nabbed wholesome and predictable, they don't allow for nuance. I've heard all the arguments about kids not being able to understand moral complexity, and I just don't buy 'em. I think kids are naturally hungry to figure out the ways of the world. If you only feed them sugar, not only will they get a distorted view of the world, their teeth will fall out.
Much more important really is the normalization of a culture that, yet again, elevates violence to a universal solution. Considering the genesis of martial arts as an avoidance of conflict, it's a bit cheeky. Although Chinese martial arts may have begun some 5000 years ago as an effective matrix for self-defense, they evolved into a series of cultural, health and religious disciplines to achieve harmony and inner peace. The Five Animals branch - utilized in this film - is far richer than the focus on fighting.
But hey, what do I know? I'm only six ... okay sixty-six ... and those moral complexities are clearly beyond me.
Oh yeah -- the pre-film trailer for Wall-E got the biggest positive reactive from the kids in the cinema. I'm with them ... 6 or 66!!
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Edited by - BaftaBaby on 06/29/2008 21:04:16 |
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MisterBadIdea 
"PLZ GET MILK, KTHXBYE"
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Posted - 06/30/2008 : 04:35:04
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| It's all very pretty - extremely pretty, in fact. That's about all it has going for it. I've seen a lot of people give it heavy praise for not being a pop-culture reference-fest like the Shrek movies, but seriously, is that all there is? Most of the humor is that of a fat bumbling bumbler bumbling into things. The message is the same Believe in Yourself platitudes that we've heard a thousand times. Yeah, kids, believe in yourself and you too can become a kung fu panda. Isn't this the kind of stupidity that The Incredibles was railing against? |
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ChocolateLady 
"500 Chocolate Delights"
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Posted - 06/30/2008 : 06:57:45
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Sounds like once again, Pixar will triumph over Dreamworks.
(The only Pixar film I wasn't thrilled with so far was Cars, but at least it had some real moral dilemas portrayed, like what's really more important, family/people you love or getting ahead/winning.)
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Demisemicenturian
"Four ever European"
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Posted - 07/08/2008 : 19:40:41
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B.B. and Mr.B.I. are right about the platitudes and simpleminded moral, but it's still very enjoyable, for the reasons that B.B. has outlined. It's the perfect voice role for Jack Black, to the extent that I wonder whether it was created with him in mind. The warmth of the homage to 1970s kung fu programmes and films sweeps one along even if one is not interested in those oneself.
On skipping past Po's origins, I thought that was perfect. What would be the point of any more detail? The point doesn't need elaborating that Po being adopted however he was turns out better for him in the end than Ian McShane getting directly adopted by Dustin Hoffman.
The rest of the population being entirely ducks(?)/pigs/rabbits tickled me for some reason, as did the moment when Po mentions Mantis's action figure.
For a red panda, though, Hoffman is really not very red, and it doesn't make sense that he would address Po as Panda. Talking of biological inaccuracy, a giant panda is a strange choice of animal to be tempted by all kinds of different food, and I didn't liked when Tigress walked on two legs.
The flipside of the violence message is that individual combat can prevent mass killing/persecution. Regardless of whether that is true, it certainly cannot be said that the film promotes violence in the way that so many do. |
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turrell 
"Ohhhh Ohhhh Ohhhh Ohhhh "
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Posted - 07/09/2008 : 07:11:27
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quote:
Originally posted by Salopian
I didn't liked when Tigress walked on two legs.
If we are questioning the biological legitimacy of the film you probably need look no further than the fact that they talk and can perform kung fu - but thats just a nit. |
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Demisemicenturian
"Four ever European"
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Posted - 07/09/2008 : 12:54:50
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quote:
Originally posted by turrell
quote:
Originally posted by Salopian
I didn't liked when Tigress walked on two legs.
If we are questioning the biological legitimacy of the film you probably need look no further than the fact that they talk and can perform kung fu - but thats just a nit.
It's not that I want a zoological documentary. It's just that some anthropomorphism is much more grating than other cases. For this reason, I really appreciated the two-leggedness explanation in Ratatouille. Tigress just looks really awkward on her hind legs. |
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Ali
"Those aren't pillows."
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Posted - 07/09/2008 : 15:06:18
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If I had a vagina, I'd call it Tigress. Just sayin'.
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Demisemicenturian
"Four ever European"
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Posted - 07/09/2008 : 16:35:40
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Lovely.
Maybe someone else will let you call theirs that. Maybe not. |
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Kung Fu Panda
