The well-known story about an orphaned boy’s adventures with jungle animals in search of his true self - after being raised by wolves. It is, after all, unnatural to try to be what you are not and he must eventually accept his humanity despite his love (& ours) for the instinctual life of animals. This movie is the real thing when it comes to animation that computers cannot touch: Raw character animation power. The inability of computers to think also limits their ability to reproduce subtle movement and in depth characterization. The characters move here as if they had genuine weight to them; while their movements eloquently reveal emotions. The animation fits the personalities of the actors; bringing their characterizations to full life. This feature length cartoon comes from the days when true character animation was important to the Disney studios. Presently, we witness the doldrums, where famous names (who cannot necessarily invest their characters with life through their voices) and bland computer animation reign mostly supreme. Mowgli is a technical tour de force of observational animation while Baloo the Bear reveals his rich emotional life (& feeble intellect) through the way he moves. The songs are actually memorable - for a Disney musical - and do not hold up the plot; they are actually part and parcel of, and integral to, the story. The only false note is the dated Beatles’ reference – a necessary scene that should have been rethought to more closely fit the style of the rest of the movie. The barbershop quartet style of the four northern English vultures (one of whom sounds remarkably like George Harrison) should have been more profitably rendered as a Beach Boys’ take off as that is more the latter’s style. This is a very funny example of the very best of the many truly great family friendly animations that Walt Disney ever made.
Copyright © 2009 Frank TALKER. Permission granted to reproduce and distribute it in any format; provided that mention of the author’s Weblog (http://franktalker5.blogspot.com/) is included: E-mail notification requested. All other rights reserved.
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